I received a Bora One wheel on loan from a certain FJT (Fellow Jetsetter/bike enthusiast).
I had kept what I'm about to write under wraps, but
the FJT in question said "it's okay to write about it," so here we go.
This is a Bora One purchased at Bicycle Workshop Highlander.
The wholesaler they sourced it from was probably Podium.
Since this FJT is well-versed in overseas online shopping,
no matter how cheap this Bora One was,
it's certain they didn't use the cheapest possible method to buy it.
Despite that, there's only one reason they specifically bought it in Sasayama:
the desire to support a friend who had just started a new shop
by putting money into their business.
In fact, they said they placed the order as a kind of congratulatory gift.
So given this background, when they asked for maintenance a year after purchase,
they were told "G3 laced wheels can't be trued" and the shop refused,
so they brought it to us.
Don't sell something you can't touch.
Selling and running without taking responsibility for future maintenance defeats the whole purpose of running a physical shop.
The right axle nut was loose.
The state shown in the image has been loosened a bit by hand, but
it wasn't "loosened by hand"—
it was already loose to a certain degree.
If it had been tightened during pre-sale inspection, it almost certainly wouldn't have come loose later.
Apparently the freewheel body was moving left and right along with the sprocket
during shifting and pedaling, and there were scrape marks on the hub axle.
The bearing on the outside of the freewheel body had deteriorated, so I replaced it.
I've received comments that Campagnolo freewheel body outer bearings
tend to wear particularly easily,
but I'll write about that another time.
When the FJT checked with Highlander after we inspected it,
they admitted they hadn't done a pre-sale inspection.
In cases like this, there are people who lie about doing something they didn't do—
pathetic lies—so I was somewhat impressed that they'd at least matured a bit in that regard.
I frequently end up cleaning up after Bicycle Workshop Highlander's screw-ups,
but until now I either didn't write about it or kept the shop name hidden.
Beyond just straightforward incompetence, there are many examples of work
where the justification for the labor charge is thin and
the procedures are just plain wrong.
There's the story about a Cervélo frame bike with an oval chainring
where they swapped an Ultegra front derailleur for a Dura-Ace front derailleur
because shifting was acting up.
SRAM Force rear derailleur shifting issues were brought in repeatedly,
money was stolen each time, and then on one occasion,
without prior consent, they replaced the rear derailleur with a brand new Force,
so when asked why they did that, they said "the pulley was cracked,"
so I said if that's the case you should just replace the pulley—let me see that rear derailleur,
and they responded "I already threw it away, it's gone"—that's the story.
An Easton R4SL hub with ceramic bearings that were grinding,
they were asked to replace with new ceramic bearings and left the bike,
then got a call saying "it's done," so they went to pick it up
and were told "we didn't have ceramic bearings so we put in steel ball bearings instead"—
that's the story.
But "it's done" is wrong, isn't it? If you don't have ceramic bearings, you should inform the customer beforehand
and let them choose whether to skip it or use steel balls instead.
A Trek women's Madone where pedaling produced a rattling noise—
they swapped the rear derailleur from 105 to Tiagra (probably whatever was in stock)
but the rattling noise was actually from a stiff link in the chain,
so the rear derailleur swap was completely unnecessary—that's another one.
A cyclocross tubular tire I had glued with triple-layer rim cement that they
seemingly wanted to reverse-engineer, so they peeled it off without the customer's (the FJT's) consent—
that's a story. When the cyclocross frame was dropped off, it stayed on the shop wall for an entire season—
that's also the FJT's account.
The road bike frame that was dropped off came back with dried water stains on it, mud on the tires,
andGolden Retriever correction: Corgi hair on the chain,
so it absolutely must have been left outside for ages—that's another one from the FJT.
Without being asked to do anything,
they swapped the chain for an expensive gold-colored lightweight chain that costs more than Dura-Ace,
and said "I changed it to a gold chain! Looks cool, right!"
but internally the FJT didn't think gold looked cool at all,
so they reluctantly paid—that's that story.
They made the effort to ride to Sasayama to ask for headset play adjustment on a Pinarello,
then the ride back got worse than the original condition, which was scary—
that's another one.
They built a cyclocross outer with white-red-white coloring
and said "I built it in Rising Sun colors!"
but the customer hadn't asked for that in the first place—another story.
