R
Roja Doja
Guest
Hello again,
I posted here about a month ago, enquiring about how much I
should spend on a new bike. After reading the many helpful
responses, I bought a new Trek 3500 with semi-slick tyres
and was happily riding it to work and back every day.
On Tuesday, I was almost home, cycled off the road onto the
pavement near my house, and before I knew it I'd gone over
the front and hit the ground, the bike flipped over once and
then stopped. When I picked myself and the bike up, I
noticed I couldn't push the bike as the wheel was bent quite
badly. Since the bike didn't hit anything else after I fell
off, I can only assume that the wheel must've bent as I hit
the kerb, and the bent wheel was what caused me to crash
(it's a perfectly straight bit of road pavement, not the
sort of place where you think anyone could have an
accident). In the fall I fractured my radius near the elbow,
which is proving to be a considerable nuisance!
I hit the kerb between pavement and road where the pavement
ramps down to the road, so the kerb was not more than 2 or
3 cm high. It was at quite an oblique angle (i.e. I went up
the kerb almost parallel to it , not straight at it) and I
was doing about 20mph or less. Should this cause a MTB
wheel to fail?
I took it back to the shop today, expecting sympathy,
explanations, a replacement wheel and perhaps apologies. I
didn't get any of that. Looking at the wheel, they agreed it
must've been some sideways force that bent the wheel, as
there were no marks on the rim that would've indicated a big
impact from the front, they looked at it in more detail the
workshop, then said it was too bent to repair and suggested
I buy a new one. I was pretty incensed at this, and
suggested that a 3 week old mountain bike wheel should not
be expected to fail going over a 3cm kerb at 20 mph, and
that as such it wasn't fit for its purpose. They looked at
me with disbelief, shrugged and said the only other thing
they could do was send it back to Trek for analysis and see
what Trek had to say, so I agreed to that.
Am I going mad? Assuming you believe I'm telling the truth,
and that I really didn't ride it into a wall at 50mph or
something similary stupid, shouldn't a mountain bike wheel
take a bit more stick than this? Doesn't the fact that the
wheel is badly bent indicate that it's failed? Shouldn't the
shop be a bit more sympathetic??
Roger
I posted here about a month ago, enquiring about how much I
should spend on a new bike. After reading the many helpful
responses, I bought a new Trek 3500 with semi-slick tyres
and was happily riding it to work and back every day.
On Tuesday, I was almost home, cycled off the road onto the
pavement near my house, and before I knew it I'd gone over
the front and hit the ground, the bike flipped over once and
then stopped. When I picked myself and the bike up, I
noticed I couldn't push the bike as the wheel was bent quite
badly. Since the bike didn't hit anything else after I fell
off, I can only assume that the wheel must've bent as I hit
the kerb, and the bent wheel was what caused me to crash
(it's a perfectly straight bit of road pavement, not the
sort of place where you think anyone could have an
accident). In the fall I fractured my radius near the elbow,
which is proving to be a considerable nuisance!
I hit the kerb between pavement and road where the pavement
ramps down to the road, so the kerb was not more than 2 or
3 cm high. It was at quite an oblique angle (i.e. I went up
the kerb almost parallel to it , not straight at it) and I
was doing about 20mph or less. Should this cause a MTB
wheel to fail?
I took it back to the shop today, expecting sympathy,
explanations, a replacement wheel and perhaps apologies. I
didn't get any of that. Looking at the wheel, they agreed it
must've been some sideways force that bent the wheel, as
there were no marks on the rim that would've indicated a big
impact from the front, they looked at it in more detail the
workshop, then said it was too bent to repair and suggested
I buy a new one. I was pretty incensed at this, and
suggested that a 3 week old mountain bike wheel should not
be expected to fail going over a 3cm kerb at 20 mph, and
that as such it wasn't fit for its purpose. They looked at
me with disbelief, shrugged and said the only other thing
they could do was send it back to Trek for analysis and see
what Trek had to say, so I agreed to that.
Am I going mad? Assuming you believe I'm telling the truth,
and that I really didn't ride it into a wall at 50mph or
something similary stupid, shouldn't a mountain bike wheel
take a bit more stick than this? Doesn't the fact that the
wheel is badly bent indicate that it's failed? Shouldn't the
shop be a bit more sympathetic??
Roger