Mah mistress is back! (Aprilia out of the shop) (And now back in)

[morthrane]

I skimmed the long breakdown post until I saw the part about a CAN wire.

With a background in industrial process control equipment, I can say with no uncertainty, FUCK THOSE THINGS.

And not in any sort of pleasurable way.

Not a big fan of CAN/Modbus/DeviceNet, especially not on a motor vehicle. :|

I thought CAN was a bit neat, but to my horror, I discovered it was basically CDMA-- ethernet. Shit's bad enough over time when you've got a nice climate controlled room and no heat or vibration sources.

Really blows from a diagnostic standpoint, as you end up with a bunch of black boxes you can't test for sheit and a layer of hardware abstraction that means "another subsystem that can fail"... on top of the usual electrical failure modes.

 

[flying_hun]

I loved my Fiat, a 74 128 sedan. It was cheap to buy and run, and it always got me where I was going - just not always when I'd planned to get there. Lots of little shit going wrong all the time.

TAKS, you're absolutely correct, Fiats were wonderful cars, perfectly executed, at the leading edge of quality and customer satisfaction. All of which explains why they had no resale value, were frequently on the side of the road, and couldn't sustain in the American market. Yep, all the fault of the owners, owners who didn't have similar problems with other makes of cars - at least once Lancias and Renaults were no longer available.

Prillers are models of design and manufacturing excellence by comparison. I suspect Dave's was built on the last Friday in July just before the whole factory departed to the seaside for a month. arty

 

[weak_link]

TAKS, you're absolutely correct, Fiats were wonderful cars, perfectly executed, at the leading edge of quality and customer satisfaction. All of which explains why they had no resale value, were frequently on the side of the road, and couldn't sustain in the American market. Yep, all the fault of the owners, owners who didn't have similar problems with other makes of cars - at least once Lancias and Renaults were no longer available.

Everyone I knew that had one had nothing but problems. Some even looked super cool, amazingly huge pieces of shit though.

 

[mototireguy]

Don't some of the big Harley rider meets still do the traditional Honda motorcycle drop from a crane for giggles?

We could try to substitute an Aprilia drop.

 

[Climber]

If it was a Honda, I'd suspect the voltage regulator....

 

[fawndog]

I had a non computerized Italian in the shop for a year.
Fixed it and sold WHILE RUNNING ! Ask around as I told any barfer "you don't want this bike" it was replaced with a Japanese bike asap

 

[Chill]

Don't some of the big Harley rider meets still do the traditional Honda motorcycle drop from a crane for giggles?

We could try to substitute an Aprilia drop.

(gasp) Shut your mouth! The horror...


This thread is a heartbreaking read. To read how bad it has gone for Valgar and the Dorso, I too would want to kick the Dorso to the curb. My Aprilia experience has been a cakewalk by comparison. The previous owners of my bike sorted out all the electrical bugs. Quirky? Yes. There is still an occasional short that resets the gauges to metric and resets the max RPM.

Italians, lol.

 

[firstbuell]

sez Valgar, [edited]".....The mechanics working on this bike know what they are doing, and I know how to take care of it. This bike is a mess of factory fuckups. This is not the fault of the dealer, or the owner, this is the fault of the factory, each and every issue is due to a fuck up with aprilia, not with the dealer or myself......"


so are we talking about Aprilia, or Buells?

no kidding, your overall problem description mimics the older, tuber 1200s pretty closely

I often tell car guys who're intrigued by my bike that it's the 1990s equivalent of a '70s DeTomaso Pantera -
exotic, loud, & not quite 'done' when shipped from their Italian factory


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hey Nemo,

great pic, Vigo & the CBX are each memorable - what's the film?

 

[Brown81]

I loved my Fiat, a 74 128 sedan. It was cheap to buy and run, and it always got me where I was going - just not always when I'd planned to get there. Lots of little shit going wrong all the time.

TAKS, you're absolutely correct, Fiats were wonderful cars, perfectly executed, at the leading edge of quality and customer satisfaction. All of which explains why they had no resale value, were frequently on the side of the road, and couldn't sustain in the American market. Yep, all the fault of the owners, owners who didn't have similar problems with other makes of cars - at least once Lancias and Renaults were no longer available.

Huns pwns people with almost inhuman tact.


I had a '68 MGB. It was almost as unreliable as my step moms Fiat. Almost.

I swear I pushed that f*cking car further then I drove it.

 

[theAmazingKickstand]

TAKS, you're absolutely correct, Fiats were wonderful cars, perfectly executed, at the leading edge of quality and customer satisfaction. All of which explains why they had no resale value, were frequently on the side of the road, and couldn't sustain in the American market. Yep, all the fault of the owners, owners who didn't have similar problems with other makes of cars - at least once Lancias and Renaults were no longer available.

