Pro Lite Revo - Warranty

gabriel959

TimothyW wrote:

What's the problem with your wheels Gabriel? Same thing with the nipples?

If they were my wheels I'd rebuild with brass nipples, job done.

Broken spoke at the nipple.

I might do that, but I don't want to pay for it myself. I don't think it is acceptable really.

dinyull

If it helps Gabriel (as the OP) I quoted consumer rights and pointed out getting nipples replaced/wheel rebuild would void any warranty I had with them.

I think, in my case, it helped that at least half of the nipples on the rear wheel were showing signs of corrosion and quite a few on the front too. If it's just a one off nipple in your case it could be hard to prove it's a faulty batch like mine.

Wiggle refunded me in the end, but only after toing and froing over email.

timothyw

The problem is, there is literally no way for you to prove that they've only done 3000 miles (which ok, is within the lifespan you might hope for but is still a fair few miles), and for all Wiggle know you might have done 10,000 on them on coastal roads with sea spray hitting you.

At what point would it be reasonable for them to decline?

Quite honestly, buy a nipple, it's a 5-10 minute job.

Inspect the others, if a lot of them look ready to go, then it might be worth kicking up a bigger fuss.

gabriel959

Dinyull wrote:

If it helps Gabriel (as the OP) I quoted consumer rights and pointed out getting nipples replaced/wheel rebuild would void any warranty I had with them.

I think, in my case, it helped that at least half of the nipples on the rear wheel were showing signs of corrosion and quite a few on the front too. If it's just a one off nipple in your case it could be hard to prove it's a faulty batch like mine.

Wiggle refunded me in the end, but only after toing and froing over email.

Only one has broken yes, although I am sure that if I tried to rebuild it a lot more nipples would fail. I don't really want a refund as I paid 143 for them and I can't buy anything for that price. I would like a repair or a replacement.

They have just said no in my case (as per the email).

gabriel959

TimothyW wrote:

The problem is, there is literally no way for you to prove that they've only done 3000 miles (which ok, is within the lifespan you might hope for but is still a fair few miles), and for all Wiggle know you might have done 10,000 on them on coastal roads with sea spray hitting you.

At what point would it be reasonable for them to decline?

Quite honestly, buy a nipple, it's a 5-10 minute job.

Inspect the others, if a lot of them look ready to go, then it might be worth kicking up a bigger fuss.

I record all my rides and would be happy to give them access to the files. If I had done 10,000 miles I wouldn't be married either! Of course, I could have ridden the wheels and not recorded the rides yes...

But I live in Cambridge and that bike has never been near the sea.

I think it would reasonable for them to decline after 2 years, which is when the stated warranty period ends. May be I am being unreasonable. You tell me.

dinyull

gabriel959 wrote:

Dinyull wrote:

If it helps Gabriel (as the OP) I quoted consumer rights and pointed out getting nipples replaced/wheel rebuild would void any warranty I had with them.

I think, in my case, it helped that at least half of the nipples on the rear wheel were showing signs of corrosion and quite a few on the front too. If it's just a one off nipple in your case it could be hard to prove it's a faulty batch like mine.

Wiggle refunded me in the end, but only after toing and froing over email.

Only one has broken yes, although I am sure that if I tried to rebuild it a lot more nipples would fail. I don't really want a refund as I paid 143 for them and I can't buy anything for that price. I would like a repair or a replacement.

They have just said no in my case (as per the email).

I'm sure you have already, but inspect all of the other nipples. You could literally pick mine apart with your finger nail. They were just crumbling.

If it's just one that's failed and the others look fine I don't think you have anywhere to go with them sadly. Difficult to prove the spoke failed because of the nipple.

apreading

To be clear - I think Gabriel is saying that the spoke failed, not the nipple. I dont think any wheel warranties would cover spoke failure unless it was really new and they were feeling nice. The fact that the spoke failed at the nipple is maybe steering people off course here?

dinyull

Ah, assumed a nipple failure was to blame for the broken spoke....

