[Closed] It can't just be me surely?

You are jinxed.

Have you upset any Romany fortune tellers/flower sellers recently ?

who did you wrong in a previous life?

It's you. That sounds like a hell of a run there fella. MDS hoppy has had a reverb fail under warranty and that's it for our 10 bikes at home.

i am asking myself these very questions... 😆

its you.

wow!! how unlucky are you!!# 😯

Nope - just you.

Nobody I know has had anything like that happen to them. A couple of mangled rear mechs / hangers due to clanging them off rocks or getting sticks dragged through the chain. I see that as rider error / wear and tear, take your pick.

Usual scuff and dents from crashes, along with broken brake levers and dropper remotes - but that's all crash damage so as above really.

And I'm not talking just top end bikes either - Boardman, Giant, Bird, Spesh, Whyte, Orange etc.

Oh, I bent a pedal axle too. When I crashed.

Si

[img] [/img]

My bike is nearly 3 years old, still fine
Garmin working well
I'm wearing my sombreo shorts that are nearly 10 years old
My road bike is 8 years old and running fine for zero investment
Ay up lights just came out for winter and work fine

In the end most of my quality stuff lasts and keeps going.

Maybe it's you

7 year old mountain bike - all good, and always has been, except when the front hub decided to eat itself toward the end of a long ride necessitating a train ride home.

11 year old road bike - all good except for time-based wear and tear.

3 year old road bike - all good.

4 year old hybrid commuter - all good except for rider-error-induced damage to various bits.

It sounds like you have had a rough bit of luck. Whatever you do, DON'T GIVE UP!

It can't just be me surely

er....with that run of bad luck it might be!

I break stuff on a semi-regular basis, but mostly it's me actually breaking stuff or wearing it out, not QC fails or manufacturing defects.

Nope. You've just been very unlucky.

In 20 years of MTBing, I've sent one thing back under warranty, even that was potentially arguable. I broke a seatpost once, which had a design flaw and was replaced cheap. I had a poor wheel build on a cheap bike.. but that's about it. Also damaged a freehub through sheer power once.

Had some issues with a Pace fork but they sorted me out. Oh and my Marzocchis had given me trouble but that was started by me running them dry.

I swear i could walk into any shop anywhere, and the thing i pick to buy will be the one that is made wrong/broken/defective/etc.

i'm wondering when its going to end...

Buy second-hand. Then it's pre-broken, and you don't feel so bad when you have to fix/replace it!

That's what I do.

funnily enough the last 2nd hand bike i bought (an 08 Turner RFX) was utterly faultless and literally never went wrong in the 2 years i owned it...

Statistical probability would suggest that someone out there has to be this unlucky, and it looks like it's you. Thanks for taking one for the team. 🙂

i wonder who has the flip side of my bad luck...?

😆 amazing run of luck.

I think it might be you actually...

I think you've been a bit unlucky but I do tend to think that rather than selling us new wheel sizes perhaps the industry could concentrate on selling us things that don't snap in half halfway up a mountain.

Far too many warranties are just a numbers game these days.

So you bought 2 Norcos which were wrong, so you bought a third!
Alarm bells.

Is this all from Evans - do you work there?
If so, don't buy an Evil 🙂

Ditto - sounds like bad luck?

Admittedly, I build all my bikes from separate components that tend to be higher quality than OEM where it matters (anything with bearings in it) - and they are generally hardtails - but I've had literally nothing fail in the last 15 years from anything other than high mileage.

One of my Hope hubs is 10 years old, has been in daily use across MTB and commuting and has the original bearings!

maybe i should buy an Evil, their business model seems to be that the bikes are designed to fail, so with my luck i should get the one that stays together!!

Im not sure that Id gamble on that one with your luck + their warranty rep....

at least the warranties have been good to you

You seem to be a bad luck sponge, sucking it up for the rest of us.

Cheers 🙂

(there are some quality products out there, try buying those instead)

i wonder who has the flip side of my bad luck...?

I snapped a chain in 2006.

😉

Actually, i'm not really that lucky. But most of my kit gets worn out through use rather than just failing. Maybe it's time to move the focus of your cheap/strong/light calculation?

And yes, i'd agree there is a lot of poorly made stuff out there, but then again, there always has been to a degree. It's just now it gets everywhere, but with slightly different badges on it......

I reckon we've all had good luck as Dave has done us all a favour and bought the factory friday afternoon shit bikes..

I'll say it for all of us..

Thank you Dave 😀

Its not from buying cheap/low quality stuff either. We are talking top end Factory Fox forks, XT, XTR, Exposure lights, Non OEM Pikes, Hope Wheels etc.

Its the cost of this stuff when it just isn't worth it imo that is whats annoying me. The Mondraker for example, Box fresh £4k retail. Fox Factory forks, X01 etc, near top end stuff and a shed load of money.

Forks rattled from the off. and its a "Common Problem" apparently, as is the crowns failing. you'd think this sort of thing would be ironed out by now? I've had 5 sets of forks fail in the last 4 years on the crowns and at least 3 mates who've had similar. All we are doing is trail riding..

Also, manufacturers that simply cannot make a pivot point that lasts. They all seem to cut costs on the bearings, the one thing that ties the frames together. Mondraker, Saracen, Norco, Specialized, Kona to name but a few. all of these i've seen bearings fail in stupidly short times, from days to a few months.

