Complaint Review: Harley-Davidson

I've purchased three Harley-Davidson motorcycles in less than 2 years (San Diego and Victorville dealers); two new and one used. I'm not new to this brand. That said, my new 2017 Harley-Davidson CVO Street Glide is a total piece of junk, and Harley-Davidson refuses to accept my complaint, let alone do anything about it.

I purchased my Screaming Eagle (more like a squawking turkey) bike after two demo rides. I went to Henderson Harley-Davidson (wonderful people) for their factory truck test ride event, and visited San Diego Harley-Davidson (awesome dealer) and test rode a zero mile bike. Both test rides were similar; the CVO Street Glides I rode were smooth, responsive and powerful.

San Diego had the color I wanted. However, as I now live in Arizona, I purchased the bike and had it shipped. I never test rode the bike. If I had, I never would have purchased it. NEVER!

From the start, my new 2017 Milwaukee Eight engine bike has shifted harder than my 2008 Heritage Classic. The Heritage shifts hard into 1st gear, with a classic "thunk", but my CVO bike shifts hard in every gear, both up and down. It's so loud and pronounced, that it's embarrassing to ride. Wasn't this supposed to have been resolved with the new engine?

At 487 miles the bike over-heated and dumped its coolant when I stopped. Fortunately, as I was out in the middle of nowhere, I had a bottle of drinking water with me and refilled the system after it cooled. Another 50 miles down the road it did it again, shut itself down in traffic, and left me stranded on the side of the road and would not re-start. I towed it to the nearest dealer, Mother Road Harley in Kingman, AZ, where I was assured there was no issue. The tech drained, filled and pressurized the system per factory specs.

Then there's my CVO's power... or lack of it.

My 2017 CVO Street Glide has less power and acceleration that my 2015 Street Glide Special. It's not as if I'm abusing the machine, grabbing fist-fulls of throttle. After riding on two wheels for 49 years, I've been through more than one break in. This thing is a freaking dog. A pig. No roll-on power. It has no business having an HD badge on it. Yet, at the 1,000 mile service I was told the bike is operating perfectly normal.

No it's not! If this is normal then I've been transported back in time and this thing was built by AMF.

Then there's the top end noise.

In HD's marketing materials - and the sales pitch - I was led to believe that the new M8 power plant eliminates most of the powertrain noise common in previous models.

Not in this bike!

This CVO bike is so much louder than my 2015 Street Glide that I can't enjoy the stereo. I'm not exagerating. It's not just a tic, tic, tic... it's a CLATTER. And the warmer it gets outside the louder it is. Did I mention that I live in Arizon where it gets hot? I ABSOLUTELY HATE THIS BIKE. It offers zero enjoyment. It was $40k up in smoke as far as I'm concerned.

After expressing my concerns with the service department at Mother Road Harley-Davidson, and being told my bike is running "normal", I called Harley-Davidson customer service. I spoke with Debbie, who opened case number 3100950 for me and basically told me that if the dealer says the bike has no problem, then the bike has no problem.

What is a customer supposed to do when he's told by both a dealer and the factory that there's no problem? Sure, the bike runs and takes me down the road. Does that mean it's as expected, that it performs, that it lives up to what was sold?

NFW!

Harley-Davidson Custom Vehicle Operations, if this is what you guy are building, you should be ashamed of yourselves.

Harley-Davidson Customer Service, if you can't accept a complaint and escalate it to management so a repeat customer can have a satisfactory experience, you have no business representing the brand. Oh, by the way, you guys never called to ask me about my purchase experience. I'll give it here... San Diego HD gets all 10's. Debbie Downer at HD CS, you get an F- for your refusal to escalate my issue as I requested.

Summary:

Harley-Davidson, you have a build quality issue in the M8 line. There's no reason that a customer should be stranded on the side of the road and experience such a huge difference in smoothness, responsiveness, mechanical noise and power from one bike to the next. Further, if your customer service department is completely unwilling to offer service, how can you justify $40k for a bike?

HD, rest assured, if I don't get my issues resolved I'm going to echo my experience in as many online forums as I can. FIX THIS PROBLEM! I've lost my patience.