Positive Halfords Experience!!! (with sexy pics)

nfrang

I know Halfords get a lot of bashing so i thought i'd post a happier thread.

Got my GT idrive in May with £200 off and was very pleased, so far so good.
Pretty much straight away it was creaking under load from the BB area. Took it in and the guy said "yep bottom bracket, got one in pick it up tommorrow". They phoned me the next day cos that didn't cure it and decided it was the crank that wasn't aligned properly.
The Truvativ Firex wasn't available so they offered me a Raceface Ride one but after looking at reviews i asked for the SLX which was fine but i had to make up the difference in RRP. I know they can be had for £100 but everything else was warranty so i figured it was worth it for £40. Can't fault the guys at Halfords although getting through on the phone aint easy.
Really happy with it. Looks great and the build quality is superb. Check it out.....









:P

geordiefreerider

Nice bit of kit, nice ride !

I got offered a brand new race face evolve xc crank with xt bottom bracket and dmr V12's for £100 quid but didnt have any money, although I did get a brand new xt shadow rear mech for 30 off the same guy so thats ok

supersonic

They are very good value machines, and do considtently well in WMB testing - infact the previous version won bike of the year in 2007!

Da Mighty Chicken

Sweet upgrade, looks real nice.

Nice to have another happy Halfords story

delcol

nice bird bath and the solar light looks good to..

can you post some more pics of the bike in the kitchen :roll:


looks awesome in that colour,,,

how does it ride.

WeAreACC

I got a Specialized Rockhopper Pro from Halford's via c2w and at every step their staff were reliable, knowledgeable and friendly. They do a good job, as far as my experience goes.

WeAreACC

.....like your bike too!

supersonic

Anyone wondering how the idrive system works?!

blister pus

supersonic wrote:

Anyone wondering how the idrive system works?!

magic









go on then

snotty badger

Go then explain it..

New shiny bike too 8)

WeAreACC

.....like your bike too!

WeAreACC

oops. Yeah, is it a floaty pivot thing to stop pedal bob? If so, does it work?

nfrang

Glad you guy's approve!

Ride's well...really inspires confidence. Hoping to get up to Dalby soon with the boys as it's not too far from home. Give it(and me) a proper testing :shock:

No pics of the kitchen...and that's not my gaff unfortunately...just nipped round to borrow my dads camera.

This was our first night together if thats any good...

supersonic

See that gert big pivot above the outer chainring? Well on a normal single pivot bike of that position, when the sus compresses the distance from the bottom bracket to the rear axle will get a lot bigger. So the chain has to extend... and it does that by pulling the cranks backwards. You can feel this as kickback.

But the Idrive has the BB on a linkage that hangs off the swingarm, and is also attached to the main frame by a thinner link too. What htis does is, as the sus compresses, moves the bb backwards and rotates the shell slightly, so the distance to the rear axle and difference in rotation stays very much the same. Hence less feedback!

You still get the advantages of a high single pivot ie the backwards axle path for good bump response, high amounts of antisquat for less bob, but a lot less pedal kickback that can interrupt pedalling.

WeAreACC

Hope you wore a condom!

:shock:

supersonic

Well I shut the thread up quick there, haha!

BlackSpur

So Sonic, in theory, single pivot bikes (such as the Orange 5) will suffer from pedal feedback because of the inferiour suspension design?

/runs

supersonic

You certainly experience it imore...

Andy

This topic title is misleading I was expecting pictures of a sexy shop assistant...

Nice bike though

k2rider

crank wasnt aligned?? is there just me that finds this odd?

nfrang

k2rider wrote:

crank wasnt aligned?? is there just me that finds this odd?

Nope...i do too. It was something like...the cranks not aligned/part of the crank is not aligned...but tbh i cant remember.

After a few miles today it has creaked again...nowhere near as bad as before but it made me think.

From working in the motor trade i know mechanics can get into some 'freestyle diagnostics' with warranty work. So if it keeps up it'll be going back again...till it doesn't.

supersonic

Could be the pedals, bottom bracket, Idrive mechanism.

nfrang

Did it before i put the MG1's on and the crank and bottom bracket are brand new. Is it possible it's the plastic housing the bb sits in?

