16 ms·
FTC action against Harley-Davidson and Westinghouse for limiting right to repair
- fragmede 4y agoFascinating. I wonder why those two companies got singled out from all the rest of them.
- pilgrimfff 4y agoInsufficient political campaign contributions, probably.
- sul_tasto 4y agoThat’s what I was thinking, or contributions to the party not currently in power…
- parineum 4y agoI imagine it's because they view those as most winnable. Probably a combination of egregiousness and strength of defense (money). I have to hope that winning this case sets precedent for future cases against larger entities.
- rasz 4y agoApple turn was in 2018 https://www.ftc.gov/business-guidance/blog/2018/04/ftc-staff-sends-warranty-warnings https://www.ftc.gov/business-guidance/blog/2018/04/ftc-staff... not that anyone enforced it after the warning - apple still refuses warranty after you replace screen or battery with third party.
- 0des 4y agoTo be a fly on the wall at John Deere right now..
- trash3 4y agoLaughing and clinking drinks. Look at their stock past five years. They're a monopoly.
- VBprogrammer 4y agoIn which way are they a monopoly? Is that US specific? In the UK/EU there are at least half a dozen different tractor brands which I could name, all of them with significant market share.
- 0des 4y agoJohn Deere limits your options with regard to repair. It's not so much a monopoly as it is anticompetitive
- nomel 4y agoI don't think a brand being fashionable, to a middle aged demographic, makes them a monopoly. They're just popular. There are plenty of other similar bikes that can be bought. edit: I'm an idiot. I read the comment as being about Harley Davidson.
- WheatM 4y ago
- toomuchtodo 4y agoTesla next please.
- nxm 4y agoAnd Apple
- mynameisvlad 4y agoIn case you didn't know you can now get free access to all the service manuals via https://service.tesla.com https://service.tesla.com. I'm guessing it was a recent development to try and stave off such a suit.
- KennyBlanken 4y agoNo, it's because Massachusetts and other state right-to-repair laws. However, instead, Tesla just won't sell you parts. Either "hard" ("sorry, we show that VIN number as no longer road worthy") or soft ("that part is back ordered")
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- travisporter 4y agoFriend has a 2020 model y with a clear balance issue. I suggested firestone or a local tire shop but he's so scared tesla will void his warranty he's waiting on them to service it. I don't disagree - they probably are tracking exactly where that vehicle is.
- _ea1k 4y agoThat's silly. Our mobile service tech happily recommended a local shop when I asked who he uses. Some of the Tesla service departments will encourage you to use local tire shops for routine tire work, too, as it reduces the load on them. A bigger issue is that some shops don't like to deal with the risks of lifting a car with a battery. Poor lift procedures can cost them a lot of money, and some avoid the liability. Most have reported success with Discount Tire, Costco, and other normal shops, though.
- nazgulsenpai 4y ago> "Taking your product to be serviced by a repair shop that is not affiliated with or an authorized dealer of [Company] will not void this warranty. Also, using third-party parts will not void this warranty." I do not own or plan to ever own a Harley Davidson or Westinghouse product. I understand and 100% agree with the right to repair parts. The second part, however, I have a few concerns. So, if I buy a cheap replica part from eBay and put it into my Harley Davidson, it causes other problems with the engine and then I make a warranty claim, they have to honor it?
- post_break 4y ago"According to the Magnuson-Moss Act, a vehicle manufacturer cannot automatically cancel your warranty just because you’ve installed aftermarket car parts. This is an illegal practice. That said, if your aftermarket part somehow causes or contributes to a failure in your vehicle, the dealer may be able to deny your warranty claim—as long as they can prove the connection. In these cases, the burden of proof is entirely on the dealership." If your cheap replica part causes issues to the thing you're trying to warranty then yes. If you replace the headlights with crappy clones from ebay, and Chevy says your warranty is void on your transmission, no.
- nazgulsenpai 4y agoThat makes sense. Thanks for clarifying.
- infogulch 4y agoTotally valid question that prompted a great answer. Thank you! For some context, the Magnuson-Moss Warranty Act [1] mentioned above was made a law in 1975. This action by the FTC is basically calling HD and WH out on their noncompliance with this law, and more generally announcing their intention to enforce it more boadly. It's unfortunate that the FTC has allowed this lawbreaking behavior run rampant for decades, but I'm glad that they've gotten off their laurels and are finally moving on it now. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magnuson%E2%80%93Moss_Warranty_Act https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magnuson%E2%80%93Moss_Warranty...
