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Is Trek trying to rip me off?

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#21 ·
Two things:

One, it looks to me like a spacer of some sort has been left out of the equation. There's no way any kind of normal or even fairly radical use bent your frame in that manner.

Two, I've learned that the bike mechanics at individual Trek stores have a WIDE RANGE of abilities. A friend's experience at the local shop showed poor troubleshooting skills and a truly appalling lack of attention to detail.

Question: what happens when you loosen the axel as if you were preparing to take out of the frame?
 
#22 ·
runnindave said:
Trek's warranty and CS is among the best?

Not in my case.

Looking like it's going to be a month before I get my bike back. They ordered parts on Monday and they still haven't arrived. Then they tell me that they will have to ship my frame to trek. Then trek will have to decide whether or not to replace the frame and if so, ship a new frame. Then rebuild the bike.

So 4 to 6 weeks to resolve a problem caused by a defective frame. Meanwhile I'm on my group ride on a citibike rental.

They are very apologetic, but apparently not enough to overnight the parts or use the exact same frame they have in stock.

Yes a prime example of top notch customer service.
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I feel your pain, but not all issues can be resolved as quickly as we want. Have you worked with other brands that offered better CS?

Sounds like Trek needs to inspect your frame in order to determine what happened. Fairly standard for odd warranty claims such as yours. They are not in the business of giving away frames. Why parts were ordered when a frame replacement was under consideration is a head scratcher.

FWIW, Trek handled my two warranty claims (a frame replacement and a hub replacement) quickly and to my 100 percent satisfaction. My issues were relatively obvious failures, however.

You said you didn't want this thread to turn into a rant, but it's starting to do just that.
 
Discussion starter · #23 ·
Just got back from the trek store. Spoiler alert, the bike is in my possession and will be my ride next week.

First thing to do is to make sure that we all understand that the problem is very unusual and was temporarily resolved by using an xt caliper. Nothing dubious, that I would have done. It is possible that something was wrong when it came from the factory and was only revealed after removing the back wheel for the first time. We were all comparing the two staches at the store. We replaced wheels and drop outs from the working bike and we all agreed that the section on the left dropout seems out of alignment and not caused by any thing that I did.

Anyway I was irritated last night after being told that I would have to wait weeks to get my bike back. However I decided to go by the shop and with a calm demeanor just see what my options were and what we needed to do to get the bike working.

We discussed the options and we decided to go with the different caliper that they had laying around. Then when the Christmas rush passed we would come back and address the frame issue.

Customer service is still in question for the company in general, but the mechanics desire to assist in the process of getting me working was commendable. They are in the heat of their busy season and he helped me get running.

Thanks for the feedback from everyone, and I hope I will be able to contribute to forum in the future to assist someone else with issues like this.
 
#26 ·
Hey @runnindave, sorry I didn't jump on here sooner (away for the holidays). I completely understand the frustration with how your experience has been so far, but our teams #1 priority is to make sure that you're happy. When dealing with any sort of warranty claim, our focus is to try to eliminate all possibilities by starting with simple fixes before we just issue out a new frame or bike. Looking at photos never gives us the best opportunity to examine the frame which is why we sometimes ask for it to be brought up to Waterloo.

I'm glad to see that the caliper change was the fix however. This could likely have been the fix - either way, we'll work with your local dealer to make sure you're fixed up! Feel free to PM me if you have any questions that I could answer since I'll see those before I see the comments here during the holidays.

Happy Holidays and Merry Christmas!
 
Discussion starter · #28 ·
New Year, nothing new

I had a great ride over the holidays riding with the temp brake caliper and I was looking forward to getting back to the Trek shop to get my bike back to normal. Knowing that it's been two weeks since the replacement parts were sent, I was hoping that they would be able to try to install the new parts and find that it fixed the problem.

But no, there were no parts.:madman: Not surprised, and I just laughed. Lots of excuses...
Also Was told on Saturday that he would check on the parts and he would call me back.

Still no call. But this is typical... This is an experiment to me now.
 
#29 ·
runnindave said:
I had a great ride over the holidays riding with the temp brake caliper and I was looking forward to getting back to the Trek shop to get my bike back to normal. Knowing that it's been two weeks since the replacement parts were sent, I was hoping that they would be able to try to install the new parts and find that it fixed the problem.

But no, there were no parts.:madman: Not surprised, and I just laughed. Lots of excuses...
Also Was told on Saturday that he would check on the parts and he would call me back.

Still no call. But this is typical... This is an experiment to me now.
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Drop me a DM with the shop, your bike's serial number, the part numbers and any other relevant details not on here and I can see what the hold up is.
 
#30 ·
Trek Warranty

I have owned six Trek bikes since the 1980s and still own three of them today. During that period, I have dealt with Trek authorized retailers, Trek corporate retail stores, and directly with Trek - for many issues such as

- product support,
- technical questions,
- small part orders,
- discounts,
- project one paint questions,
- LOANER BIKES,
- frame, fork, and wheels WARRANTY,
- plus many other items.

I can only say that I am 100% satisfied with all of my dealings, directly and indirectly with the company.

Like in dealing with any customer service departments, you just have to be PATIENT.
 
#31 ·
runnindave said:
I had a great ride over the holidays riding with the temp brake caliper and I was looking forward to getting back to the Trek shop to get my bike back to normal. Knowing that it's been two weeks since the replacement parts were sent, I was hoping that they would be able to try to install the new parts and find that it fixed the problem.

