New bike fitted with a different chainset, both make and sizes.

daniel_b

Hey BR peeps,

finally picked up my Scott Addict Gravel 30 yesterday from Balfe's bikes in Kingston.

Pain free and easy, they even swapped out some tyres for me which I thought was good service.

As I didn't reach home until gone 8, I popped it in the garage and forgot about it until today, when I bought it out to take some pics.

I immediately noticed that the crankset is not what was specced.
They have fitted a praxis Alba 48/32, it was meant to come with a Shimano GRX600 46/30.

I wanted the lower gearing, without an outlandish rear cassette, as I worked out it would be perfect for my commute, as well as gravel rides/light touring etc.

Additionally, after ordering it last year, I bought a 4iiii Shimano power crank (From PBK) ready to bolt onto the bike, which now I cannot do.

Also, I own a load of tools, and can easily change a shimano crankset and BB, but it appears you need specific tools to change a Praxis one, and I do not own any.

I've dropped them a mail to see what they can do, am I being unreasonable?

If they can not source a chainset and bb immediately or within a month (I realise parts are scarce currently) I can ride the current setup, and then enjoy the 2.5 hour return journey to the shop to have it changed out.

Up until this, their customer service has probably been the best I have ever experienced, so I'm interested to see how this is handled.

I'll be honest, I'm disappointed they did not flag it as a specification change, and find out if I was ok with it or not.

Bummer though, has taken the shine of new bike day

JimD666

Don't think you're being unreasonable however almost all bikes I've looked at in the last 12 months have the following caveat "We reserve the right to change specification without notice".

I think it sucks.

daniel_b

Thanks Jim, I've always noticed the 'specification is subject to change' but this felt like quite a substantial one to me.

Anyway, they are proving to be doing well so far - I spotted on their site they had one GRX810 48/31 in stock, in the right length.
They have reserved it for me, and the only stumbling block now is to locate a suitable BB, as the praxis one is different.

I'm hoping they will change it with no extra charge for me (Sounded like that to me) and I get a minor upgrade into the bargain, plus a slightly bigger top gear, all be it not as small a bottom gear, though I think it will be fine.

Only frustration is another 2.5 hour return journey to go there, and then they said they need a couple of hours to make the change, so will likely have to go on a weekend, and burn half a day as a result.

If they had noted it and queried it with me, we could have approached it differently and I would have just have had to make the one journey, but it can't be helped I guess, they are doing their best currently, and hopefully we can reach a suitable resolution soon.

me-109

Check out the weather and see if they have any demo bikes you can take out for a bit. Or take another one of your own if you've room.

daniel_b

May have a solution of sorts, as I happen to be driving into London on Saturday, so have suggested I drop it off with them then (Probably add 15 minutes to my journey) meaning they have it for as long as they need, and just another 2hr 30 trip needed there and back, which I can do after work one day to simply pick it up with the new parts fitted, as they open until 8.

Hopefully some positive news later this week, surely a pushfit BB can't be hard to come by......

singleton

Glad to see that they are offering a solution and trying to fix this.

daniel_b

They have the BB, just waiting to hear on the condition of the chainset which should be tomorrow hopefully, when it arrives with them.

Sounds like if I can drop off Saturday, they will sort that day.

However due to seeing a show in London, will need to collect on a different day, but hopefully Sunday or Monday.

daniel_b

Just to update this - spoke to them on Friday, confirmed the chainset and BB were in and ready to go, so rocked up there on the way into Londinium at about 09:30 to drop the bike off.

Rang back during the intermission at the royal albert hall, and they confirmed all was ready to go, bit of a race across London to get back to the van in time, but managed to get into the shop with 10 minutes to spare.

Evidently plenty of grease has been used, but it's all on there and fitted, kindly they had also offered to fit the 4iiii crank for me, but I'd thought that would be a bit of a cheeky ask, so had not taken it along, generous of them to offer though I thought, so I need to do that before it goes away for it's wrap.

No extra charges were suggested, which I thought was good of them - can you imagine Evans doing anything like that..........?

If I have the opportunity to buy any parts, or an entire bike from them, I would not hesitate.

MidlandsGrimpeur2

Fair play to them, sounds like a good shop to deal with.

As per my travails with the CAAD12 (currently trying to get a warranty claim sorted), I am seriously considering a budget Allez to get me through the winter and then act as a spare/turbo bike.

Balfe's have a couple of good deals on them at the moment and your experience will probably tip the balance in their favour when I come to buy.

daniel_b

That's great to hear @MidlandsGrimpeur2 , I may have been lucky of course, but seeing as I ended up dealing with at least 3 people from their HQ purely online, who were all really on the ball, and the two guys I dealt with instore, I'd wager that it's a company ethos thing if that's not too much corporate bingo bs!

