Brought my bike in to get fixed. Its 20 years old, has been professionally maintained through its life. Its had a lot of use and had some wear.
I decided to have the entire drivetrain replaced. When I got the bike back, I could not select all the front sprockets. In fact, the bike wanted to jump out of either sprocket 3 or 2 depending on which gear the bike was in. I took the bike back and got the following excuses.
1) The book said the bike should take a 28 tooth gear. The bike was all original and had 32 teeth.
2) "Ah, its good enough, you really don't need the first sprocket
3) I could put a shim in to make it work
4) I had a really hard time getting parts for this bike
5) Maybe the selector mechanism should be replaced (maybe?)
6) Yea, I can see, the cable is loose (it wasn't noticed before?)
7) Probably other things that I cannot remember
I was very careful NOT to write this review until I tried to fix the problem myself. Well, can you guess? I was able to fix the issue. I simply put the chain on the first sprocket. I loosened the cable and the fine adjusters. I put the selector on position 1. I reset the cable. I took the bike out for a ride. Adjusted the fine adjusters a couple of times and the bike is as good as it was prior to "getting it fixed".
The estimate given was $200 - $225. The final price was $272. Just giving you the facts folks.
If the bike had been flawless and only worked on the second and third sprocket, I would have been satisfied. However, as stated above, it wanted to jump off either of those sprockets depending on which gear you selected. Almost unusable.
I will not be returning to Bikes Plus.
I wanted to add to this review. I've seen other bike shops state that a bike is some kind of Chinese knock-off brand and you kind of get what you pay for, thus I could not fix your bike review response. The bike is a well-known quality brand and not some cheap knock-off. It was American made and is highly desirable due to its quality. The "they do not make them this way anymore" thing. It has all Shimano parts. read more