MarcHD

I don't usually comment on opinions, because everyone is entitled to them, but I would say this is somewhat misleading. I cannot speak for Armouride, but Bikeshield is thick enough that if fitted correctly (so it doesn't peel) it will NOT rub through from heels or bakkie shuttles. I completely agree AMS is damn strong and is a hard shell protection as opposed to soft shell

Some really interesting opinions and/or experiences here so may as well add to the fire lol. I've been in the industry for just on ten years as of this August. Spent five of those ten in retail (two as the manager of a bike shop) One year as a sales rep for a distributor Last four years as a director of a distribution company I co-own, founded as a result of my decision to NOT start my own bike store after my final stint as a manager of a bike shop. More on why I didn't later... Below are some insights, anecdotes and experiences that I hope are of some use to people looking to start any business or just for interest to those on the consumer end of this market. Loyalty One thing nobody touches on, probably because it's not common knowledge in the service industry is that of the cause for customer loyalty. That is to say: the reason they would come to your store instead of another or buying online. Most people tend to think it's about customer service or customer experience (CX) and as a result I see a lot of new and/or well meaning store owners bending over backwards to please customers thinking this is the answer. They're not completely wrong. For sure you cannot have terrible service, and it's a combination of aspects, but statistically speaking, the leading cause for customer loyalty is convenience. Yes, it's a tough pill to swallow, but the sooner people understand that most end consumers just want frictionless transactions that are on their way to work or delivered to their door for example, the less store owners will be so upset when their customer of 10 years who they thought was loyal had no problem going to another store or buying online without batting an eyelid. Please don't get me wrong, I am not saying convenience is all that counts, I am merely saying it is the primary reason for loyalty in our current market. This is why, for example, when I was the manager of a bike shop that was located on a trail network farm and we wanted to attract repeat customers (and not just rely on post ride foot traffic), I made it clear to my staff that we need to offer the best service the customer's have ever seen due to the fact that they had probably passed 4 other bike shops on their way to us (convenience) and if they do not get the best service ever (service) while creating a memorable experience (CX) there was no way they would come back for anything other than perhaps a post ride tyre or bomb. Long story short here is that convenience is the driving factor for a lot of consumer behavior and is both a limiting factor (bad location) but also a good motivator such as in my example above. Professionalism Before you tell me a story about how you prefer customer service and think it's essential for stores to always bend over backwards and that's why you visit store X, it's important to remember that a professional is someone who is consistent. There is no use offering 11/10 service on Monday if you are burnt out and offer 4/10 by Friday... This is the trap many smaller, inexperienced bikes shops fall into as they are [understandably] fighting for market share from the slower moving, poor service bigger stores, and this might be the case, but many of the larger stores with a good following understand this principle of being professional. That is to say consistently good. Customer Experience There is a great lesson from a book called the Power of Moments, for which the following hypothesis has since been turned into theory by further studies and data which goes something as follows: If you were to rank all your customers from a scale of 1 - 10 with 1 being the most dissatisfied and 10 being the most satisfied. It is proven that attempting to convert a customer who is a 6, 7 or 8 on this scale to a 9 or 10 is literally 9x more profitable than trying to please the 2, 3 or 4 customers and converting them to a 10. Yes you read that right. Nine times more profitable.... The moral of the story? Again, I have seen many smaller or less experienced stores exclusively adhering to the mantra "the customer is always right" and worrying and slaving and toiling over the 2, 3 and 4's out there when in reality these people will likely be unhappy with your service and life in perpetuity. Don't waste too much time on them. You sanity, motivation and bottom line will thank you for it. Price Price is not just about price... more often than not what it really is about is value, and when customers are more and more frustrated with lack of value from dealers that offer a mediocre experience, limited knowledge, average or bad service and charge premium prices, all because it's been easy to own a bike shop with this attitude in the past.... who would blame them for buying online? Now add to this that online is increasingly more convenient AND better service (get back to you asap etc) then you can understand why it's not just about price for a lot of people. Buy ins/MOQ/Opening orders This is common in lots of industries and as an astute/realistic Hubber pointed out already, is perfectly understandable and should be expected by prospective store owner. I won't say much more on this subject as I know it is bound to offend some people, but I do agree that some of the opening order expectations are truly obscene and one must remember that every business starts somewhere so you cannot be too demanding on the new guy. So why didn't I open a bike shop of my own? I managed a bike shop for two years with the express purpose of seeing if the experience would make me confident enough to know I could do it my self, after all, if you can manage something you can own it. This ended up not being the path for me, mainly due to the constraints of being in a fixed location. I would still one day love to open a bike shop that uses the concepts laid out above and with perhaps delusions of grandeur I think I could change the way retail is seen in South Africa, but that is a dream for future perhaps. Hope this post was of interest to those who read it. please remember the above are relating to bell curve behavior and OF COURSE there are loads of exceptions to what I have said. If you are one of the exceptions, that's great, you're probably helping a little store grow and provide education for their kids, but please remember people are people and bell curves are bell curves for a reason. Failing to recognize consumer behavior is something one does at their peril. Cheers

