Monday 9 June 2014

Bicycle Repair (or Praise/Curse Evolution Bikes)

Le Velo Electrique, which I had bought in Brest in June 2013, had developed a rather nasty kink.  An intermittent and very annoying clicking sound. So I brought the bike to Evolution Bikes in North Vancouver, a store that also sells bicycles with Bosch mid-motor drive. As I found out in a Google search, there is actually another store in Surrey, but Evolution Bikes has nicer bikes ;-).

So I brought le velo to them, overcame the first hurdle, which was their refusal to deal with any bikes that they had not sold in the first place.   A few phone calls later I get the good news/bad news play:  Yes, they think they found the problem and work on the bike, and yup, they are going to replace the whole motor and it's going to cost me $940.  Ouch.  But I was prepared for something in that price range, and if it gets the bike into almost-new riding condition, I am happy to pay that price.

So they fix the bike, I pick it up on Thursday, the 29th of May, and we run into a little snag.  The store owner refuses to give me my old motor with some lame excuse that Bosch is very protective of its parts.  However, this would be the correct procedure if Evolution Bikes had accepted that the bike is still under warranty (I bought it in June 2013). But if this was a warranty repair, I would not have to pay.  Since I had to pay, I assume it is NOT a warranty repair, in which case I can't think of a single valid reason why the Store owner would not give me MY MOTOR.   VERY SUSPICIOUS, but on the other hand: I was willing to pay that amount anyway and what in the world would I actually do with my broken motor?  So I let it slip.  Hey, I have a perfect bike again.

In Nanaimo it starts emitting the very same sound again that caused the repair in the first place.


F(*&^&^$^#)(*&(*&%!


So I start to thinking: A brand new motor got f***d up after only 200 km of riding?  WTF?  Or is this my old motor with a new cover?  WHAT IS GOING ON?

I call Evolution Bikes from Nanaimo, make an appointment for Tuesday, and give him a hint of the WRATH to come, whereupon he mentions that he has been talking to the Manufacturer.  Warranty after all or is he just saying that to keep me from biting him?



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