Appears you might have earned some 'good will' points with the dealership. Did they get the leaks fixed on your other bike?
I read the entire string on this subject and can't believe HD doesn't think bubbles under the clear coat is a defect. Whomever said that needs their head examined. Or, doesn't the paint come under the warranty? If anything like an auto warranty, it cover paint for defects. Bubbles are defects. Period. No argument. In the past, I made a living painting and can tell you none of my customers would have accepted anything but perfection. Nor would I.
This is another one of those situations where I can't believe we are having this discussion.
I'm hoping the individual who turned down the request to begin with is in HD purgatory or looking for a job where he can't inconvenience customers. Especially those who paid for their top of the line products. Simple common sence is something that can't be taught.
You should have been around in '06 when the SEUC was in it's first year. Dozens and dozens of people here on the site had horrible paint because the clear coat was milky. Not just one little part, but the outer fairing, tank, bags...everything. There were three colors back then: Black Candy Crimson/Slate; Autumn Haze/Black; and Black/Green (we called them Watermelons). Both of the dark colors had the problem, though I suspect the Autumn Haze did too, but it was not easily seen. And those were just the bikes that people here on the site owned...no telling how many are out there with bad paint and the people don't even realize it. Those bikes got nicknamed "Milk Duds" because that's how bad the paint was...it looked the color of a Milk Dud where the black was. People went through absolute HELL getting HD to 'fess up and replace the parts. They fixed the problems later in the production year (I had one that was built in May '06 and it was fine), but the early ones were awful. HD tried buffing, refusing to acknowledge the problem, refusing to warranty the problem....people HERE got their tins replaced, but all the poor souls out there who didn't know better were SOL, 'cause HD sure as hell didn't have a recall, or notify people that they might have bad paint on their 32K bike. Harley gave some lame assed excuse that if the defect was not visible from 10 feet away, it was not a problem, was cosmetic, etc. It was a nightmare for those affected. Though not a paint issue, the same kind of thing happened in '07 when they put the 110" motors on the street...oil leaks, compression releases not working, starter components self destructing due to related issues. After being threatened with a Class Action law suit, the MOCO finally did a recall to basically replace the entire top end of the motor, but they didn't do it voluntarily. Some dealers try to do the right thing, but the regional authorities and Mother Harley thwart their efforts until the customer raises enough hell to make something happen. I'm not sayin' that HD's are junk, or that 98% of the customers are not happy with their bike, blah, blah, blah, but when folks have a problem, it's sometimes hard to get obvious, common sense defects repaired/replaced.