The shop itself had plenty of staff, and on the Saturday at least, had a nice 'buzzy' atmosphere, customers in talking things through etc, and the mechanics out the back of the shop, but still in plain sight which I thought was good.

By chance I have a 2019 Allez Elite which I have never actually ridden, it was destined to go to my parents place who live abroad, but I haven't managed to get over in recent years for the usual reason.

My brother is riding it currently, and it's a very decent bike, think it was £1049 at the time, 5800 105 on there, and rim brakes of course - weighed it the other day, 9.2kg I think with the pedals and cages, computer mount etc etc.

I need to give it a ride at some point to see how it feels versus the CR1, but I'll have to change the pedals, as my bro is SPD-SL whilst I ride Look.

MidlandsGrimpeur2

Thanks @daniel_b

I am sure you are right, they obviously employ good staff and ensure they offer a top service all round. I didn't realise they had so many shops, looks as though they have taken over a couple of other smaller independents down the years.

Good to hear about the Allez, it is the elite I was looking at as well, which currently comes with Rival 22. Happy with this as I run it on another bike so no issues there. The plan is to swap over bars/stem/saddle/wheels from the caad whilst that frame gets inspected for the warranty. This would lighten the allez down to just over 8kg I think, and means I can keep the allez parts brand new and possibly even sell them on if I don't really need them.

daniel_b

Sounds like a good plan @MidlandsGrimpeur2

What is up with your Caad?
My bro still runs a Caad3!

Yes I gathered from a forum member whose name escapes me, that they have been fairly regularly seeking out and buying up independents, but an article I read suggested (Though I had no proof) they they did their best to persuade existing staff to stick around, and just tried to instill the company policy and just improve things if they could.

I did ask in this store what it had been previously, one person thought it was empty previously, whilst another thought it might have something to do with Sigma Sports - not sure if either of those are correct!

The same forum member who alerted me to their existence (I have yet to meet anyone out here in west berkshire who has heard of them) on a random thread, was suggesting that they were trying to move into the space mostly vacated by the ever worsening evans.

Entertainingly there was an Evans about 5 doors down from Balfes - I went to pick the bike up at about 6pm on the first Monday, and they said they needed half an hour to fit the tyres, came back later, evans was firmly shut up, where as I think Balfe's stay open until 8pm, at least in Kingston, not looked at any of their other store opening times.

I really wanted to buy a Dura Ace groupset from them, but sadly after speaking to them they don't generally stock/source entire groupsets, only the odd parts here or there.

veronese68

The shop Balfes is in was a catering equipment suppliers immediately before they took it on. Before that it was a Specialized shop run by Sigma Sports.
Pleased to hear good things about them, haven't needed anything much for a while, but when I have been in there they've been friendly and helpful.

MidlandsGrimpeur2

Cheers @daniel_b

Ordered, should be here early next week!

CAAD bb keeps eating bearings for breakfast! I suspect the bottom bracket shell is undersized which is compressing the bearings, causing deformation and the limited lifespan. Currently going through a warranty claim but IME these things can take awhile. The CAAD is my winter bike and I doubt it will be available to me in time for the bad weather, hence the allez!

I thought that even if the CAAD gets resolved, I can use the allez for the really bad winter months in Jan/Feb, then as a turbo bike in the summer. I have also had 4 or 5 occasions in the last 2 years when both the training and race bike have been out of commission, so the allez as a spare for similar eventualities is also handy. Also, on the off chance the warranty claim is denied, I will retire the CAAD and use the allez instead.

Interesting re the Evans theory. Sounds like that could well be the case and nice to see a good bike company taking up the spaces and offering a quality service.

It's a shame about Evans since the Ashley takeover. My local one used to have good staff who knew what their stuff. They mostly seem to have left and it is a bit of a ghost town in there now. Poor range of stock and generally 1 or 2 staff milling around at any given time.

daniel_b

It is a shame about Evans, but they didn't overly cover themselves with glory in my experience.

Agreed the calibre of staff could vary MASSIVELY, much like Halfords I suppose.

My experiences with Evans include:
Mountain bike that we had to wait for to have a PDI carried out, supplied with the forks fitted back to front
Bike delivered to my house with the wrong tyres, wrong material seatpost, and wrong length seatpost
Bike delivered to my house covered in scratches, and the shifters absolutely mullered

The middle one was sorted easily enough, the last one was more of a battle, until I was supplied with the details of the head of customer service, then it was sorted swiftly, and it was a satisfactory outcome - that was some 6 years ago though, so now under the ashley umbrella I can only imagine what a sh1tshow it is.

They have lost a lot of the great brands they used to stock, Louis Garneau are a great brand and Evans were the only distributor here - think Scott have jumped ship as well, and if you look you see the once revered muddy fix brand making it's way into the bike and clothing line ups.