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How many vipers with starters going bad?

My '15 Viper runs so bad, it fouls plugs with barely a warning and leaves me stranded in the woods because of it. It has erratic idle & starting and obviously a bad enough tune to kill plugs. As it sits, it is completely unreliable. I can't wait for the day it takes out the starter. It sat for a month at a dealer last winter, in the middle of the season, trying to get this "tune" resolved. The dealer got nowhere with Yamaha except "there's a re-flash coming". So it is obvious- Yamaha realizes there's still an issue.

This coming season will be 4 model years for the Viper. If Yamaha were going to do something about it; I believe it would have been done by now. Seriously, 4 years? In my book they're a bunch of liars and can stick that in their PRIDE pipe and smoke it.

Agreed; "$hit show" pretty much sums it up. But I'll add this; if I have to spend $500 of my hard earned cash, to fix a factory "engine-running" issue; it will be the last unit I'll purchase from that factory.

I realize this site is based on positive input to help other Yamaha owners, but; there is plainly nothing positive about this subject-
Yes I agree with RTX. My dealer had one that was a real problem child. Similar symptoms to yours. They even replaced whole throttlebody assy. And everything else. What it turned out to be was the tone ring that triggers the crank position sensor had spun a little bit. It's not on the flywheel on these motors. It's Seperate wheel on these.
 

Was there any 2016 that had a starter problems or starting? I have not heard of any. so was the problem fixed for 2016?
 
The story goes on.

I went to the Yamaha dealer to pick up my parts this morning. What I found was an old style looking idler gear without the mold ring in a bag with the new part number on it. I had my old gear with me to compare. The shape and color was the same. I explained the shape of the updated gear. Of course they know nothing about it and cannot call Yamaha until Monday. I suggested that would be a waste of time but go for it. I refused to take the gear because they cannot prove to me that it is better than the one I have. The mechanic told me he has changed a few and just puts a new gear in the engine and is oblivious to the problem.

So what do I do next ?
Wait for them to tell me the new gear is good and I should pay $87 for it ?
Put my old gear back in and forget about it ?
Pay for all the damage out of my pocket when the gear breaks and wrecks the starter shaft ?
Did Yamaha do a real QC check on the old gears and re-label them ?
Did Yamaha send all old stock to Canada in re-labeled bags ?
Should I try to buy a new gear from a dealer in the US and have it sent to Canada ? How would I know I would get a new gear ?

I thought I would be smart and just change the gear myself to an updated part, avoid the damage, pay for it myself, and shut up about it. It appears my best efforts were once again thwarted by corporate bafoonery. I guess I am an even more happy customer now.

BP
 
It could be that the little mold ring/step on the new gear I took a pic of is just a imperfection thats not cleaned up by machining. As for color we were comparing a new gear to a used gear. Hard to say if color is different. So yes no identifiable way to say a new part no. gear is any better than a old one. Thats why its so important for Yamaha to say what the difference is even if its not physical as in appearance,hardness or material. If they just said the inspection and documentation process was improved it would be good enough for me to change the gear. I am sure there will never be a 100% failure free starting system in the old motors at least but everything possible should be done.
 
The story goes on.

I went to the Yamaha dealer to pick up my parts this morning. What I found was an old style looking idler gear without the mold ring in a bag with the new part number on it. I had my old gear with me to compare. The shape and color was the same. I explained the shape of the updated gear. Of course they know nothing about it and cannot call Yamaha until Monday. I suggested that would be a waste of time but go for it. I refused to take the gear because they cannot prove to me that it is better than the one I have. The mechanic told me he has changed a few and just puts a new gear in the engine and is oblivious to the problem.

So what do I do next ?
Wait for them to tell me the new gear is good and I should pay $87 for it ?
Put my old gear back in and forget about it ?
Pay for all the damage out of my pocket when the gear breaks and wrecks the starter shaft ?
Did Yamaha do a real QC check on the old gears and re-label them ?
Did Yamaha send all old stock to Canada in re-labeled bags ?
Should I try to buy a new gear from a dealer in the US and have it sent to Canada ? How would I know I would get a new gear ?

I thought I would be smart and just change the gear myself to an updated part, avoid the damage, pay for it myself, and shut up about it. It appears my best efforts were once again thwarted by corporate bafoonery. I guess I am an even more happy customer now.