- KennyBlanken 4y agoI bought a car from a guy who was a H-D dealer but privately, rode everything but H-D and said the bikes were shit. Their V-twin design is not only a shit engine - but it generates so much vibration that it literally shakes itself and everything on the bike to death, causing stuff to fatigue/wear/rattle loose, wiring to fray, you name it. H-D dealerships are cash cows between that and insane accessory and clothing sales. They're basically Boomer cosplay stores.
- rootsudo 4y agonot really, high barrier of entry and one source of branded material/license means it's totally dependent on HD, which, very soon will go dealer hostile.
- eweise 4y agoI had a sportster with the engine solidly mounted to the fame. Drove it over 10,000 miles one summer. It was totally fine. Nothing broke or rattled loose.
- nicbou 4y agoThat’s not a lot of distance. Japanese bikes will reach 60k with basic maintenance and nobody will bat an eye.
- _carbyau_ 4y agoAnecdotally, I got my 2006 GSXR1000 to 130 000km(80 000 miles). I only sold it because I was moving into a bigger city. Having to trawl around in 1st using the clutch most of the time was not appealing. I ride commuter most days and used to do on weekends. I like the 2nd hand market having so many low mileage bikes. While I am not about to make disparaging remarks on Harleys reliability, I won't buy one because I like my bikes to perform. Also, amongst my friends the "Boomer cosplay stores" comment rings true. Nothing inherently wrong with that I guess but not my crowd. I mean, people buy italian supercars to pose down slow streets with too. Your money, do what you want.
- 4y ago
- squarefoot 4y agoLong gone are the days when "custom motorcycle", a term generally associated with HD and similar styles, would imply "I can repair this by myself, heck, even modify it with spare parts taken from a demolished truck".
- tengwar2 4y agoRepairing modern motorcycles isn't difficult. Even working on state of the art throttle-by-wire engines isn't difficult, other than it taking a bit more time to get all the fairings off. This is about what effect repairs will have on the warranty - and if you're building a custom, you're usually going to start with a bike that's out of warranty anyway. The only overlap is getting hold of the manuals. Bike manufacturers have started to put them online only, like car manufacturers, and charge for access. That's a pain in the neck.
- citilife 4y agoWhen are we going to discuss tractors (speaking to the FTC)? The fact I can't even change some settings such as the gear shifting speed without a technician is insane.
- caboteria 4y agoWell, the article mentions Harley-Davidson, which some claim makes 2-wheeled tractors.
- joshspankit 4y agoJohn Deere is a consistent (imposing) presence in almost all discussions of right to repair simply because they understand the power we people have: Once right to repair is established in law and public opinion, nothing they can do will stop farmers from being able to work on their own tractors.
- mulmen 4y agoI paid for books (and beer) in college with a summer farm job. I did equipment maintenance and drove trucks. We ran John Deere 6602 combines from the mid 1970s. This was in the late 2000s. They were an absolute dream to work on. Everything was straightforward and consistent. The assembly was well thought out to enable in the field repairs. In my mind at the time John Deere was a brand that understood the needs of farmers. I can't reconcile their current position on right to repair with my experience. Something clearly changed between the 1970s and today.
- kevin_thibedeau 4y ago> Something clearly changed between the 1970s and today. MBAs took over American companies. They're the ones who cook up these exploitative ideas so that no money is ever left on the table.
- lotsofpulp 4y ago401k owners, IRA owners, and taxpayers via defined benefit pension funds want to pay for the management that maximizes returns.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- samaman 4y agoAnd not tesla, seriously?
- _ea1k 4y agoDoes Tesla void the warranty if parts are replaced with third party ones and those third party parts are unrelated to the failure?
- yakz 4y agoTesla has other levers they can pull if they have a bone to pick. Supercharger network access can be revoked.
- _ea1k 4y agoI've only seen that happen with salvage vehicles, but I agree that its a problem. Especially since they seem to restrict all DCFC (chademo, ccs adapter, etc) along with it.
