Was this mechanic's fee reasonable?

[mackula]

Hey all,

I got myself an old Yamaha SR125 for around £430 six months ago. It didn't have a long service history but it had a fresh MOT so I thought I'd take the risk.

It ran ok-ish for a few months but it definitely had some problems: the engine would sometimes shut off at idle (my temp fix was adjusting the idle speed screw) and the front brake felt really weak. I went a couple of weeks without riding it and when I tried to start it up again it wouldn't start, so I took it to a mechanic.

The mechanic said that he could basically find things wrong with it wherever he looked, and implied that the MOT it came with was probably dodgy. Here's the invoice:

Front tyre 300-17” L301 £55.00
Inner tube £10.00
Fuel tap seals £6.00
Oils £8.00
Oil filter £6.00
Air filter £5.00
Sparking plug £4.50
Tensioner cap and seal £8.00
O ring £2.50
Wheel bearings £16.00
Carburettor flush £5.50
Brake seals £48.00
Brake pads £17.00
Brake fluids £ 8.00
Oils, odds etc £ 6.00
Labour 4 Hours £ 200.00
Total £405.50

He also mentioned he sorted problems with the following: engine, front tyre, rear wheel, chain adjusters, swingarm, fuel tank, steering bearings, front fork, front wheel bearings, front brake caliper, rear brake, clutch, left handlebar switch, carburetto, airbox, gear lever.

The front brake is definitely better (feels much more like the modern 125s I rented in the past) and the engine sounds quieter and has less of that "clickety clack" sound from poorly adjusted valves.

I don't really know much about bike maintenance so I'm wondering if this was an okay price to pay.

[defblade]

Looks OK to me. I always feel like labour rates are high, but they have to include garage rental, insurance, tools etc etc etc as well as paying the guy a wage. If he was trying to rip you off, there'd have been more stuff on there again, eg back tyre/tube.
The brake seals look expensive to me, but as everything else looks reasonable, that's probably just what they cost.


If you found it expensive, might be worth learning how to twirl a spanner yourself, the £200 labour would have bought a lot of tools - although probably not enough for tyre changes on top of the rest! Also, dodgy brakes are possibly not the best point on the learning curve to start at
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Honda Varadero 125cc => Suzuki Bandit 650 33bhp => 77bhp =>
BMW K1200R Sport 163bhp => Aprilia Shiver GT 750 95bhp

[rpsmith79]

Looks about right, but you really should now learn some basic maintenance, i mean an oil and filter change is a piece of cake, as is changing the spark plug

That alone would have saved you at least an hours labour charge
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Current Bike: Honda CG125 ES4 // Honda CB600FS Hornet // Triumph Street Triple R

[ThunderGuts]

Looks reasonable; some of that stuff can be a pain to deal with, even if the parts cost is cheap.

As said previously, worth learning some basic maintenance skills though - bikes are so easy to work on and basic stuff like oil changes can be done with the absolute bare minimum of tools and skills.
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TG.

[M.C]

Cheap bike ended up being not so cheap, put it down to experience, and get yourself a Haynes manual and socket set.

[Nobby the Bastard]

Was this fee reasonable? No. They charge an extortionate amount for stuff you could do yourself.
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trevor saxe-coburg-gotha:"Remember this simple rule - scooters are for men who like to feel the breeze on their huge, flapping cunt lips."
Sprint ST 1050

[redeem ouzzer]

Looks about right, £40-60 is a typical hourly rate for the average none dealer mechanic.

If you don't know how to do something yourself there's really no point in people saying it's too expensive.
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Be a REAL MAN!

[M.C]

It depends how you want to look at it. If the OP bought a bit of a lemon which might have been Vince Candelin dangerous, then they've paid out £830 odd for a (hopefully) now sorted bike. Looking at current used prices it doesn't seem that far off: https://www.ebay.co.uk/sch/9809/i.html?_from=R40&_nkw=yamaha+sr125&_sop=2 Granted SR's are now at the (fairly) rare so must be valuable stage.

Check the MOT history if you want to know whether it had a potentially dodgy MOT: https://www.gov.uk/check-mot-history Although my lemon 125 fell apart within 6 months of me 'sorting it'... then I sold it on

[Ste]

Doing all that lot in four hours seems quite good.

The list he also mentioned of problems he sorted has duplicates of things in the £405 list of stuff.

A fresh MOT doesn't mean anything.

If everything in the £405 list needed doing and has been done then it's reasonable enough.

[stinkwheel]

Seems like a good deal. Prices of the parts seem good too.

It would take me more than 4 hours to do that lot.
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“Rule one: Always stick around for one more drink. That's when things happen. That's when you find out everything you want to know.”
I did the 2010 Round Britain Rally on my 350 Bullet. 89 landmarks, 3 months, 9,500 miles.

[M.C]

[almostthere]

seems cheap to me, with tyre changes I always take the wheel off and take to my local garage saves a bit on labour
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Beer, It's the reason I get up every afternoon
www.mfairco.uk

[Travis Bickle]

[mentalboy]

Fook me, he must have been humming along at a fair old whack to get that lot done in four hours!

200 quid for the labour was a bargain even if he did slap the best part of an hour's labour in with the cost of the brake seals.
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Make mine a Corona.