Funny/sad/horrible story @ my shop today, need serious help

[Phil, Squid-in-Training]

I'm embarrassed to tell this story.

Today at close, there was this guy who had ridden across the country from LA
to NYC, and then down to FL. He's riding a Felt F1 with a Rolf deep-dish
front and Rev-X rear, DA everything. Everything else he owns is in his
small bicycle trailer. He's broke with a 4-figure bicycle, and he wants his
headset examined.

A less experienced coworker of mine begins to help him out, taking the
bearing out of the Chris King headset. Ping and balls go flying. Toast. I
tell him I'm not sure, but I think replacement bearings are available
without replacing the whole headset. Great, he says. He has a Campy Record
headset with him that we can install.

My coworker isn't too familiar with more intricate bicycle repairs, and
begins to install the Record headset. I point him to the cup extractor. No
problems getting them out. Then he assembles the C-Record headset and
notices a space at the bottom. Did you remove the crown race, I say. He's
not sure what I'm talking about. I then show him the Park extractor and
show him how it's used. Comes off fine. I then hand him the incorrect
crown race setter to set the crown race. Bang, bang, bang goes the hammer.

My mind wanders back to the S-Works Epic I was building up. My mind
returns. ****, ****, ****! I tell him to stop and I review the situation.
It only has a 1/8 of an inch to go the owner says. Little does he know.

I twist the race setter. Doesn't budge. It's now pressed onto the fork
steerer along with the C-Record crown race. There's no easy way to torque a
crown race setter off a carbon Ouzo Pro, so I sit and think of options.
Using the crown race extractor, we try to get both the setter and race off
at the same time. Extractor yields, the hardened steel plates cracking at
the points of highest stress. Lots of swearing and fear of losing my job.

Boss 1 of 2 likes to go apeshit. I think about what he would want me to do.
"Get it done" he always says. I think about cutting off the crown race
setter with a pipe cutter. Ten minutes later, I've cut down to ~28mm. 3mm
to go, I tell myself. I resort to the Dremel in hopes that I can relieve
expansion stress of the steerer on the setter. I cut down to just nicking
the steerer. No good. I switch back to the pipe cutter. I get it down to
25mm, and then 24mm. It doesn't look like it's cut through the setter, but
it's too small to have not cut through the steerer. I stop. Customer is
extremely calm in front of me for all of what just happened. He gets a ride
home with my roommate who happened to be visiting the shop. It's now 1.75
hrs after close. We look up prices for a new Ouzo Pro and Campy Record
crown race. Not bone-shattering.

I feel like ****... mope on home. Roommate tells me how customer was
frustrated on the way to his campsite. I compare the feeling to how I felt
when I went to jail... a little worse actually.

Bottom line: my coworker worked on the bike, but I gave him the wrong tool
to use. If worse comes to worse, we can pay the shop back for a
replacement. But, shop owners, what would you do? What would be my fate?

Does anyone have any ideas of how to remove the crown race setter from the
expanded part of the steerer at the very bottom?

--
Phil, Squid-in-Training (screwed big time)

 

[Mark Hickey]

"Phil, Squid-in-Training" <[email protected]>
wrote:

>I'm embarrassed to tell this story.
<tale of woe mercifully snipped>

I hope that your story will prevent it from happening to anyone else
though...

>Does anyone have any ideas of how to remove the crown race setter from the
>expanded part of the steerer at the very bottom?

you might try heating it (not TOO hot of course, since it's a CF steer
tube), since it shouldn't take too much expansion to release it.

I suppose you could take it to a machine shop and have them install it
on a lathe and turn down the race setter (might just work).

Mark Hickey
Habanero Cycles
http://www.habcycles.com
Home of the $695 ti frame

 

[Phil, Squid-in-Training]

> you might try heating it (not TOO hot of course, since it's a CF steer
> tube), since it shouldn't take too much expansion to release it.

My apologies... it was actually an Ouzo Comp, not a Pro, so Al steerer.

> I suppose you could take it to a machine shop and have them install it
> on a lathe and turn down the race setter (might just work).

Good idea... will try if the fork ends up in my or my coworker's possession.