In that case I don't think you have a leg to stand on.

gabriel959

I think for me the question is (and I need to put a photo of this). The spoke isn't broken, just the nipple, but I would expect the spoke to to be a bit longer than the length of the broken piece of nipple (the bit that screws into the head of the nipple). I believe the spoke is too short for the nipple but I do not know for sure yet, I haven't found the other part of the nipple yet, I might take the wheel to a wheel builder in Cambridge but personally I am not sure if a wheel that has been used for 2700 miles should fail in this way. It doesn't strike to me to be sold as advertised.

apreading

Ah - OK, when you said the spoke broke at the nipple, I took that at face value. The nipple broke. This is all too common for aluminium nipples, especially if used in bad weather etc. Aluminium is brittle and breaks all to easily. It also corrodes badly.

If buying wheels where I have a choice, I always use brass nipples. Seen too many alu nipples break, particularly on mountain bikes - and at any age/mileage.

I would just get the spoke repaired at LBS - chances are the others are still OK, as long as you havent abused it since this one broke. But by OK, I mean OK but they are all still aluminium so have the same design flaw (as I see it) as the one that broke. Plenty of people broke a spoke and just replaced it with no further problems.

If you go to the bother of having them ALL replaced though, I would get a new rim too as the hubs on the prolite are great but the rims arent so much.

apreading

I would also be surprised if any wheel manufacturer covered aluminium nipple breakage any more than spoke breakage. Prolite are no worse then anyone else probably would be in terms of warranty here, and no worse than many in terms of using aluminium nipples - its quite common to get a low quoted weight but saves very little to be honest.

gabriel959

Fair enough. Can I just buy one alloy nipple and put it in myself? I did not ride the bike again since I found out that this happened. The wheel is still true too. Are all alloy nipples the same? Do they have different lengths and/or widths?

apreading

You need to get the spoke to the right tension. You also need to be careful that winding the spoke onto the end doesnt twist the spoke - I think they are bladed spokes? LBS could do it for peanuts most likely. Lots of people would do it themselves but I am not that brave! There is a 'hand wheelbuilder' thread on here - if you post on there you will get responses from lots of knowledgable people...

They might suggest you replace the spoke aswell - I have no idea.

To give it some perspective, when I was on a tour in Italy with my hand built wheels, the chain jumped for some reason and caught one of my spokes, which snapped. Because it was a disk wheel, the tour leader just cut the short bit at the nipple, so the nipple dropped into the rim, out of sight, removed the other part of the spoke which threaded out of the hub and I rode the last 10 miles like that. With 32 spokes, it wasnt too bad but started to wobble a little and certainly went out of true. They took me to a bike shop that evening and for 10 EUROs, the shop replaced the spoke, fished the nipple out, trued the wheel, told me the gear cable was stretched so they replaced it and told me the brakes had air in so they bled them!

In the UK, I have had a broken spoke replaced for very little money - so little that I cant remember how much it was.

gabriel959

Thanks apreading. All very useful information.

There was a further update, which I didn't put here. At the weekend upon removing the tyre and tube and the cassette so I could get the spoke replaced I noticed that the cassette had completely chewed into the freehub body. It took me a long while to remove the cassette from the hub and once it was done the results were pretty awful.

https://photos.app.goo.gl/trWTYKpyH4jppOY73

I have to say I am surprised about this, although I do not have a torque wrench for my cassette, I have never had an issue with any other cassette freehub and I have got and have had many Mavic wheels (from aksiums to kysrium elites to cosmic carbones), Fulcrum wheels, Shimano wheels to no name Formula hubs, and I always make sure they are really tight and never had an issue. I mean I have even had other wheels with alloy free hubs and they've been fine.

I emailed Wiggle and they have told me it isn't their fault but mine for not using enough torque in the cassette. Is this true? I am more and more disappointed about having bought these. I am a fairly powerful rider and like to go fast but I can't believe that I am going to have to buy a new freehub (£40 too). What do you guys think? Do you think it is worth it pursuing this further? What I take from this is to never buy a pro-lite wheel ever again. Wiggle also mentioned that they only warranty broken spokes/nipples for 90 days although I am sure they would have a hard time not to replace any item within 6 months.

