Giant Support in USA Gone Dark?

[Volt Dolt]

Four months ago, the electric drive on my Giant Full E SX 0 quit. I brought it to my local Giant bike shop. I've been calling them every week or two to see what the status is of the repair. They tell me that the way Giant works these repairs, is to send the shop a part to try (first one was to be a replacement on/off switch). The shop changes it out and if that fixes it, done. If not, they send the next most likely part. They tell me that a claim has been open, but they have never received the first part to start troubleshooting. When they call 800 Giant USA (I may have that number wrong) they can never get a live person and have been unable to move my repair forward. The mechanic tells me he has taken to trying random extensions at the Giant office, but never can get a person and can only leave a message. The mechanic also told me they have a Giant representative, but 4 months in, he has not been able to move this forward either.

I understand there is a pandemic, but even if they are working from home, how hard is it to return a phone call? OK, so besides venting a little, I really just want to know if anyone else is having similar trouble getting Giant support to help fix a broken EMTB? One of the main reasons I went with Giant (I have bought 3 eMTBs from them) was because I figured they were the biggest, so I wouldn't have to worry about support.

I'd appreciate any thoughts or suggestions.

Bruce

 

[pmcdonald]

That's unacceptable. Get their (Giants) attention on social media. Even if everyone is working remote their comms team should notice and esculate it to service.

 

[Deleted member 4210]

Yikes ! What a sad way for them (giant) to wreck the Yamaha reputation. Sheesh.

 

[Volt Dolt]

Update: It's been 6 months now, and my shop finally received a new wiring harness for them to "try". I'd imagine changing out a wiring harness on an EMTB is not trivial. The shop owner asked me to give him a couple of weeks.

Does anyone know if there are diagnostic codes available from the Yamaha drive system? Seems that would make a lot more sense than random trial-and-error approach Giant is using with my bike. There's nothing wrong with the trail-and-error approach to troubleshooting if you have all the parts on-hand. But if you have to wait months between each trial, the time-frame becomes unacceptably long. I really miss my bike.

 

[SoCalDave]

The problem you have is two-fold from a diagnostics standpoint: 1) Yamaha has its own firmware written for its motor, which may or may not have any 'codes' for diagnostics (I would suspect not) 2) Giant has a third party software firm involved that has written software that allows for communication and control of their operational side of the ebike, in the RideControl app. They may not have provided anything more than very basic diagnostic capabilities. In fact it's doubtful they even have that, which may be why Giant is forced to do the troubleshooting the way you are witnessing. Yamaha has their own controls and programming built in on their own complete ebikes in their own on board controller, with resident Bluetooth communication, and full diagnostics on the Yamaha, built and designed and fully integrated by Yamaha engineered ebike models with their own motor.

In your case, Giant is only getting the motor and not using any of Yamahas own proprietary controls software and they are having to use a third party written (non Giant, non Yamaha) software company to provide operation of the motor and controller, etc. This is probably in part why people see so many software issues with Giant ebikes that have just the Yamaha Motor. Everything is different and even how the motor performs and tuning, is completely different on Giant and what they hired the software firm to do for their bike. It's been a disaster waiting to happen. And they fired their first company doing the software and so from there it's a complete do over for the next company. That's why you see Sync drive on the Giant ebikes that have Yamaha motors. It may have some of the mechanical guts of a Yamaha Motor, but it pretty much ends there. Also not integrated at all with the battery, and pertinent info that Yamaha uses there on their own ebike. I'd bet money it's not even a Yamaha designed wiring harness.
Disclaimer: I've been selling Yamaha ebikes since they were first introduced. So yeah I have some bias. But you'll hear the differentiation straight from Yamaha staff if you ask. Maybe not specifics, but definitely there are substantive differences. Also, I have not had one Yamaha ebike come back with any motor or controller or software issues, and no mechanical issues, other than a front through axle on a CrossConnect, that was not opening smoothly on its locking mechanism. Yamaha covered it under warranty. And a customer damaged chain ring. Their warranty system on line, their staff, the level of detail , their thorough operators manuals and service manuals for dealers, and on line detailed build drawings is beyond compare. No other ebike OEM is even close. They use the same platform theyve used for years for all their other power sports products. It's intimidating at first to use. And I've barely scratched the surface on any of it, because I feel like the old Maytag repair man on their commercials (when they were built in the US in Newton IA) with their products. The Yamaha staff for warranty issues would walk me through anything I ever needed, if and when. Yawn. My Yamaha service 'hat' is going back to sleep now.
Ps. Wouldnt your dealer have and be using diagnostic codes if Giant provided any ? Btw what you describe is EXACTLY how Rad troubleshoots it's own ebikes with customers (many of whom likely have no tools, or understanding of any 'technical' terms beyond 'bike' , 'motor', 'wheel', 'I'm screwed'. but hey they got such a great 'deal').