So glad to hear you're happy with Bikeshield! Let me know if I can send you a complimentary kit for the next bike as our way of saying thanks

We sell Bikeshield (the original frame protection) through our direct to consumer portal here: https://getstokedonline.co.za/product-category/protection/bike-protection/?filter_brands=bikeshield Can have it delivered to your door or sent to a bike shop for fitment. Pre cut kits or 1m rolls for customisation. Armouride is also great if you want the entire bike covered and live in CT where they can fit for you Hope you come right

Nice! Personally a huge fan of straightpull (as is DT Swiss) the frustrations, perceived or real, are negligible compared to their benefits

No problem! Your reply didn't show up as a notification either, new settings for Bikehub it would seem...

Thanks for the feedback! Stock is always tricky nowadays, and thankfully DT have answered our call for faster engagement with the new 350 model coming as 36T

Cheers mate

Thank you for the feedback man

Thanks for the feedback. Interesting as up until very recently (last week to be exact) the wholesale price was identical... to the cent

Thanks for the feedback. Luckily engagement will be less of an issue from next year when the new 350 hubs are available with 36T as standard (10 degrees engagement)

Morning guys, and hope everyone had a good weekend... Not to hi-jack this post (hopefully your answers will help our friend Jono in his decision further) but for those who voted Hope over DT Swiss hubs, may I ask you reply with your reason why, out of those listed below? You can message me directly if you prefer not to spam this thread, but I hope I'm not speaking out of turn when I say Jono wouldn't mind better understanding the decision for Hope over DT hubs... Which of the following best describes your reason for voting Hope over DT Swiss hubs (assuming same price): A) Faster engagement as standard B) More Colour options C) Availability D) Familiarity/trust in the brand.

Honestly, it's a difficult one to answer as it depends on so many factors. The EX 511 are strong enough for most riders out there and mine have survived some gut wrenching sounds from gapping into Contermanskloof rocks that would otherwise leave a lesser rim shattered and my ride over... Equally as important as the rim you choose however, is the wheel builder doing the build for you as correct tensions, threadlock and proper destressing between the truing phases is mandatory. All this being said, rims are not something you would want to replace too often so if the HX 531 offer that peace of mind then why not. From my point of view (and experience) however, you can't go wrong with EX 511

Well I can't speak for what your subjective experience will be with faster engagement, but the objective benefits are huge and widely documented. DT have just launched an upgrade for the 370 hub (3pawl model) which allows you to upgrade it to a ratchet system and therefore increase the engagement (previously 3pawl DT hubs were not upgradeable) ....sadly though due to delays we will only be getting these in next year for all those on 1900 MTB and 1800 Road series wheels or 370 hubs.

