It’s got to me

[Bondysbike]

recently I’ve been go at by the huge number of posts here and on Facebook etc etc shouting how unreliable Rockets are. To date I’ve simply put this down to the noisy minority as always....but...

Take a Harley as a comparison...Are our bike in the grand scheme of things poor when it comes to reliability compared to Harley?

 

[Rocket Scientist]

My rocket has been a troubled soul. Fortunately I can work on it myself. I'd probably have close to $20,000 in repairs if I had had to take it to the shop over the years. Part of my bikes problem was shoddy dealer work done under warranty before I got it. Others ride their rockets for years with no problems. I've heard plenty of horror stories about Harley reliability. But I also know a lot of people who ride them with little or no problems.

 

[Joesmoe]

And let's remember, it's the people with perceived problems who are the noisiest, and if moved to make noise at all, they (we ?) tend to overemphasize the nature of the problem(s) to convince ourselves as well as others how important it is.

 

[coolrocket]

recently I’ve been go at by the huge number of posts here and on Facebook etc etc shouting how unreliable Rockets are. To date I’ve simply put this down to the noisy minority as always....but...

Take a Harley as a comparison...Are our bike in the grand scheme of things poor when it comes to reliability compared to Harley?

I bought my Rocket 111 new in 2011 and 8 years later all I have had to do outside regular service was change my stock battery about 18 months ago. I tend to go through rear brake pads and Tires but I put that down to the way I ride.

 

[Mike188]

Got mine new in 2012, apart from new fork seals, GPS (under warranty) and a battery the biggest expense is fuel and tyres

 

[Bondysbike]

Got mine new in 2012, apart from new fork seals, GPS (under warranty) and a battery the biggest expense is fuel and tyres

Great to hear...you what it’s like , you get told somthing often enough you tend to start believing it...good stuff thanks

 

[dandiego]

Like a few others who own ‘08/‘09s, I experienced some serious electrical problems in the first 20k miles. Triumph covered it all under warranty...and then extended my warranty a year to cover later damage.

They also reimbursed me for my troubles (I had a lot of troubles before they sorted it) and that took some of the sting away.

The electrical issue in the 2008/2009 (Touring, at least) was a known and recognized issue by Triumph.

There are other issues I’ve heard of, and I’m just waiting for them to haunt my ‘09, but the last 35k miles have been trouble free.

 

[sonny]

51,000 thousand miles on a Rocket X with no problems. Up grades and maintenance has been about it. Harley at 51,000 needed a lot of work. Very happy with the rocket and hoping to get another 50,000 out of it.

 

[idk]

Hard for me to say as I had only 130,000 odd miles on my 2006 RIII, but apart from 2 warranty issues and a couple of minor electrical issues which I sorted with the help of the good people on this forum, all has been well. It's still working well - even after @Steel took it for a swim.

 

[atlsrt44]

It's a low production bike. There will be some problems but I think they've caught most of them. Look at a similar bike the m109. They were destroying transmissions and other things like crazy when they came out and that's from Suzuki who is supposed to be #2 in reliability.