I've told this story before, but I might as well tell it again here.
When my Dad was young, he owned a 1949 HD Hydra-Glide. Before that, he had an Indian Chief, and a Matchless. He got the HD from a friend of his that used to race midget cars, and this friend had souped it up a bit. Of all these bikes, the HD was my Dad's favorite.
For whatever reason, he sold that bike. I don't know how long he owned it - maybe a year or two. But he regretted selling that bike, and to this day kind of wishes he still had it.
As long as I can remember, he was talking 'HD this, HD that, if you ever rode a HD you'd never ride anything else....' He owned some Hondas when I was a teen; two Shadows, and a Rebel, but he still talked like HD was the best. And yes, he often bragged about the HD with a smug look on his face.
Well, as he's getting up there in age, he got himself another HD. A 1996 Heritage Softtail. The bike had only 2,000 miles on it when he got it (not sure why the PO didn't ride it more...). So my Dad was happy once again. But before my Dad could even put 500 miles on it, the check engine light came on, and he took it to the HD dealer to have them check it out...
To this day I don't know what exactly was wrong with it, but they had convinced my Dad (not hard to do...) that the engine needed to be replaced. And they couldn't do it at the dealer. So they shipped it back to HD and $3,000 later my Dad had his HD back.
The engine needed to be replaced with less than 2,500 miles on it.
My Dad is kind of a simple guy, and he never really understood why the engine needed to be replaced. They explained it to him, but like I said, he's kind of a simple guy, and he didn't understand what they were saying, and he couldn't remember enough to try to explain it to me. Plus, I imagine he felt the clock was ticking away his life as he is getting older, so he just let them do what they told him. It frustrates me, because maybe I could have fixed it...
The HD dealer then put him on a maintenance schedule. After putting the extra $3,000 into it, and confused why the engine went out with only 2,500 miles on it, he was scared to not follow through with their maintenance schedule (for fear he might void a warranty or something...). So he took it in for an oil change that cost $250 (no #$%* - he showed me the bill!). I think he had them do it twice now, and he is not very happy with the cost of things. Come to think about it... he doesn't ride that bike very much anymore. So little, in fact, that the battery went dead and needed to be replaced (at least he had my cousin do that instead of the stealership, er, I mean dealership...).
So with the $3,000 in the engine, plus the $9,000 he paid for it, he has $12,000 invested in it (plus the ridiculous oil change fees). That's a lot of money...
But that's not the worst part of it. Like I said, for as long as I can remember, he's had that twinkle in his eyes for HD. But not any more. After this fiasco, one time when I was leaving his house (on my scooter, of all things...), he had a sad look on his face and he said, "I'm not so sure about Harleys anymore...." That twinkle is gone, and it's like he just found out he was living a lie. It's very sad. All these years. It really saddens me, and I feel bad for him.
By the way, wouldn't you think that HD would stand behind their product that (if you could see the bike, you'd agree) had been well taken care of, and had less than 2,500 miles on it?! Nope! 'Tough #$%* old man! #$%* you! We don't care! We're not even going to give you a stupid HD T-shirt!'