Definitely won't happen again

--
Phil, Squid-in-Training

 

[psycholist]

"Phil, Squid-in-Training" <[email protected]> wrote in
message news:[email protected]...
> I'm embarrassed to tell this story.
>
> Today at close, there was this guy who had ridden across the country from
> LA to NYC, and then down to FL. He's riding a Felt F1 with a Rolf
> deep-dish front and Rev-X rear, DA everything. Everything else he owns is
> in his small bicycle trailer. He's broke with a 4-figure bicycle, and he
> wants his headset examined.
>
> A less experienced coworker of mine begins to help him out, taking the
> bearing out of the Chris King headset. Ping and balls go flying. Toast.
> I tell him I'm not sure, but I think replacement bearings are available
> without replacing the whole headset. Great, he says. He has a Campy
> Record headset with him that we can install.
>
> My coworker isn't too familiar with more intricate bicycle repairs, and
> begins to install the Record headset. I point him to the cup extractor.
> No problems getting them out. Then he assembles the C-Record headset and
> notices a space at the bottom. Did you remove the crown race, I say.
> He's not sure what I'm talking about. I then show him the Park extractor
> and show him how it's used. Comes off fine. I then hand him the
> incorrect crown race setter to set the crown race. Bang, bang, bang goes
> the hammer.
>
> My mind wanders back to the S-Works Epic I was building up. My mind
> returns. ****, ****, ****! I tell him to stop and I review the
> situation. It only has a 1/8 of an inch to go the owner says. Little does
> he know.
>
> I twist the race setter. Doesn't budge. It's now pressed onto the fork
> steerer along with the C-Record crown race. There's no easy way to torque
> a crown race setter off a carbon Ouzo Pro, so I sit and think of options.
> Using the crown race extractor, we try to get both the setter and race off
> at the same time. Extractor yields, the hardened steel plates cracking at
> the points of highest stress. Lots of swearing and fear of losing my job.
>
> Boss 1 of 2 likes to go apeshit. I think about what he would want me to
> do. "Get it done" he always says. I think about cutting off the crown
> race setter with a pipe cutter. Ten minutes later, I've cut down to
> ~28mm. 3mm to go, I tell myself. I resort to the Dremel in hopes that I
> can relieve expansion stress of the steerer on the setter. I cut down to
> just nicking the steerer. No good. I switch back to the pipe cutter. I
> get it down to 25mm, and then 24mm. It doesn't look like it's cut through
> the setter, but it's too small to have not cut through the steerer. I
> stop. Customer is extremely calm in front of me for all of what just
> happened. He gets a ride home with my roommate who happened to be
> visiting the shop. It's now 1.75 hrs after close. We look up prices for
> a new Ouzo Pro and Campy Record crown race. Not bone-shattering.
>
> I feel like ****... mope on home. Roommate tells me how customer was
> frustrated on the way to his campsite. I compare the feeling to how I
> felt when I went to jail... a little worse actually.
>
> Bottom line: my coworker worked on the bike, but I gave him the wrong tool
> to use. If worse comes to worse, we can pay the shop back for a
> replacement. But, shop owners, what would you do? What would be my fate?
>
> Does anyone have any ideas of how to remove the crown race setter from the
> expanded part of the steerer at the very bottom?
>
> --
> Phil, Squid-in-Training (screwed big time)

I don't own a bike shop, but I own a business. I have about 25 employees.
They make mistakes. So do I. If I know they feel bad for their mistakes
and are resolved to do their best to avoid repeating them, then I say, "so
it goes." The company is better able to bear the expense than the employee.
(It's another matter if there's a "so what" kind of attitude about it.)
Mistakes happen. I try to be reasonable about it. I think most good
managers realize that if you create a lot of pressure about it, the result
is more mistakes ... not fewer.

I think about the convenience store down the street where the cashier tells
me she has to pay if a customer drives off without paying. That seems so
wrong to me. The cashier is completely distracted from what's going on
inside the store 'cuz she's always looking out the window at the people
pumping gas. I often wonder how much merchandise has been shoplifted that
went unnoticed.

It's clear from reading your post that you sincerely feel badly for your
mistake and for the consequences to your customer and your boss. And you've
said it won't happen again. The only thing further I'd expect from you is
that you see it through to whatever extent you have to in order to get the
customer rolling again. If I owned the shop, I'd pay for the
out-of-pockets. You'd get your normal pay, but anything extra you had to do
for that customer would be on you. But that's easy for me to say. I don't
own the shop.

Good luck. Let us know how it works out.

Bob C.