LOL, thanks Drew, you know me too well! The HX series of rims (e-bike specific) have more material around the spoke wholes to further reduce the chances of nipples pulling through compared to the EX range (enduro specific) given the high loads experienced. As all DT rims ship with load dispersing washers and matching rear drive nipples this is already a rare occurrence, but DT prefer their customers to be safe than sorry.

Great to hear, although as Andrew from Stoked Suspension mentioned, both need a specific tool and thankfully the rest is all tool free. We do offer the tool in question via our e-commerce site for home mechanics: https://getstokedonline.co.za/product/dt-swiss-assembly-disassembly-tool-for-ring-nut/ Enjoy your hub(s) and feel free to contact us should you have any questions about them

Hi there, This is going to sound a little strange as usually the distributor/sales person for a brand wouldn't actively point out their product is heavier than expected... but for the purposes of this thread I wanted to point out that the DT Swiss M 1900 wheels (assuming you are boost and 29er) is in fact closer to 2050g not the 1750g mentioned. The M 1900 are the trail wheels (what the M stands for) and are the entry point wheels (what the 1900 stands for) in the DT Swiss range, so for their price, reliability, intended use they are not bad wheels at all, but given your predicament with your riding buddies it's obviously not suited to your needs. If you're wanting to make your bike a more trail/XC leaning then saving weight on the rims/tyres would be absolutely the best place to start. Note: I said best, not cheapest or easiest! The M 1900 wheels are great for their intended use and should fetch a decent price if you sold them complete! Hope this helps

Apologies for missing your comment! Suspect the new site updates have changed the way in which users are notified of posts/comments/tags as I don't recall seeing any mail come through... I think the Torque Zone guys up in Gauteng are the official importers. https://www.torqzoneacademy.co.za/

Unior make some great tools! Regret not signing that brand a few years back

The official tool used in house by DT is a pneumatic clamp that costs hundreds of euro's. For literally everyone else, the accepted practice by DT is one of these pliers

A good point, and DT Swiss have actually already answered this question. Going forward all tubs have been replaced with a toothpaste style tube that makes application much easier. All Star Ratchet upgrade or service kits will come with this tube as standard as well now. It is still however a 20g serving, I suspect due to DT wanting to keep the expectations the same. I will however forward your query to DT for [hopefully] an addition to their range. Thanks for the feedback

Happy to reach out to your LBS to give them all the details for you?

Hi there, Yes we have actually have a few coming in our next shipment. I can get in touch with your closer to their time of landing? Thinking of it another way, the 36T hub won't so much affect the suspension as the suspension will affect the 36T hub. Meaning a bike with high percentages of pedal kickback will obviously tug on the chain at a higher rate, which is then exacerbated the higher your hub's engagement is as there is less room for the chain growth to be taken up. Noticing you have a Giant Trance 29er listed as your personal ride, we can look at the kinematics of your bike in detail through this blog spot: https://linkagedesign.blogspot.com/2019/09/giant-trance-29-2019.html Here we see the Giant Trance (at least the 2019 model) has a relatively low pedal kickback value - roughly middle of the spectrum found on contemporary bikes. For this reason both the 54T and the 36T would be fine for your use, and I personally ride a Giant Reign with a 54T upgrade and have had no negative feedback. Cheers

If we want, we can actually pretty accurately calculate the expected lifespan of a 20g tub... As per the DT Swiss user and technical manuals one is expected to service their star ratchets a Minimum of annually (in the case of normal use) a Maximum of quarterly (in the case of extreme use such as dust and rain) On average it takes about half a gram (0.5g) to correctly coat the star ratchets once they have been cleaned of old grease 20g / 0.5g = 40 total uses (minimum) or 10 quarterly uses. (maximum) Going for the conservative worst case scenario of every 3 months/quarterly this means you have a minimum of 2.5 years/30months of use from one tub (assuming it's one hub you are servicing) In your case Tim, that is 10months of servicing with your three sets of DT hubs you have, again assuming you ride in UK mud and/or Gauteng dust all year around! Yes it's a slow Friday....

Lifetime supply