After cutting an integrated seat tube,
to prevent carbon fiber from splintering at the cut edge,
they tried to apply instant adhesive, but it
splattered all over the seat tube and became a disaster, so they scraped it off, painted over it (the frame is black),
and delivered it to the customer's house where the cover-up was immediately seen through—
that's a story.
When asked if the customer reported it to a supervisor,
they said "no," so if the customer doesn't notice or just gives up complaining,
that's good enough—that's the attitude.
A red Cervélo was knocked over in the shop creating a paint chip the size of a ¥10 coin,
and they tried to repair it with touch-up paint from the hardware store,
but the shade of red obviously didn't match, so they painted and wiped, painted and wiped,
and as they repeated this, the solvent in the paint kept expanding the chip
until it was the size of a ¥500 coin, at which point they pleaded with a friend of mine (who does paint work)
to secretly repair it—that's the story.
The condition my friend accepted was: don't tell anyone I fixed this.
Oops, I also wrote about the Silvest Cycle days.
Anyway, the problem is that there are many cases where the labor charge is mysteriously high
relative to the actual work, and examples where they proceed with work unilaterally without consulting the customer
or secretly install expensive parts are extremely common,
and I often end up cleaning up after these messes—
and that's still happening now.
I received a Time Worldstar on loan from a certain FJT.
Apparently it was built about a year ago, but the bar tape isn't dirty.
It was built at Bicycle Workshop Highlander with Super Record,
but they rode it once, nearly died in a corner, and haven't ridden it since.
Apparently they built it with the brake on the left side "because the outer line looks cleaner that way!"
but this FJT brakes on the right.
Doing something at this level without asking—are they crazy?
Addendum:
I received a comment that someone who doesn't notice the brakes are reversed
until they reach the corner also has issues, but
they actually knew the brakes were reversed because I told them when handing it over.
So they rode it and realized it really didn't work—that's the story.
Our FJT is cute for at least trying.
They want me to convert it to 9000 Dura-Ace (of course with the right brake setup),
which is fine, but they're saying they want to pick it up on the way back from Maishima on April 2nd.
Having something like this squeezed in during this insanely busy period is annoying first of all,
and the shop being cramped because of it is also annoying.
Isn't this a problem that exists before even getting to the screw-up level?
I had kept what I'm about to write under wraps, but
the FJT in question said "it's okay to write about it," so here we go.
This is a Bora One purchased at Bicycle Workshop Highlander.
The wholesaler they sourced it from was probably Podium.
Since this FJT is well-versed in overseas online shopping,
no matter how cheap this Bora One was,
it's certain they didn't use the cheapest possible method to buy it.
Despite that, there's only one reason they specifically bought it in Sasayama:
the desire to support a friend who had just started a new shop
by putting money into their business.
In fact, they said they placed the order as a kind of congratulatory gift.
So given this background, when they asked for maintenance a year after purchase,
they were told "G3 laced wheels can't be trued" and the shop refused,
so they brought it to us.
Don't sell something you can't touch.
Selling and running without taking responsibility for future maintenance defeats the whole purpose of running a physical shop.
The right axle nut was loose.
The state shown in the image has been loosened a bit by hand, but
it wasn't "loosened by hand"—
it was already loose to a certain degree.
If it had been tightened during pre-sale inspection, it almost certainly wouldn't have come loose later.
Apparently the freewheel body was moving left and right along with the sprocket
during shifting and pedaling, and there were scrape marks on the hub axle.
The bearing on the outside of the freewheel body had deteriorated, so I replaced it.
I've received comments that Campagnolo freewheel body outer bearings
tend to wear particularly easily,
but I'll write about that another time.
When the FJT checked with Highlander after we inspected it,
they admitted they hadn't done a pre-sale inspection.
In cases like this, there are people who lie about doing something they didn't do—
pathetic lies—so I was somewhat impressed that they'd at least matured a bit in that regard.
I frequently end up cleaning up after Bicycle Workshop Highlander's screw-ups,
but until now I either didn't write about it or kept the shop name hidden.
Beyond just straightforward incompetence, there are many examples of work
where the justification for the labor charge is thin and
the procedures are just plain wrong.
There's the story about a Cervélo frame bike with an oval chainring
where they swapped an Ultegra front derailleur for a Dura-Ace front derailleur
because shifting was acting up.
