New Honda Quality ?

525 Views 10 Replies 8 Participants Last post by AT-Dragon, 8 d ago

Fernandes

Discussion Starter · 10 d ago

I love the look and feel of the AT 1100 and am doing my pre purchase research. Ive owned a load of Hondas from 1977 up to 2005 knowing they were streets ahead of the competition for quality and not one of them had any issues. I bought my first Triumph in 2019 after looking at a lot of parked up examples to see how they were standing up to the British climate and was very surprised to see a lot that were almost pristine and no scruffy ones. Nearly 4 years down the line my very well looked after 800 XCA is absolutely mint and has not missed a beat.
I have been offered £10,300 for it against a 2023 AT by the Honda dealership. It 'only' cost £13,000 new. I have done the same 'due diligence' with older AT's 2016 to 2019 and they have been in superb condition. If Honda have not protected their reputation I will hang on to my Tiger.
More research to be done.

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Hood

· #2 · 10 d ago

When I was looking at the AT's prior to buying one I noticed that all the used tricolour ones I saw had flaking paint/rust on the white frames. All the other coloured ones with black frames looked fine, I was after a matte black one anyway so....
Mine seems to have stood up well to its first winter and my previous one likewise.

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paulbaker428

· #3 · 10 d ago

Hood said:
When I was looking at the AT's prior to buying one I noticed that all the used tricolour ones I saw had flaking paint/rust on the white frames. All the other coloured ones with black frames looked fine, I was after a matte black one anyway so....
Mine seems to have stood up well to its first winter and my previous one likewise.

Yeah, the white paint on my '20 ATAS clearly feels as though it wants to be elsewhere, but hey-ho. A leisurely perusal of the secondhand offerings at my local dealer includes immaculate low mileage examples, some of which have probably never seen a wet road. I'm not excusing the shoddy finish, but if you've got a bike that you love riding, in all weather, with minimal cleaning, the mass migration of the paintwork doesn't matter too much. If someone enjoys a 16 hour stint in the garage with an array of cleaning agents, sponges, rags, cotton wool, cotton buds and dental floss that's fine, if you prefer the round-the-world look that's fine too. We all have different priorities.

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AT-Dragon

· #4 · 10 d ago

I have a white 18AS yes it has a couple of small rust spots on the frame, no I personally don’t care (I can understand why some do). For me, it’s not a show bike, you gotta hunt around to find the spots, by the time those spots start to look really ugly who ever owns the bike will probably be restoring it as a classic and need to rebuild the engine anyway so at that time whoever they are can take care of those rust spot(s). By then I’ll be on my 5th Africa Twin. But this is just my personal opinion… All that being said, I do say that this should not of been an issue to begin with and it definitely points to poor quality paint job from Honda.

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Dado

· #5 · 10 d ago

Geez, is this going to be another 128.740 words novel like @CaptTwin

😫

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paulbaker428

· #6 · 10 d ago

Dado said:
Geez, is this going to be another 128.740 words novel like @CaptTwin 😫

Get the drinks and nibbles in, put the cat out and cover the budgie 😁

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Autonomity

· #7 · 9 d ago

Hood said:
When I was looking at the AT's prior to buying one I noticed that all the used tricolour ones I saw had flaking paint/rust on the white frames. All the other coloured ones with black frames looked fine, I was after a matte black one anyway so....
Mine seems to have stood up well to its first winter and my previous one likewise.

Mine had one spec of rust right behind the steering head, that said it got through winter and loads of salt riding rather unscathed. Stock exhaust can is worthless though, mine looked very ugly coming out of the winter.

Frame was fine, spokes were fine, rims were fine.

My main quality concern with the 1100's would be all the things relating to the TFT, electronics and switchgear/instrument clusters.

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Beowulf

· #8 · 8 d ago (Edited)

Quality is an interesting idea to apply to a motorcycle...

Having owned/own a couple of ATs, I would say the quality of some of the stuff for cosmetics and components is average to above average, depending upon the pool you compare it to.

They were designed to compete at a lower price point than BMW, Ducati, et al. Some of the corners cut show up in areas mentioned; rust, switches, electronics, etc. However, none of them have been deal breakers when compared to other marks at their respective price points.

The ATAS fuel tank issue was a disgrace for Honda, but eventually they came around to doing something about it. I was fortunate in that I did not get to experience that debacle.

I felt the lousy 2mm thick bracket that holds up the 28lb instrument pod was an example of low quality engineering when it broke. Such is life. I fixed it. It won't break again with a 10mm backstop.

Some of the "above average" bits that keep me interested are the power plant (see the thread on the guy in Germany with over 480,000 kms on one with no rebuild and mostly factory recommended maintenance) and the DCT transmission that so far, for two bikes, has operated flawlessly in a variety of modes.

My friends with BMWs love them; except when they are broken and needing service... no free lunch in today's market.

In a prior life (well, at least 40 years ago) I got to work on most marks of bikes. I dreaded working on Hondas, because of experiences with early CB750's, CB360's, CL350s and the whole host of 400-550 fours. Crappy castings, lousy fasteners, all the stuff that made work miserable. I feel like the overall Honda quality is higher than in the '70's, but so it is with most bikes.

Anyone work on Harleys from the '70's and 80's ?

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DoubleThumper

· #9 · 8 d ago

... any Harley's remaining on the road from pre-21st century?

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Dado

· #10 · 8 d ago

Autonomity said:
My main quality concern with the 1100's would be all the things relating to the TFT, electronics and switchgear/instrument clusters.

I remember having issues with "Hazzard and Reverse" push switches on my GW1800, the Reverse button left me stranded and had to disassemble the switch cluster in the parking lot. When I got home Google confirmed it's a well known issue on Wings.

As far as TFT let's hope most of the issues can be fixed via firmware or software.

Personally and as a precaution I park my TFT in the shade and/or cover it, to keep it shielded from the Sun intense heat, also to prevent the plastics from deformation.

Some bikes with older style LCD displays were getting damaged when exposed to intense heat in the sun.
Can sunlight damage LCD screen?
The LCD is intended to operate within a certain range of temperatures according to the manufacturer's instructions and outdoor use can lead to higher than normal temperatures. The display being exposed to excessive heat can cause the crystal to become isotropic and fail to perform properly.
...TFT is a variant of an LCD which uses thin film transistor technology to improve an image quality, while an LCD is class of displays that uses modulating properties of liquid crystals to form what we call an LCD (liquid crystals display) which in fact does not emits light directly.

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AT-Dragon

· #11 · 8 d ago

Bottom line….
It‘s gonna happen..
Pretty much with all vehicles and all manufacturers. As technology advances vehicle parts are outsourced more and more, making it harder and harder to control quality.

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