BP

I would contact a yamaha parts vendor on here and speak with them about your concern.
Im sure someone like port yamaha can get you the part you want. Port is a little more aware/sharper then most from what i have seen.
Tell your dealer to ship it back and you pay shipping.
Lesson learned.
 
When I have enough go wrong with a specific brand, I change brands. As I have posted before my 2014 Viper now on 3rd chewed up starter will go into service repair this fall. Although I'm hoping they have a solution by then I know they don't. For over a year now I heard a fix was coming and it never has. Just this last weekend I fire up my 2015 Viper and when I hit the kill switch to shut off, the engine stays running. I can toggle back and forth, nothing happens. So it's bad enough to have my 14 going in for the 4th starter repair and now my 15 with only 1200 miles heading for service. Yamaha's product quality has declined so badly, I will ride out the 5 year warranty, which thankfully I bought and then dump them for a different brand. Enough is enough.
 
I realize this is an old thread.

The starter locked up on my 15 LTX this past weekend. It was originally sold in late 2015. I bought it from the previous owner last November (2018) with 46 miles on it. It now has 1219 miles and the starter locked up after 3 minor kickbacks on a semi-cold start. It had never given me any issues or kickback before.

I read that a number were replaced out of warranty. Is there any point for me to contact a dealer to try to get Yamaha to cover anything or is it way too late at this point? Warranty ran out late 2016.
 
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Yes try. Sucks to keep hearing of this!

I talked to me local dealer today. Their warranty guy called Yamaha and explained the situation. He called me back and told me, surprisingly, that Yamaha will cover the parts for the repair but not the labor since it is over 2 years out of warranty. It sounds like what helped is that my 15 LTX had not had any ECU flash updates yet. If it had received the 2016 update that was supposed to correct the starter kickback, they would not cover anything.

Anyway, I do not know how extensive the damage is yet. If it is just the starter, I would be ahead by about $150 if I bought one and installed it myself vs. paying the dealer their 3.9 hours of labor for a starter replacement at $98/hr. If it is more extensive and needing parts such as a stator, flywheel, idler gear, and one-way bearing, I will be way ahead by letting them do it. They list 3.6 hours to replace the flywheel so the replacement of all of the above parts wouldn't be much more. My total cost for a starter, idler gear, one-way assembly, flywheel, and stator is just under $1100. Even though I will be gambling a bit on the overall cost, I think I am just going to bring it to them although it makes me nervous. Not because they don't do good work. More because I currently 5 Kawasaki quads and 3 Yamaha snowmobiles and ALL of the work has been done by me in the past (including full engine builds on the quads).
 
I talked to me local dealer today. Their warranty guy called Yamaha and explained the situation. He called me back and told me, surprisingly, that Yamaha will cover the parts for the repair but not the labor since it is over 2 years out of warranty. It sounds like what helped is that my 15 LTX had not had any ECU flash updates yet. If it had received the 2016 update that was supposed to correct the starter kickback, they would not cover anything.

Anyway, I do not know how extensive the damage is yet. If it is just the starter, I would be ahead by about $150 if I bought one and installed it myself vs. paying the dealer their 3.9 hours of labor for a starter replacement at $98/hr. If it is more extensive and needing parts such as a stator, flywheel, idler gear, and one-way bearing, I will be way ahead by letting them do it. They list 3.6 hours to replace the flywheel so the replacement of all of the above parts wouldn't be much more. My total cost for a starter, idler gear, one-way assembly, flywheel, and stator is just under $1100. Even though I will be gambling a bit on the overall cost, I think I am just going to bring it to them although it makes me nervous. Not because they don't do good work. More because I currently 5 Kawasaki quads and 3 Yamaha snowmobiles and ALL of the work has been done by me in the past (including full engine builds on the quads).
So get the Warranteed parts and do it yourself. Lots of help here and if not removing the pan its easy job compared to a engine rebuild on a quad.
 
So get the Warranteed parts and do it yourself. Lots of help here and if not removing the pan its easy job compared to a engine rebuild on a quad.

Yamaha will only cover the parts IF the dealer does the labor.
 
Yamaha will only cover the parts IF the dealer does the labor.
So find a dealer that will let you do the labor. Also I have never seen Yamaha cover anything without paying for labor. Something is fishy there. Any other dealers ever hear of this?
 
At this point, I think what they are offering is a "good will" thing since the warranty ran out on my sled around December 2016. They could have easily just said "Sorry, nothing we can do".
 


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