 

[James Thomson]

"Phil, Squid-in-Training" <[email protected]> wrote:

> I switch back to the pipe cutter. I get it down to 25mm, and then 24mm.
> It doesn't look like it's cut through the setter, but it's too small to
> have not cut through the steerer. I stop.

It sounds as though the cutter has also crimped the setter to the steerer
at this point. You didn't mention where on the steerer you were making the
cut, but don't count on having any usable length above this point, and I
doubt that heat will free the setter.

Horrible story. You have my sympathy. Let us know how you get on today.

James Thomson

 

[[email protected]]

On Mon, 24 Jan 2005 08:12:48 GMT, "Phil, Squid-in-Training"
<[email protected]> wrote:

[snip]

Dear Phil,

I once thought that I'd made a mistake, but it turned out
that I was wrong.

Be glad that it was only an inanimate object, fix or replace
it if you can, and resolve to be understanding if a plumber
ever makes a mistake and floods your basement.

Carl Fogel

 

[Zog The Undeniable]

[email protected] wrote:

> Be glad that it was only an inanimate object, fix or replace
> it if you can, and resolve to be understanding if a plumber
> ever makes a mistake and floods your basement.

Or burn the shop and claim force majeure.

 

[Derk]

Zog The Undeniable wrote:


> Or burn the shop and claim force majeure.
It all started with a very small problem that we are not to blame for,
officer!


Greets, Derk

 

[David B.]

OK, let's review...

This coworker of yours -
* Can't disassemble a headset without losing the bearings
* Doesn't know what a crown race is
* Uses an impact tool on an expensive part without understanding
exactly what he's doing

The real question is why this guy was on the shop floor in the first
place. Its the shop's fault for hiring this idiot...Its very nice that
you take so much ownership of your work, if I had a shop I'd hire you
in a second. But this isn't your fault at all. If you get fired, its
probably a blessing in disguise...what a lousy shop.

On an unrelated note, this anecdote makes me so glad I don't live in
NYC anymore and don't have to deal with horrible New York bikeshops. I
have seen consistently shoddy work done by just about every shop in the
city...Habo, Metro, ANewGen, R&A (bad work AND bad attitude). The good
thing is that living there finally gave me the incentive to invest in
enough tools to do all my own work.

 

[Donald Gillies]

"Phil, Squid-in-Training" <[email protected]> writes:

>I'm embarrassed to tell this story.

If a customer knocks a jar off the shelf at a grocery store, the store
covers the jar. It's a cost of doing business.

If a mechanic makes a minor mistake and destroys something in a bike
shop, the shop should cover the price of the mistake. It's a cost of
doing business. A good mechanic should only do this rarely, e.g. less
than once per month.

However, a reynolds fork is a major mistake. I remember when we had
our house built when i was a little kid. the foreman fired a worker
because he bent too many nails. the worker's conduct was
unprofessional. Such a worker is a danger to others and to the
financial health of the team or bike shop.

I do not envy you our your friend. I would say that even if you paid
for the cost of the fork, your job(s) might still be in jeopardy.

- Don Gillies
San Diego, CA

 

[Donald Gillies]

"Phil, Squid-in-Training" <[email protected]>
writes:

>I'm embarrassed to tell this story.

If a customer knocks a jar off the shelf at a grocery store, the store
covers the jar. It's a cost of doing business.

If a mechanic makes a minor mistake and destroys something in a bike
shop, the shop should cover the price of the mistake. It's a cost of
doing business. A professional mechanic should only do this rarely,
e.g. maybe a couple of times per year.

However, destroying a reynolds fork is a major mistake. The shop must
cover this mistake. I remember when we had our house built when i was
a little kid. the foreman fired a worker because he bent too many
nails. the worker's conduct was unprofessional. Such a worker is a
danger to others and to the financial health of the work team or bike
shop.

I do not envy you and especially your friend. I would say that even
if you got together and paid for the cost of the fork, your friend's
job might still be in jeopardy.

- Don Gillies
San Diego, CA

 

[Boyle M. Owl]

Donald Gillies wrote:

> I do not envy you our your friend. I would say that even if you paid
> for the cost of the fork, your job(s) might still be in jeopardy.

I disagree.

Stuff happens. Indeed, the prices of the things you guys bat around
here, even the expensive stuff, _pales_ in comparison to the stuff I
make every day, and I work in a small business (80 people give or take).