SRAM Force rear derailleur shifting issues were brought in repeatedly,
money was stolen each time, and then on one occasion,
without prior consent, they replaced the rear derailleur with a brand new Force,
so when asked why they did that, they said "the pulley was cracked,"
so I said if that's the case you should just replace the pulley—let me see that rear derailleur,
and they responded "I already threw it away, it's gone"—that's the story.
An Easton R4SL hub with ceramic bearings that were grinding,
they were asked to replace with new ceramic bearings and left the bike,
then got a call saying "it's done," so they went to pick it up
and were told "we didn't have ceramic bearings so we put in steel ball bearings instead"—
that's the story.
But "it's done" is wrong, isn't it? If you don't have ceramic bearings, you should inform the customer beforehand
and let them choose whether to skip it or use steel balls instead.
A Trek women's Madone where pedaling produced a rattling noise—
they swapped the rear derailleur from 105 to Tiagra (probably whatever was in stock)
but the rattling noise was actually from a stiff link in the chain,
so the rear derailleur swap was completely unnecessary—that's another one.
A cyclocross tubular tire I had glued with triple-layer rim cement that they
seemingly wanted to reverse-engineer, so they peeled it off without the customer's (the FJT's) consent—
that's a story. When the cyclocross frame was dropped off, it stayed on the shop wall for an entire season—
that's also the FJT's account.
The road bike frame that was dropped off came back with dried water stains on it, mud on the tires,
and
so it absolutely must have been left outside for ages—that's another one from the FJT.
Without being asked to do anything,
they swapped the chain for an expensive gold-colored lightweight chain that costs more than Dura-Ace,
and said "I changed it to a gold chain! Looks cool, right!"
but internally the FJT didn't think gold looked cool at all,
so they reluctantly paid—that's that story.
They made the effort to ride to Sasayama to ask for headset play adjustment on a Pinarello,
then the ride back got worse than the original condition, which was scary—
that's another one.
They built a cyclocross outer with white-red-white coloring
and said "I built it in Rising Sun colors!"
but the customer hadn't asked for that in the first place—another story.
After cutting an integrated seat tube,
to prevent carbon fiber from splintering at the cut edge,
they tried to apply instant adhesive, but it
splattered all over the seat tube and became a disaster, so they scraped it off, painted over it (the frame is black),
and delivered it to the customer's house where the cover-up was immediately seen through—
that's a story.
When asked if the customer reported it to a supervisor,
they said "no," so if the customer doesn't notice or just gives up complaining,
that's good enough—that's the attitude.
A red Cervélo was knocked over in the shop creating a paint chip the size of a ¥10 coin,
and they tried to repair it with touch-up paint from the hardware store,
but the shade of red obviously didn't match, so they painted and wiped, painted and wiped,
and as they repeated this, the solvent in the paint kept expanding the chip
until it was the size of a ¥500 coin, at which point they pleaded with a friend of mine (who does paint work)
to secretly repair it—that's the story.
The condition my friend accepted was: don't tell anyone I fixed this.
Oops, I also wrote about the Silvest Cycle days.
Anyway, the problem is that there are many cases where the labor charge is mysteriously high
relative to the actual work, and examples where they proceed with work unilaterally without consulting the customer
or secretly install expensive parts are extremely common,
and I often end up cleaning up after these messes—
and that's still happening now.
I received a Time Worldstar on loan from a certain FJT.
Apparently it was built about a year ago, but the bar tape isn't dirty.
It was built at Bicycle Workshop Highlander with Super Record,
but they rode it once, nearly died in a corner, and haven't ridden it since.
Apparently they built it with the brake on the left side "because the outer line looks cleaner that way!"
but this FJT brakes on the right.
Doing something at this level without asking—are they crazy?
Addendum:
I received a comment that someone who doesn't notice the brakes are reversed
until they reach the corner also has issues, but
they actually knew the brakes were reversed because I told them when handing it over.
So they rode it and realized it really didn't work—that's the story.
They want me to convert it to 9000 Dura-Ace (of course with the right brake setup),
which is fine, but they're saying they want to pick it up on the way back from Maishima on April 2nd.
Having something like this squeezed in during this insanely busy period is annoying first of all,
and the shop being cramped because of it is also annoying.
Isn't this a problem that exists before even getting to the screw-up level?