I think Malcolm sells the freehubs for these so I might send him an email to verify.

apreading

Alas, this is all too common these days too, although yours is a particularly bad case!

Again, in the pursuit of lightness freehubs are commonly made of cheese/alloy these days (delete as applicable). Superstar offer a steel freehub as an option and lots switch to that after finding what you have found.

The Novatc hubs have been updated now and include an 'anti bite guard' (ABG) which is a thin strip of steel along one of the splines to reduce the amount of cutting in that the cassettes to. Alas, our Prolite wheels predate that change. The ones that Malcolm sells do.

Although Malcolm has posted the same POV as wiggle - that if you tighten the cassette enough you wont get a problem. Personally I get a bit of this regardless but not as serious as you have here. I would always go for a cassette with a steel bite guard whenever I can because although it doesnt stop it 100%, it seems to reduce it significantly. Seems like a perfect compromise.

Malcolm also uses aluminium nipples regularly and says that they have their advantages but to me, brass nipples and a cassette with ABG every time please...

dinyull

That's something that has been mentioned about these wheels before and something I noticed when striping them down to return.

Mine wasn't as bad as yours, but I had a hard time removing cassette and it definitely wasn't under torqued!

It's made of cheese.

daniel_b

Dinyull wrote:

That's something that has been mentioned about these wheels before and something I noticed when striping them down to return.

Mine wasn't as bad as yours, but I had a hard time removing cassette and it definitely wasn't under torqued!

It's made of cheese.

Christ on a bike - advertising my unused pair this weekend!

Feel for you Gabriel :evil:

veronese68

apreading wrote:

Although Malcolm has posted the same POV as wiggle - that if you tighten the cassette enough you wont get a problem.

I'm surprised by that. I thought it was just a bit of BS when I read Gabriel's post, but I don't think Malcolm would tell porkies so there must be an element of truth in it. I have Novatec hubs that have done that and I wouldn't say the cassettes were under torqued, but I couldn't quote a figure they were done up tight then nipped up a bit. I just bought replacements with the ABG as you suggest. The other option is to buy cassettes where all the sprockets are on a carrier rather than individual.

apreading

From my experience with American Classic hubs that had their own ABG, dont expect this to totally stop biting though - they will just keep it within reason.

I never used to torque my cassettes up at all - keeping them loose so that they would be easy to get off, thinking they just had to keep the cassette on which wouldnt need much force, not thinking they had to be soo tight that they would stop the rungs from twisting on the splines - that seems like a tall order to be honest!

Never had a problem on my shimano hubs but they were steel and more heavy.

If I were designing a freehub, it would be aluminium but with ABG on every spline rather than just one per hub.

apreading

viewtopic.php?f=40042&t=13020726&p=20178884&hilit=tight#p20178884

and

viewtopic.php?f=40042&t=13020726&p=20184063&hilit=forging#p20184063

gabriel959

Thanks guys, it was tight, as tight as I have ever done it, I always check for play in the cassette and there was none. Again my word against theirs. But I have never had an issue with any other freehubs and the are not the only ones to have an aluminium freehub.

I am not sure if I should pursue this with Wiggle further and cut my loses. To be honest I haven't been to impressed with Wiggle's slow response times, makes me think twice about spending any sort of money with them. They kept saying the issue was with the manufacturer's warranty.

What do you guys think?

apreading

Could have been worse:



To be honest, I am dissapointed by Wiggle. I thought they used to be well regarded for their customer service. If they are just putting it all on the OEM then I am not surprised. But I thought Wiggle would think about the OEM response and consider adding a bit of goodwill in some cases.

The last few times I have mailed Wiggle CS they have been very slow. VERY slow.

I wonder if new management/growth of the company has compromised their previous good reputation.

keef66

Low profile Shimano pattern splines? Make the freehub of steel, provide it with steel bite guards, or mount the entire cluster on a carrier.

Taller Campag pattern splines? You're free to make the freehub out of a lighter, softer alloy.

With a Shimano pattern alu freehub i'd be worried I was either going to get notching, or I'd strip the thread tightening the lockring.