Crashing a die in a power press comes to thousands of dollars (and
that's just repair, not including press down-time at $300/hr). Nobody
gets fired because of it. Shrug it off and *learn* from the experience.
If you get fired because of an honest mistake (assuming you're not in
the habit of making mistakes), then you SHOULD work for someone
else...someone BETTER. Indeed, if you work under the threat of being
fired every day, you *will* make mistakes. It's inevitable. Such a
management style is simply setting up the worker to fail from the
get-go. (been there, done that, got the teeshirt, now it's a bike rag)

What needs to be assessed is if Phil's cow-orker is unfit for his job or
simply needs more training. If unfit, as in not mechanically adept and
unable to grasp mechanical concepts, then he needs to be "reassigned to
marketing himself"(fired). If the person simply needs more training
(and it sounds like it), then they're just going to have to train the
individual, especially if he was hired with no experience.

It's as simple as that, because if the guy that broke the fork is fired
over a training issue, the owner of the business will have to find
another low-paid body to work at the shop as Phil's helper (working in a
bike shop ain't about the money, that's for damn sure.), and Phil will
have to start all over again training the new body and he's right back
where he started.

And training a new body ain't free. It's definitely more expensive than
the busted fork.

I wonder what Sheldon has to say about all this...

--
BMO

 

[Neil Brooks]

Boyle M. Owl wrote:

> I wonder what Sheldon has to say about all this...

Time for a new acronym: W.W.S.D.

??

 

[Andy Morris]

Phil, Squid-in-Training wrote:
> Bottom line: my coworker worked on the bike, but I gave him the wrong
> tool to use. If worse comes to worse, we can pay the shop back for a
> replacement. But, shop owners, what would you do? What would be my
> fate?

I used to be apartner in a shop so:

"we can pay the shop back"

No mate you could pay the shop back, your coworker was junior to you and
used the tool you gave him..

I'd want to know that you understood and accept responsibility for the damge
the damage both in terms of the cost of parts and making the shop look like
a bunch of cowboys. If you do theres no point in rubbing your nose in it and
it would be unfair to expect you to cough up.

If you can't accept that you blobed there no point in trying to get you to
understand, and I wouldn't make your work out your notice. If I was in a bad
mood I might take the cost out of your pay-in-lieu, but I'd regret it.

I'd also hope that you can work out the root cause, in terms of not
understanding your co-workers ability, of not understanding the risks
involved when delegating delicate tasks to juinor staff who my be either
overconfident and keep wacking away, or to timid and keep wacking away
because you told them to.

Theres are also issues of allowing yourself to be pressured into doing a
hasty job, of the reasons we don't do work in front of customers, of why we
don't chat to customers while we work.

If you can learn from all that, you'll be ok.

> Does anyone have any ideas of how to remove the crown race setter
> from the expanded part of the steerer at the very bottom?
>
Buggered if I know.

--
Andy Morris

AndyAtJinkasDotFreeserve.Co.UK

Love this:
Put an end to Outlook Express's messy quotes
http://home.in.tum.de/~jain/software/oe-quotefix/

 

[B.B.]

In article <[email protected]>,
"Phil, Squid-in-Training" <[email protected]>
wrote:

[...stuck thing woes...]

If you ever again have a destroyable round thing pressed around a
non-destroyable round thing, use and anvil and a cold chisel. In this
case set the setter on an anvil (or a vise's fixed jaw, or concrete
floor, even) and use a cold chisel to put score marks around the
outside. Ought to make little lines parallel to the tube. Do a bunch,
like eight or twelve, space 'em as even as you can. Thicker things need
more lines. If you can, grind the outside down first. THEN try a
puller. Sometimes it'll loosen enough to pop off by hand.
No chisel? Ball-peen hammer can do it too, but not quite as well.
Has worked for me even on big, nasty, non-bike parts.
Also, teach the other guy to do a stupidity check before making any
moves. Teach him to ask questions like "will this fly apart?" "Will it
stick?" "What's behind it?" "What will bend?"

--
B.B. --I am not a goat! thegoat4 at airmail dot net
http://web2.airmail.net/thegoat4/

 

[Vee]

David B. wrote:
> OK, let's review...
>
> This coworker of yours -
> * Can't disassemble a headset without losing the bearings
> * Doesn't know what a crown race is
> * Uses an impact tool on an expensive part without understanding
> exactly what he's doing

King headsets use cartridge bearings. When cartridge bearings go bad,
they sometimes fall apart upon disassembly. Whether the balls are lost
is inconsequential. The rest sounds like simple inexperience...

