I think I'm being stitched up by local bike garage

[octapusfoot]

Could someone advise me on something please?

I just bought an L-reg RGV and took it to a 2-stroke specialist for a pre MOT check and some tyres. The chap there said my bike would pass an MOT no problem. The next day I took it to a local garage for it's MOT (the other garage didn't do MOT's) and they failed it because they said the front brakes were binding.
I didn't want to ride it 10 miles to the previous garage as the MOT had expired months ago and I didn't want to ride illegally. So I asked them if they could do the work as the bike was already there.
They quoted about £60 plus the brake fluid to strip both calipers and re bleed the system. I phoned to collect the bike the next day and they said they couldn't bleed the brakes and discovered the seals had swollen in the pistons. They replaced these at £40 and said it was taking longer to fix than first thought. I just phoned back again and they said they are still having problems with bleeding them and it won't be ready now till Monday.
How long does it take to strip down both calipers and is it possible that all the seals had swollen?
Because I'm female, I never trust mechanics as I have found in the past they try and stitch me up because they assume I don't know anything. Also, it seems mighty conveinient that they won't pass the MOT and they now have the bike.
Any advice would be greatly appreciated as the garage is now unable to tell me how much my bill will be.
Thank you.

[Kickstart]

Hi

Possible that they are trying to stich you up. However it is possible the seals are screwed up (and the seals are not that cheap), but to be honest they are fairly common calipers (think the same ones are used on the 1200 Bandit, but not certain) and it might be cheaper to just buy some decent 2nd hand calipers.

£60 is probably 1~2 hours labour and would be a reasonable time for a mechanic to spend cleaning the calipers up and doing a fairly good job. However if they have them far enough apart to check the seals properly then the amount of extra time to fit new seals is tiny (although it might take them a day or 2 to receive new seals after ordering them).

The seals normally come in a set for a single caliper. £20 (ie, half the £40) is probably about right (maybe slightly cheap) for a set of seals. To be honest if I were replacing a seal in a caliper I would replace all the seals in that caliper.

Also worth pointing out that bleeding brakes when the system is empty of fluid can be a real pain, but I would expect them to be expecting such problems. They might well also be having problems with the brake hoses, and you might well get told you need new ones of those (cost is about £11 each hose from Busters for basic ones, plus a few pounds for each banjo bolt).

Overall I would say they might be taking advantage of you, but what they are saying is still perfectly possible. Without seeing what they have found I am afraid to say I would have to trust them.

All the best

Keith
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[kev]

It is very common for the brakes to seize up on RGV`s because they don't have a weather seal round the pistons in the caliper.

You also looking at about a 3 hour job to strip and rebuild the calipers on that bike.
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