- KennyBlanken 4y agoNo, they demand your VIN number before they'll sell you parts, and god help you if they've decided your chassis is no longer fit for the road. They will also refuse to service the car or do bodywork on it (and they are the only place you can get bodywork for a Tesla done, I believe, as Tesla refuses to make bodyparts available), stop providing over the air updates (a violation of federal law, I believe), disable supercharger network access (and in the US, that means no fast charging whatsoever, as Tesla only sells a CCS 1 adapter in South Korea, and US cars lack the software to talk to a CCS charger), and turn off features that the owner had "purchased." Richrepairs has found that they are quite arbitrary about when they declare a vehicle "totaled", and there's no recourse (except via civil court, I guess?) To head the inevitable responses off at the pass, such as "well it's got that incredibly dangerous high voltage stuff, they have a duty to make sure it doesn't start a fire or kill someone": * no other automaker requires VIN numbers for authorization purposes. You can walk into any car dealership and ask for a part number, and get it. * no other automaker makes it their business to declare their vehicles road-worthy or not. No car manufacturer bothers to maintain such records except maybe for recall notification purposes, or tracking historical vehicles (such as non-road-legal, factory-built race cars for which there will eventually be heritage) * no other automaker makes parts sales contingent on whether the vehicle is road-worthy or not. Or even if such a vehicle exists. GM, Ford, Dodge, and numerous other automakers will in fact sell you "crate" engines for whatever purpose you want. Again, no questions asked. ...all that, for vehicles that use a carcinogenic, poisonous, highly flammable fuel called "gasoline" which readily generates highly flammable, heavier-than-air vapors. Or, for that matter, for their electric vehicles. A number of which use twice the voltage Teslas do.
- blobbers 4y agoRight to repair feels like it's a battle of who owns a product after it is bought. Everyone wanting to operate their business in the way SaaS or subscription service is really annoying. Photoshop gets jealous of saas numbers so they put out the creative cloud. Printer companies authenticate their ink cartridges. Coffee makers only accept their own branded cartridges. Right to repair, right to modify, it all comes down to ownership.
- BoorishBears 4y agoAuthenticating cartridges is so 2008 Leasing ink on a per page basis is in now: https://www.hp.com/us-en/shop/cv/instantink https://www.hp.com/us-en/shop/cv/instantink
- weq 4y agobananas!!!
- blobbers 4y agoThe ink disappears if you don’t pay your subscription fee. It’s amazing libraries have managed to stay true to their goal and not charge membership fees. Should authors be getting residuals on every read of their book in the same way every Netflix play of a movie pays an actor???
- petre 4y agoThe movie industry would cease to be an industry otherwise. It would become all indie movies, Cannes and the like and maybe some state sponsored propaganda. So no Spiderman or X-men for you, just movies about real life, Sweedish movies about the super rich getting marooned on an island after a storm and ending up at the mercy of the housekeeper.
- lelanthran 4y ago> Sweedish movies about the super rich getting marooned on an island after a storm and ending up at the mercy of the housekeeper. TBH, I'd see that.
- nimbius 4y agoformer harley owner here. Ive had 4 and honestly this sounds like the punchline to a bad joke. Every harley ive owned, every single one, has required at least a cursory knowledge of how to fix issues as they arise. youll need to learn to replace pegs, grips, and bars as the chrome and fitment of all these components on the sportster is just trash. youll need to learn how the oiler works on the dyna because well, it doesnt and youre going to be installing some aftermarket parts to get it to where it needs to be. youll learn the springs in the clutch plates are trash, plastic drive shoes that require frequent service, and youll need to be pretty good at replacing not one, but three separate types of oil (not just the sump tank.) to "limit" my right to repair also implies Motor Company is in any capacity interested in honoring the warranty, which they are not. it implies a shop that doesnt have a 3 week lead time after COVID, it implies a competent shop that wont send you back with more problems than you came in with, and above all else it implies a shop that isnt going to nickle and dime you for repairs under warranty to a $30k bike that you had to pay to tow into the garage from some armpit like blythe or tuskaloosa. I cant stress this enough: the aftermarket is and has been the only thing that kept my harley harem running from 2001 to 2015 before i switched to Yamaha. there are dozens of small mom and pop machine shops like low brow customs and loser machine shop that have parts for your harley that are not only available, but miles better than anything motor company can think to put out.
- knob 4y agoSorry but... facts: what do you mean by "how the oiler works"? What oiler? Did you buy a 1950s Harley? The three oils? Yes, that's a Harley. That's what they have: three oil pans, all separate. If you do not want that, do not buy a Harley. If another system / design is better engineering doesn't come to the table. Harley-Davidson is upfront in: three oils. If you want a Harley, you get three oils (unleas you get a Vrod, or a Sportster, or one of the new Pan America or Sportsters with the new Revolution Max motor).
- j_m_b 4y agoGetting to the point as a company where you're fighting right-to-repair seems like you're a company on your last gasps. It means you can't sell enough product at a profitable margin to keep yourself going through sales alone. In fact, there isn't even enough product out there so that your dealership/repairmen can have enough business to not worry about independent repair shops. HD is a prime example of one of these brands. HD has been running brand loyalty fumes for decades.
- bluGill 4y agoWoah, in the law details matter. You can be in favor if the idea of right to repair and oppose all proposed laws because the details are bad.