> The real question is why this guy was on the shop floor in the first
> place. Its the shop's fault for hiring this idiot...Its very nice
that
> you take so much ownership of your work, if I had a shop I'd hire you
> in a second. But this isn't your fault at all. If you get fired,
its
> probably a blessing in disguise...what a lousy shop.

Do you think bike shop pay attracts anything other than "idiots"? I
partially agree with you - it's unfortunate that this guy was working
on a fancy bike, but he has to learn somehow. Aspiring bike mechanics
don't usually have the money for Barnett's training, and shops don't
usually have the time and resources to fully train all their monkeys.
Even with lots of training, I don't think a mechanic has learned much
until he's seriously botched a few repairs, anyways. The guys who made
this mess (hopefully) learned a lot from the experience, and, if the
shop promptly and properly fixes the bike, I don't see much to get
worked up about.

-Vee

 

[Vee]

David B. wrote:
> OK, let's review...
>
> This coworker of yours -
> * Can't disassemble a headset without losing the bearings
> * Doesn't know what a crown race is
> * Uses an impact tool on an expensive part without understanding
> exactly what he's doing

King headsets use cartridge bearings. When cartridge bearings go bad,
they sometimes fall apart upon disassembly. Whether the balls are lost
is inconsequential. The rest sounds like simple inexperience...

> The real question is why this guy was on the shop floor in the first
> place. Its the shop's fault for hiring this idiot...Its very nice
that
> you take so much ownership of your work, if I had a shop I'd hire you
> in a second. But this isn't your fault at all. If you get fired,
its
> probably a blessing in disguise...what a lousy shop.

Do you think bike shop pay attracts anything other than "idiots"? I
partially agree with you - it's unfortunate that this guy was working
on a fancy bike, but he has to learn somehow. Aspiring bike mechanics
don't usually have the money for bike maintenance classes, and shops
don't usually have the time and resources to fully train all their
monkeys. I don't think a mechanic has learned much until he's
seriously botched a few repairs, anyways. The guys who made this mess
(hopefully) learned a lot from the experience, and, if the shop
promptly and properly fixes the bike, I don't see much to get worked up
about.

-Vee

 

[Vee]

David B. wrote:
> OK, let's review...
>
> This coworker of yours -
> * Can't disassemble a headset without losing the bearings
> * Doesn't know what a crown race is
> * Uses an impact tool on an expensive part without understanding
> exactly what he's doing

King headsets use cartridge bearings. When cartridge bearings go bad,
they sometimes fall apart upon disassembly. Whether the balls are lost
is inconsequential. The rest sounds like simple inexperience...

> The real question is why this guy was on the shop floor in the first
> place. Its the shop's fault for hiring this idiot...Its very nice
that
> you take so much ownership of your work, if I had a shop I'd hire you
> in a second. But this isn't your fault at all. If you get fired,
its
> probably a blessing in disguise...what a lousy shop.

Do you think bike shop pay attracts anything other than "idiots"? I
partially agree with you - it's unfortunate that this guy was working
on a fancy bike, but he has to learn somehow. Aspiring bike mechanics
don't usually have the money for bike maintenance classes, and shops
don't usually have the time and resources to fully train all their
monkeys. I don't think a mechanic has learned much until he's
seriously botched a few repairs, anyways. The guys who made this mess
(hopefully) learned a lot from the experience, and, if the shop
promptly and properly fixes the bike, I don't see much to get worked up
about.

-Vee

 

[David B.]

Well, I read messages regularly from this guy Phil, and he's clearly
not an idiot...so obviously there are people out there willing to put
up with the low pay in order to do a job they enjoy. I imagine it must
be difficult for a guy like him who takes pride in his work to be stuck
in that kind of environment.

I agree that people have to learn by doing, and that involves making
mistakes, but this situation sounded like a little much to me.

 

[Werehatrack]

On Mon, 24 Jan 2005 08:12:48 GMT, "Phil, Squid-in-Training"
<[email protected]> may have said:

>I'm embarrassed to tell this story.
[snip]

So, how did it come out?

--
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Typoes are not a bug, they're a feature.
Words processed in a facility that contains nuts.