I read some of the posts. Here's a little fuel for the fire.
1. I traded in my 03 red skis three weeks ago. Well finally the dealer has my skis back. I'd be missing at least 3 weekends of riding if I was waiting for replacement skis from AC. Who is replacing the red 03 skis with dumb a** looking black for a red patriot sled. Good thing I happened to have the money (credit) to get a set of Powder Pros which work great for the Patriot. So AC's problem became my reason to push for a better set of skis anyway, but at my expense. I have some black stock AC skis that will soon be going on Ebay.
2. Had good luck with a few dealers in the UP of Michigan and upper lower Michigan for problems. Maybe some of these dealers care a bit more, but it all comes down to how many mechanics they have working for them and whether the guys are willing to put in overtime.
Here's some experiences we had with service from dealers in Michigan.
*(one star) Pickelman's Performance in Newberry: You will find a large supply of parts (at about 20 to 40% above suggested retail from this place. If you need a part they might be able to help you. If you need service, well when ever we asked them about service availability the response was "did you buy the sled here". Seems if you get your sled there they will move you to the front of the line, which is understandable from pleasing the guys who bought there, but being told that you have got to wait 3 days before you sled can be worked on is like saying drop it off and come back next week. (BTW: these guys have expensive parts, but they are the only cat dealer in Newberry. They also gave me the cheapest out the door quote for a spring order F7 of all the dealers, nobody else could match them. Maybe they were selling at a loss, and subsidise that loss with inflated parts prices.)
***(three stars) Matteson Marine, Brutus Michigan. This is a really nice dealer, and they will try to help you if they can. Unfortunately Brutus is a small town and the mechanic that they have who seemed to be the most experienced guy there is a part time mechanic and has a job that is more steady and pays better. If you in a small town, do you think you can sit around and wait for a few cat customers to come in 3 months a year to throw you some quick work? So although they were able to get a burned down sled one time back on the trail within 4 hours actually taking an employees new parts and putting them on our sled from their upgrade (pistons for a sno-pro), lately whenever we've asked about service they didn't have a mechanic available. But usually we ask about service near the end of a day on the weekend. Also they are closed on Sundays. But like I said it's a small town dealer, real friendly and worth the stop if your on the trail near Brutus Michigan.
BTW: I had a ZR600 engine burn down, left the sled there and they did the warrenty work for me and had my sled ready for the next weekend. Saved me from having to haul the sled downstate and wonder if a local dealer could fit it in.
****+ (4 and 1/2 stars) Arctic Cat dealer in Ontagonan Michigan: Keeweenaw Penesula trip. We were spanked, literally spanked by a 600 with our firecats. Being on a trip and misplacing our manuals, since we are not exactly a sled head mechanic we were not sure what was happening. We went into this dealer and asked if they had time to look at it. They did a power valve and throttle cable adjustment fairly quickly while we waited and we went out and had our zip back in our sleds as both the power valves and throttle cable were way out of adjustment (from wear). Nice dealership, nice service.
***** FIVE STARS, my highest rating. AC dealership in Gaylord Michigan. Actually have had our sleds in for a few things, not going to mention all of them. Years ago, in the old dealership I took a sled in for a minor warrantee work issue and they dealt with it right then and there, fixed that small problem and had me back on the trail. Now that they are moved and Dan and the APC guys are in the same building complex, they have some extra help from the mechanics of APC. A nice supply of mechanics who are willing to go the extra mile is a very good thing. So we have had very good luck with them and they have been able to fix our problems (some minor some major) in a very short time and get us back on the road. Right now this dealership has my highest rating. The combination of APC and the AC dealer being in the same location is very good thing. I think my friend and I are sold enough to probably buy our next AC sled from these guys.
***+ (three and 1/2 stars) Bright Powersports in Lincoln Park Michigan. (New owners.) I bought my last two sleds from this place. They are able to do work and the mechanics (most of them) have been friendly and answered my questions. Of course I bought the sled there. They have bent over backward in some cases when I asked for help, and a couple of times I was stressed and they took it pretty well and provided good service. I'd rate their service as almost as good as some of the service I get from up north. But guess what, the service up north is better as far as I'm concerned because: a.) I don't have to drop my sled off downstate and come back to pick it up. b.) the up north dealers for the most part I've dealt with were able to rush and get me back on the road and c.) the dealers up north usually have a nice snowy field to do some actual ride testing if it's needed for setup or diagnostics.
