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Should one get annoyed for taking you bike back the 3rd time for the same issue


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Posted

Been there, experienced it. Took my bike for service to bike shop, cranks BB, steerer the whole works and got it back Friday. Sun i'm out riding the Lido route when suddenly my whole crank comes off, parts strewn all over, lucky for me a cyclist stopped and phoned his wife to collect me and take me to my car. Went back to shop and told them to fix, after a week of not hearing from them I phoned them and they told me they were waiting for some parts, no follow up from the LBS. I ended up phoning the distributor and the overseas manufacturer to sort out the parts.needed. 3 weeks after the incident and me constantly phoning I picked up my bike and the LBS owner had the cheek to tell me he would not charge me. 

Posted

Remember that a bike is not a luxury German sedan that can just be plugged into a computer for a diagnostic test. Often noise seems to eminate from one area (say the crank) and it is actually coming from elsewhere (say the seat post). It takes a wrench with experience to quickly get to the bottom of it, and for that you pay more than an 18 year old that likes riding, but is not quite good enough to turn pro. It also helps if the same wrench have worked on your bike before as they would know in what shape things like BB's, head sets and pivots should be in on your bike. Like many on here I have up-skilled myself to be able to fix things myself, but with work and family commitments I'd rather pay my wrench his fee and let him get on with it.

Posted
  On 2/19/2017 at 1:35 PM, GLuvsMtb said:

Remember that a bike is not a luxury German sedan that can just be plugged into a computer for a diagnostic test. Often noise seems to eminate from one area (say the crank) and it is actually coming from elsewhere (say the seat post). It takes a wrench with experience to quickly get to the bottom of it, and for that you pay more than an 18 year old that likes riding, but is not quite good enough to turn pro. It also helps if the same wrench have worked on your bike before as they would know in what shape things like BB's, head sets and pivots should be in on your bike. Like many on here I have up-skilled myself to be able to fix things myself, but with work and family commitments I'd rather pay my wrench his fee and let him get on with it.

with mine it was clear the issue is the crank - first time got home Same creek - ok should have tested at the shop but then took it back and they slapped a @#$ load of grease in - 80km and its back worse then before

 

When I buy an expensive Top of the range bike I expect the people working on it knows it inside out

 

Clearly they dont and the issue is obvious so all it needs is time and patience to get it right 100% the first time

 

I love the sport but I hate the constant trips to the shop to get things fixed - perhaps we need some disruptive new approach to bike mechanics - in general seems others have the same issue

 

 

 

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Posted

I think of a group of guys got together and put some well known mechanics on retainer , they would quickly come and work for them. That way mechanics will have to focus on say 20 bikes at a time . But if they don't do the job well , they will quickly be out of a job.

Posted
  On 2/19/2017 at 6:53 PM, Brickleberry said:

I think of a group of guys got together and put some well known mechanics on retainer , they would quickly come and work for them. That way mechanics will have to focus on say 20 bikes at a time . But if they don't do the job well , they will quickly be out of a job.

Ja that's not a bad idea at all , I know in the motorcycle industry they have places where guys get together and have all the tools in one place and you can come and fix your own bike with the help of others to assist - so knowledge transfer and a pool of skills - everyone upskill

 

DISRUPT the normal way of doing things

Posted

Always done everything myself from the early days when I lived on my Mongoose BMX, been fixing all my bikes since then.

Theres some things I choose not to do, I dont intend on doing suspensions myself so that Ill send in.

 

All the rest is done myself, if its wrong... Im the ****.

 

Sent a fork in once before and had it royally cocked up and thought it may have been better if I bought the stuff and did it myself, but no... voted with my wallet and had it fixed elsewhere.

 

DIY is best if you have the time on your hands and "some" mechanical ability.

Posted

As most of you have provided reasonable answers, I would have to say that taking it back a 3rd time is directly proportional to how well you know the mechanic/manager/owner, what coffee he drinks and what coffee they serve you while reading the latest magazines to get the job done while you wait.

Posted
  On 2/19/2017 at 8:29 AM, Grease_Monkey said:

What bike shops don't understand is thay people have full time jobs. At 9 when they open I'm already at work, and at 5:30 when they close I sit in traffic. This means that every time I want to take it in I sacrifice lunch today to drop it off and lunch tomorrow to fetch it. Blerry anoying to say the least!

This!

But then again, I am also one of those customers that will demands them collecting my bike and deliver it if they haven't fixed the problem.

They can keep their fancy coffees for their cycling friends that hang out at the shops - I just want my stuff fixed the first time around, spend less time at the shop and more time on the bike.

I now do 99% of all my bicycle repairs. It will take me an hour or two, but if I have to take into consideration how much time and effort is spent going back and forth with a bicycle to a shop, it's actually less time and effort

Posted

I've had the similar experience, my bike made noise and I took it to the mechanic, after paying over R1000 for parts excl labor the noise was still there, but then there was another noise from elsewhere that started after they "fixed" my bike. I took it back the 2nd time and told them the noise is still there and they managed to fix the original noise.

 

When I told them about the noise that started after they worked on my bike they became very defensive telling me it cannot be their fault bcs they have lots of experience, the noise must be coming from elsewhere. I decided to take it elsewhere and it was fixed within 10 minutes. If u take a bike twice to the LBS its not worth a 3rd try because you might end up replacing every part of the bike that is not damaged.

Posted

On the other end of the spectrum, the number of people who 'work on their own bikes' and it shows.

Badly seated bearings, over tightened bolts, headset pressed in so skew it was wearing a neat groove into the frame, forks have been ridden into oblivion, scour marks inside hubs where people have self 'serviced' bearings, cassettes that have practically welded themselves to a freehub, seatposts that are stuck .... 

 

One beautiful moment was someone wanting to claim a 'warranty' on wheel bearings after "60km" and they were "rough" .... in reality they were pristine actually.

 

Mind you, I still remember years back when a certain workshop in Edenvale took an angle grinder to my expensive Race Face cranks. This was when a square taper BB was standard. 
They lied about trying to drill it out or cut the BB axle and then 'traded' a Deore crankset.

 

We all have a workshop horror story, yet there's as many horror stories on the flip side too it seems. 

 

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