But no, there were no parts.:madman: Not surprised, and I just laughed. Lots of excuses...
Also Was told on Saturday that he would check on the parts and he would call me back.

Still no call. But this is typical... This is an experiment to me now.
Click to expand...
Weird situation dave.
Sounds like the bike shop is on the receiving end of what / when Trek ships the parts or they being available. I'd guess they are having no more fun with this than you are.

I'd utilize Mitch@trek as he offered to get things moving or tracked then you can post here with updates as things happen.

It may not be the case but if you come here first, it appears you are more willing or interested in catching them screwing up to post about it rather than employ the company rep as he asked / offered.
If so,use your own time and efforts more effectively and you might save yourself from dread or feeling frustrated.

I love seeing company reps pop in here to post, participate and help !!
:rockon:
 
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Discussion starter · #32 ·
bachman1961 said:
Weird situation dave.

It may not be the case but if you come here first, it appears you are more willing or interested in catching them screwing up to post about it rather than employ the company rep as he asked / offered.

:rockon:
Click to expand...
I contacted Mitch and it seems that we're making progress.

My original post was to ask about the experience of warranty issues, and it did turn into a mild rant. Glad I did though, might not have been able to connect with Mitch otherwise.

True that I am interested in seeing how this progresses, and it is also good to post it on this thread. Future readers with similar problems will have an idea on how to resolve their problem.
 
#33 ·
Excellent !

If you haven't yet, let the bike shop know you might be getting some help from the rep so they don't think you sic'd him on them !! lol
Good luck .
 
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#34 ·
On my Alu framed Stache, the proximity of that caliper body bolt is dependent on the position of the dropouts in the adjustment. Mine can go from over a cm to almost touching depending on whether the sliders are forward or not. In addition I had to buy a new dropout when another carbon Stache I own got stepped on in a race. After installing the new part the caliper was in a different place (other side of the oval holes) even with all the parts except the dropout remaining the same. Those things may not be held to the tightest dimensions when we are talking about where the caliper ends up. It is hard to say from my uninformed position here on the other end of the internet, but I think there is a real chance new parts may "fix" it.

I've had a few warranty claims on Trek bikes and they have all been sorted in a reasonable fashion with minimal BS. I can't say that about two other brands I've dealt with, and it means something to me. The last 5 out of 6 new bikes in my household have been Trek brand bikes. Mitch has been good about helping even in cases when it hasn't been a positive thread. He deserves credit for representing his employer even when the news isn't all roses. I couldn't do what he does. I hope everything gets sorted.
 
Discussion starter · #35 ·
Myself, and the mechanic at Trek were not able to resolve the issue with new parts. It is looking like a problem with the frame. It is a mystery and I was able to have a great conversation with Mitch yesterday about this.

Mitch agreed to send a new frame out to the Trek store and get my bike up and running. Going to miss my old frame since it has the black decals on matte black frame, one of the main reasons I bought that Stache 5, the new one has blue decals. sigh.

Either way, I think here in a week or so I will be able to go for a ride.

Thanks Mitch for you help on this and so far so good.
 
#36 ·
I'd bet with the proper measuring tools, it'll be pretty straightforward comparing a good fit/ aligned caliper and frame to the problematic one to see what or where the variance is.

Trek's interest will be how this one got out of the bag if such is the case.
 
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Discussion starter · #37 ·
bachman1961 said:
Trek's interest will be how this one got out of the bag if such is the case.
Click to expand...
It will equally be in my interest. It seems to be a one off, or there is something that the mechanic at Trek is completely missing. Doubt it though, if you replace everything but the frame and nothing works, logically you replace the frame.

Now to figure out how to burn off the Blue Trek decals. :)
 
Discussion starter · #38 ·
Ok we are back and rolling

I called Trek yesterday and the guys told me my bike is ready to roll. The old frame is on its way to Waterloo for analysis.

The thinking is that its probably something I did when I was adjusting the stranglehold drop outs. So I talked to the mechanic to see what I need to avoid doing so it doesnt bend the frame in the future. We spent about 10 seconds speculating what may have happened. No idea really.

Still not sure what I could have done to bend the frame, but either way Trek replaced the frame and didnt give me a lot of hastle about how it got bent. Unlikely that it came from the factory that way, but also unlikely that I did anything just taking the wheel on and off.

Thanks Mitch and the team at the Trek store for getting me back and rolling. Ill try to make sure that I will take some extra care when working with the strangleholds.

Also the trek decals are going to stay. they look pretty cool. Forum wont let me post a picture, so you will have to take my word for it.
 
#40 ·
runnindave said:
I called Trek yesterday and the guys told me my bike is ready to roll. The old frame is on its way to Waterloo for analysis.

The thinking is that its probably something I did when I was adjusting the stranglehold drop outs. So I talked to the mechanic to see what I need to avoid doing so it doesnt bend the frame in the future. We spent about 10 seconds speculating what may have happened. No idea really.

Still not sure what I could have done to bend the frame, but either way Trek replaced the frame and didnt give me a lot of hastle about how it got bent. Unlikely that it came from the factory that way, but also unlikely that I did anything just taking the wheel on and off.

Thanks Mitch and the team at the Trek store for getting me back and rolling. Ill try to make sure that I will take some extra care when working with the strangleholds.

Also the trek decals are going to stay. they look pretty cool. Forum wont let me post a picture, so you will have to take my word for it.
Click to expand...
Glad to hear it. Bike issues are never fun, but as has been said in here I think Trek is one of the best out there at standing behind their product.
 
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