Yea US buyers are famous for insisting on purchasing quality cars. A great metric to judge if a company succeeds or fails here is to look over their quality control and longevity of cars produced.

Taking into account that her engine was tuned to perform, used, had completely disintegrated piston rings and/or valve guides causing a big enough compression leak to shoot oil up, had stripped plug threads large enough to ooze bubbling oil yet still hold the plug in place, had spark weak enough to not burn up the oil yet to still make the car with beyond bad psi run on a regular basis, with only a slight "tuning" of carbs, that would de-tune after running well for 15 miles....I'd say the Fiat 124 was an engineering marvel. We're pretty much placing it into the most reliable and die hard automotive vehicle in the history of time category now.
My apologies for mysoginizing anyone. It's been 10 years so I forget how common and normal it is for a HS girl to be driving and repairing an old POS on regular basis.

 

[Mr.P]

If fiats are so great come buy the pos in the back of the shop.

Fix it again tony.

Talk about the dumbest fing window regulators on earth....a cable...and 8 pulleys with a clip and tensioner....When I bought the regulator the fiat guy did not say much but as I left chuckled and said "good luck with that"


Thought would rather have the fiat than the aprillia at this point.

That is why I love supermoto's well most of them anyways, dead simple and reliable!

 

[clutchslip]

Huns pwns people with almost inhuman tact. .

Oh, re-al-ly? Of course I would never own a 128. But, that's another issue.
Repost, since you might have missed this:

The only problem I ever had with a '74 [124 spyder] was a rear-axle that I replaced with $150, and it getting stolen, twice.
I tracked that car, some. It had the following: Webers, headers, cams, ignition, Konis, cut coil-overs, custom sway bars, and other goodies. Never had an engine problem. Quick little sucker. I liked that car.

But, hey, I tend to bypass the general trends, for better (in this case) or for worse (in most cases).

 

[flying_hun]

Oh, re-al-ly? Of course I would never own a 128. But, that's another issue.

Can't say that I disagree with your take on the 128, but here's the story. I was a poor student at the UW, and I didn't want to go through a Seattle winter again with only a motorcycle. I thought, "What car can I get cheap? Ooh, most people who have Fiats can't wait to get rid of them!" And I wanted FWD for snow. There you have it. That little shitbox would do wicked handbrake turns!

 

[littlebeast]

Can't say that I disagree with your take on the 128, but here's the story. I was a poor student at the UW, and I didn't want to go through a Seattle winter again with only a motorcycle. I thought, "What car can I get cheap? Ooh, most people who have Fiats can't wait to get rid of them!" And I wanted FWD for snow. There you have it. That little shitbox would do wicked handbrake turns!

lol - that turn, while funner than fun, was probably damned near all that could be relied on before something broke.

 

[flying_hun]

lol - that turn, while funner than fun, was probably damned near all that could be relied on before something broke.

True, but even then one was taking the risk that the cable going to the rear brakes would let go!

 

[Kestrel]

Talk about the dumbest fing window regulators on earth....a cable...and 8 pulleys with a clip and tensioner....When I bought the regulator the fiat guy did not say much but as I left chuckled and said "good luck with that"

I don't know, bud. VW might take the cake with that one. Replaced a regulator in my buddy's Jetta, and it honestly made me want to set fire to that car. I cannot believe people still buy those pieces of shit.

 

[Climber]

 

[Brown81]

Oh, re-al-ly? Of course I would never own a 128.
Repost, since you might have missed this:

No, I didn't miss that at all!

 

[Xenophonii]

We had a guy in the SCA that would ride to meets with his Loricum Segmentata on...

TAKS, you're absolutely correct, Fiats were wonderful cars, perfectly executed, at the leading edge of quality and customer satisfaction. All of which explains why they had no resale value, were frequently on the side of the road, and couldn't sustain in the American market. Yep, all the fault of the owners, owners who didn't have similar problems with other makes of cars - at least once Lancias and Renaults were no longer available.
arty

 

[nine_inch_rear]

Honestly, if your blowing fuses like that, theres a dead short. That shouldnt be THAT hard to find. Time to start opening up the harness and see wtf is going on. Tell your Ape techs to take out the fuse thats blowing and put a 12v test light in place of it. If the light is on, you have a short. Start twisting and tugging on the harnesses. Disconnect items one at a time as you go. When the light goes out, you just found your short. Sorry you have to deal with this problem, plain ass sucks. But geeze, blowing fuses is the most cut and dry flow chart to diagnose. Iam surprised after all this, the techs havent found it.