Khanzo

nfrang wrote:

After a few miles today it has creaked again...nowhere near as bad as before but it made me think.

I can say I bought the same bike for the same price in June as well. It was a bit of a bugger that I had to set up the bike myself in reguards to the shock as none of these had any pressure in what so ever even though the bike was given its 25 point saftey check.

Afterwards though I was as happy as a pig in sh*t for about 3 hours...then a strange and alarming 'creaking' noice appeared with every pedal, so drove 40 miles to take it back to the store.

They replaced the BB and re-lubed/oiled everything and since that didnt work so they kept my bike over the weekend (took it in on a the day after I bought it) untill monday when they could ring GT and find out what to do. Ill be honest that left me pretty bummed out.

On monday it turned out they couldnt fix it imediately so they replaced the full frame. They customer servicing I experienced was spot on, and very very helpful, just seems there may well be a manufacturing problem if its a common occurence

-Mat

PS hello, been lurking for awhile just never posted

nfrang

Mmm. Its looking that way

***thread title currently under review***

supersonic

Khanzo

Hello and welcome to bikeradar.

They quite often will not set the shocks up as they will not know what you want: your weight or preferences. You need a shock pump and time to experiment to get what is right for you ie pressure, sag and damping.

Seems like you got good service though! I think all riders need to be aware that creaking is VERY common, and quite often benign: and due to meany reasons. Park Tools has a very good diagnostic feature on bike noises. Sometimes as simple as needing some grease on the pedal threads.

Skonk

I also have this same bike and experienced the same creeking. A chap I spoke to in one of the local Halfords store said the 2 they had both had the same issue (and had been sold, returned, replaced, returned).

I had previously "messed around" with it, thinking the bolts must have come loose and ended up over-tightening it all which made the problem worse and damaged a couple of the soft aluminium components (which I then had to replace).

So I then stripped the pivots down, cleaned them, re-greased with copper grease, put it back together to the correct torque and added some loctite to stop the locking nuts from comming loose, after several rides it seems fine.

It's always been very pleasent to ride though.

Obviously I could (should i guess) have taken it back and had Halfords service it but I enjoy tinkering with it myself

I actually paid the full £999.99 for mine, and about a week later they did one of the 20% off sales which I was a little miffed about, but never mind

I have also tweaked it a little; I added an SLX crank set (actually thought this would fix the creeking, but it didn't), RockShox Revalations (110-140mm u-turns, wanted lockout) and some Juicy 7's since I was finding the Juicy 3's lacking in stopping power for the trails I was riding.

delcol

WeAreACC wrote:

Hope you wore a condom!

:shock:

no need she nice and clean.. not a dirty hore...


how do you convince the missus to let you sleep with bike,

Northwind

Have any of you i-drive lovers weighed the frame and shock alone? I'm still vaguely considering picking up one of these with my bike-to-work next year (of COURSE I'll ride it to work every day, it is to replace my road bike. Honest) but the weight puts me off a little... So I'm wondering where all that weight lives. I don't expect it to be a light frame with all the extra ironmongery in it for the i-drive but I'm wondering what I could do to it with my lighter kit...

Skonk wrote:

So I then stripped the pivots down, cleaned them, re-greased with copper grease,

Hmm, you know most copper grease isn't recommended for bearings, pivots etc? A few are but most are intended as anti-seize rather than as lubrication for a moving part. You sound like you know what you're about but I just thought it might be worth mentioning...

Skonk

The vidoes on GT's website advise the use of anti-seize grease on all the componants of the pivots because there is a lot of metal on metal contact.

I went to Dalby Forrest today and did about 20 miles around the red route and early on there appeared to be some play in the pivots again; though it seemed to go away some time into the ride.

It's somewhat annoying but seems harmless.

Northwind

Ah, I think I'd misunderstood your post- you're quite right, those parts look like they're not moving against each other, so an anti seize is what's needed, on first read I thought you were using coper grease in bearings and bushings rather than in the spacers etc.