Did Giant make the decision to use third party software because Yamaha will not allow the software to be used on non-Yamaha manufactured bikes, or did Giant make the decision to use third party software in order to offer features that Yamaha doesn’t offer and/or to save money?

 

[J.R.]

Update: It's been 6 months now, and my shop finally received a new wiring harness for them to "try". I'd imagine changing out a wiring harness on an EMTB is not trivial. The shop owner asked me to give him a couple of weeks.

Does anyone know if there are diagnostic codes available from the Yamaha drive system? Seems that would make a lot more sense than random trial-and-error approach Giant is using with my bike. There's nothing wrong with the trail-and-error approach to troubleshooting if you have all the parts on-hand. But if you have to wait months between each trial, the time-frame becomes unacceptably long. I really miss my bike.

That's really disturbing to read. 6 months downtime during prime riding season is unacceptable for a warranty issue. I hope you got a loaner bike. I also hope you get a good warranty period on the repair.

 

[PDoz]

Does anyone know if there are diagnostic codes available from the Yamaha drive system? Seems that would make a lot more sense than random trial-and-error approach Giant is using with my bike. There's nothing wrong with the trail-and-error approach to troubleshooting if you have all the parts on-hand. But if you have to wait months between each trial, the time-frame becomes unacceptably long. I really miss my bike.

Yes, there are codes - dealer plugs bike in and gets a code which is supposed to tell giant where the problem is. My experience in the past 3 years is 3/3 electrical problems were sorted this way, but each time giant sent out at least 2 possible components , the dealer tried each and fitted the relevant part.

I'm starting to wonder if there are regional variances in warranty support? I've only had dealings with giant Australia and been very Impressed / lucky

 

[Stefan Mikes]

I'm starting to wonder if there are regional variances in warranty support? I've only had dealings with giant Australia and been very Impressed / lucky

I'm glad with the level of technical support from Giant LBS in Poland, too. Whatever deficiencies Giant bikes might have (and I see none except of the RideControl App), the Giant guys in Warsaw have been great so far.

 

[GypsyTreker]

Wow, It hate hearing stuff like this from the "Big Gun" eBike guys ( ie Trek, Giant etc) and just looking through past posts on here it makes you question how much support an LBS can actually offer doing 1 part at a time diagnostic/repair warranty work. I mean why not send the 3 most likely parts, dealer sends back the 2 that didn't fix it. I just think the actual market has to mature before I would want to invest 3-4k into a higher end bike. If I was a dealer I would be going crazy because it's their reputation that's on the line, not that its fair, but consumers don't care about the factories excuses. 6 months..OMG!!

 

[Volt Dolt]

Here's an update on my bike:

After many months at the Gainesville, FL Giant shop, I was told it needed a new battery, but none were available but a local guy would re-build mine with new cells for $400. After being told so many different things by the guys at this shop, I declined and brought my bike to University Bicycle Center in Tampa. They formulated a plan to get the parts they needed to get my bike fixed and did battle with Giant to finally get them to agree to send ALL of the parts in the electric drive train so they could trouble-shoot. It turned out the issue was the controller / display. They replaced it and my bike is now working fine. I'm giving the Gainesville bike shop half the blame for the slow repairs and the other half to Giant. Again, I know there's a pandemic, but Giant should have offered to ship all parts to dealer initially. Tampa shop returned all un-needed parts to Giant.

So it took me 8 months to get my bike fixed. I'm now very happy to have it back and to be able to ride.

 

[Dewey]

Sorry to read about poor service from a bike shop in a college town, glad you found a better shop.