Bright scored pretty high as far as I know. When I asked about a warrenty issue they asked me once if I bought my sled there, so this downstate dealer probably gives some priority to those who buy at the dealership.
** Labarons Sports in Troy Michigan. My buddy bought his F7 03 from them. He had a minor warranty issue a handle bar grip or warmer related issue if I recall now and could easily just bring in the part. He bought the sled from them, they have a policy that they cannot do warrenty work unless you bring the entire sled in. This might be the agreement all dealers have with AC, but lets face reality. If I have a small part problem, say a snow flap damage thing and it's under warrenty. The 03 sleds having the problem were the only sleds that had firecat snow flaps at the time, so every snow flap was under warrenty last year, for example. If it's something small I should be able to take the darn thing off and take it into the dealer, they give me the flap strap update and a new flap and I take it back to my garage and do the flap fix. AC should be NONE the wiser, and the customer should be pleased. I should NOT HAVE TO TAKE and ENTIRE SLED in for a snow flap fix. Labarons I think bent their rule once for my buddy, but another time they didn't for a similar small issue, demanding that he bring in the entire sled. Guess what, we will never buy another sled from Labarons. They have a nice dealership, give straight answers, and have a good supply of parts. But they just lost one sled customer because of their demands to bring an entire sled in for a fix akin to the snow flap. This from a down state dealer. This dealer also asked "did you buy it here" when talking about service. I think most dealers reward their customers in the queing of service, but aparently Labarons won't go the extra mile when it comes to bringing in the entire sled for a snowflap like fix.
why?
*** (?) AC dealer near New Baltimore (not Macomb cycle) this small AC dealer is located on the right hand side of I-94 down about 4 miles from the freeway. Maybe they were near Marine city. I can't remember the name of this dealer, but it's a small dealer and it doesn't show up in AC's website when searching for dealers (what's up with that?) Anyway we chatted with these guys, and had them do a shock rebuild, not exactly warrentee service. We have heard good and bad about this dealers service. We had a good experience, the bad we heard was related to setup of sleds bought from them, but it could be hearsay. We were so prejudiced against this dealer after hearing some of the stories, that we actually wanted to blame them for a shock related suspension problem we had, but it turned out the AC factory of the guys we bought the used SnoPro from probably were the cause of the damage. The shock actually wasn't screwed on properly (tight enough) and came undone while riding. Sudden loss of suspension on one side of your sled with the ski dropping will ruin a ride. Fortunately my friend was travelling 15 mph over a bump on a power line when it happened, not 60 MPH on a tree lined trail. Anyway that's a different story. We had a pretty good experience with this dealer (unnamed) but that was for shocks being rebuilt. There was some waiting (for parts from AC) on one of the rebuilds. We now send our shocks to Shock Therapy for rebuilding.
*** (?) Rosenau Powersports, Dearborn Michigan. I took my sled in for some minor adjustments. This was a few years back. They did an okay job for the minor fix in an acceptable time period. I'm not giving them more stars in my rating because I really haven't had a lot of experience with their service department, but they seemed okay from what I did experience. Unfortunately there's so much money being spent by that dealer that the sales people are a bit lazy, kind of like motorcycle sales guys who don't care much about selling sleds. It seems they are used to having guys walk up and just hand them cash for sleds, without much effort. So I didn't return to buy another one from them. Not a negative buying experience, but kind of null. (Like I was supposed to feel lucky to be handled by a cool guy.) But now I'm getting off dealerships service and discussing sales people which is a different subject.
That's our experience with Michigan dealers. Also we had some good work done at the Shell station in Paradise Michigan. They do sled work and have come through a few times for us for things like welding a shock (See above) saving our weekend.
REGARDING PARTS on BACK ORDER:
AC's procurement system is kind of messed up. Hopefully they will get their act together. I wish more dealers carried more parts in stock, but of course it's difficult to have everything in stock and sink money into parts that just sit waiting for some customer to come in. Some dealers (like Bright in Lincoln Park) have a very small part inventory and order almost every AC part. That can cause delays.
Overall most of our experiences in Michigan with AC dealers have been positive.
Greg
The bad news is that the dealer told me the grenading caused damage to a seal on the Diamond Drive itself...and F**K Face Cat has not Diamond Drives or Assemblies until at least Feb 14th, and they don't ship out over the weekend...so again, I am porkhoused out of sledding thanks to Arctic Cat...even though I took all the excuses away by having 2 brand new 2004 sleds...effing pathetic huh!!! 