We spend a fortune on these things and they are marketed as suitable for "X" (i know to take marketing with more than a pinch of salt) when they plainly cannot, in my case at least (and a few mates i should point out)

All i'll say is thank god for warranties!!

@golddigger, you are welcome!

Lol sorry mate couldn't resist..

I would have lost it with all them problems.

I am close to ending my 30 year relationship with mountain bikes i tell you! 😆

At least i now know that yes it can just be me!

I should offer my fault finding services up to the highest bidder...

If anyone wants to buy me a beer next time im on the surrey hills to say thanks for saving you all from the rubbish products that would be ace.. 😆

Can I recommend something a bit less involved?

Crown green bowling perhaps? 😆

Snapped a shimano chain once and had puncture last year..

Are you buying all the kit that's been returned to a retailer "under warranty" and is being sold off in an end of season staff sale?

nope!

You should have kept that shonky 650B sample bike : )

.. Or did you quietly wreck that too?!

I kept buying ****y brands and they kept being ropey. Last 2 bikes I bought were from massive boring brands and they're properly designed and made. Breakthrough!

Serious tip: buy a 100mm steel hardtail.

Nobeerinthefridge - Member

Can I recommend something a bit less involved?

Crown green bowling perhaps?

He'd end up with square balls.

^^ 😆

@JamesO that thing was awesome and definitely not on the list, so yeah, should have kept that!!

And don't even get me started on the insane number of Reverbs i've been trough...

I hear the Reverb skip behind Fisher is close to overflowing now... 😉

the past 4 full suss frames i`ve owned are all out of alignment (i just put a spacer on teh axle). bizarrely the commencal was not but that just cracked.

they are all second hand though.

i think most people just dont notice (or dont want to) if something is wrong (unless its really bad).

it's you. And your insistence on buying brands that have previously let you down. Why on earth would you buy a THIRD Norco? (probably predicated by getting that trade discount you mentioned so I assume you work at Evans?)

I had the fork brace on a pair of 1997 Manitou SX-Tis crack whilst still under warranty (they replaced the lowers). And a Raceface external BB that lasted 3 rides (I replaced the bearings). Other than that I'm struggling (I bought a London Road with a clown's pocket seat tube, and a Kona Process assembled buy a clown, but both went back without being used so didn't fail in my ownership).

we must be related !!!

its not just the Norcos, it is EVERYTHING i buy, doesn't seem to matter what it is.. and it doesn't seem to matter how i ride, 99% of my riding is surrey hills.

beano68, did i here a little "me too" there??

Maybe try buying a bike from companies that don't change stuff so frequently - Like Giant or Trek.

I have a riding mate who had a whole series of issues with a Radon and some with a Whyte but no one else who bought them had any problems at all.

I had a Giant Reign 2009 which came from a mate and I owned for the last 4 years; apart from the BB shell being eaten by the cups (which might have been my own fault) it would still be on the go today and it had worked hard all its life.

alot of people dont ride very hard either are you a 'sender' or a 'mincer'?

and surrey hills eats components. especially if you ride regularly there when its wet. i can almost feel my bike disintegrating as i ride there.

luckily i buy very few 'new' components so most of my stuff is already beta tested.

Sand doesn't weld things on wrong though, and i rarely get to the point that things are worn out, brake pads are about it in that regard!

i didn't say i don't ride hard, i just feel that we are now at a point that the issues i have had really shouldn't be happening anymore, the manufacturers of all components have had more than enough time to iron out "known problems"

might I ask are you a BIG guy?

6'2", 13 stone. so reasonably big, but, a lot of this stuff has broken or been damaged [u]before[/u] riding, thats my point. i am not breaking it through riding, it is purely rubbish QC, like the ISCG mounts not welded on properly, twice, forks having no oil in, knackered wheels, twice from the factory etc..
If it was me actually snapping and breaking and wearing out things through crashing etc then i could put up with it, but its not.

I've sent roughly 30% of my stuff back including a frame, a fork, Fox knee pads, Funn seatpost, Azonic jockey wheels, Tenn waterproof shorts and a Mavic wheel with play in the hub from new.

Mainly manufacturing faults/cost reduced design choices and retailers (CRC) taking the piss sending out damaged customer returns.

External Shimano bottom brackets last about a year and fail with a dry seized bearing on the non-drive side. Correctly torqued in 3 different frames.

Most tyres across several brands (except Bontrager thus far) seem to buckle with ease within the first few rides IME. Might be my riding style that's to blame, I'm no Kelly Mcgarry! nor do I run XC tyres or pressures below 22 psi.

On the other hand some of my gear has performed better than expected and has proved to be good quality for the money.

My guess is a lot of stuff now is contract manufactured in the Far East - which probably makes QC much harder to manage than having your own factory, being able to recruit your own employees and run your own processes and procedures etc

I've not had the experience you've had though, and I've bought a lot of different bikes over the years. Exposure did fix or replace by Flash and Flare about 4 times though! On the other hand I have a 10 year old Joystick still going strong

It's the cheap parts that are hidden when you buy a complete bike that get me. I had a bottom bracket that lasted 12 months, replaced with a Hope one, which is still going strong 4 years later.
I bought a Scott Scale last year, a really nice carbon hardtail, but already the rear hub and headset have gone. I have ridden it a lot though!

I'm easily pleased but I love to see real full groupsets and proper headsets- my Voodoo came with 105 everything including cassette and chain, and a real cartridge fsa headset and the like. It makes no economic sense, this, it'll cost the company way more than any benefit they can gain but it's cool.