fearfeasog

i think i know the answer already, but i wanted some other opinions before i took any drastic measures.

got a brand new Surly Cross Check via UPS today. Damaged in transit, i believe. though the pics on the ebay listing were not so close up. seller said "new--not a mile on it. no scratches or dents" here's the original pic, damage would be visible on the seat tube if it were present...



but i get this:





it's about 11.5 inches up from the BB, roughly 3mmdeep (maybe 4) and a 1cm or so by 1,5 cm or so. GOD i'm p.o.'d!!

the seat tube isn't bent, i don't think, just dented, but i need to check w/ a straight edge

WAIT!!!! CRAP CRAP CRAP!!! that tube is no longer straight. is that my answer? i was SO looking forward to this. knew it was too good to be true.

mark

dsellinger

All you can do is contact the seller and tell him it's damaged and you want your money back. He will then probably file a claim with the shippers. Maybe you can talk him into splitting the dough with you, and keeping the bike. It's probably still very usable, but you need show a better picture of the tube with the rest of the bike so we can see if the tube is bent or just dimpled.

bikeman715

was the box damage in any way ? like a hole or a tear in it ? if so then it the shipper fault . fill a claim form from for the damage. this may be hard to do since you already toke ownership of it.but try anyway. yes from your photo it is hard to tell if the bike was damage before being shipped. and that is a p;problem with buy things on ebay.

nomo4me

Looks to me like that dent was caused by something inside the box that wasn't properly padded/immobilized. If so the courier is likely to deny the claim due to insufficient packing. And rightly so IMO.

silver_ghost

Yikes. That's a real disappointment. On the other hand, the nice thing about steel frames is they can take much more abuse than aluminum without failure. My Surly 1x1 has a dent in about the same place on the seat tube from a theft attempt and a much worse crunch in the top tube from the same thing.
You definately have been wronged one way or another but if worse comes to worse, I wouldn't be afraid to ride that frame. Just touch up the paint to avoid rust.

unterhausen

I hope it's not bent. That dent is actually repairable. Seat tube dents are much easier to repair than top tube dents. Looks like bad packing.

nomo4me

Looks like an impression from a QR nut on the front wheel? Front wheel bouncing around would have the mass to cause such a dent.
Was the front wheel loose in the package?

fearfeasog

thanks to everyone for your replies.

yep the front wheel was cable tied to the TT but the bottom was free. i think things did a lot of shifting around in there. and yeah the nut furthest out on the axle did this, i believe (skewer was floating around at the bottom of the box, wrapped in bubble)

a UPS rep will be calling me to inspect the damage by end of day tomorrow. yes there was a tear in the box but it really just looked like a tear and what i could see of the wheel (the front wheel, btw) thru the hole did not seem damaged at all. i should have opened the box. i am kicking myself big time for this.

has anyone else had a similar experience? please tell me what you did that worked and what didn't work to get your claim fulfilled. thanks!

m

fearfeasog

it is slightly bent. i'm sure that opinion about what is rideable and what is not varies so much as to be pretty much useless, though.

fearfeasog

yes well i really hope you're wrong, but you just put my fears into words!

well biked

Wow, it would take quite a lot of force to put a dent like that in a Surly tube. The 4130 tubing they use isn't exactly thin-walled.

DOS

I don't know, that tube would have had to take a pretty good wack to sustain that damage; so even if something in box made the impression, the whole box would have had to gotten bashed pretty good -- like being dropped -- for it to make such a dent. If it was the wheel, I would expect that to be damaged as well.

fearfeasog

y'know thats a funny thing--it doesn't seem to be at first glance. i spun it and its as true as can be expected. the axle might be ever so slightly bent, on further inspection. what bad luck--the axle had to line perfectly up with the seat tube so that it didn't just glance off and gouge it--it was well centered! but i agree that something that probably would have caused damage even if the packing was great must have happened. i just need to convince UPS of that!

fearfeasog

indeed.

Mr. Underbridge

Either way, it should be out of your hands. The seller files the UPS claim since he's their customer. So I'd tell him I wanted my money back, but would fully support his attempts to UPS to reimburse him - though they're likely to tell him to pack fragile items better, as mentioned.

In any event, you shouldn't be in that loop. Whether he gets his money out of the shipper shouldn't be your problem.

fosmith

Its on the seller. Either they, or whomever packed it did a crap job. The courier won't take responsibility. I've dealt with this in the past. sorry

fearfeasog

well my apparent ignorance has me smack IN the loop at this point. UPS is going to pick it up for inspection tomorrow, then, thought they usually ship back to the shipper, they agreed to ship it back to me. i know, i know--it'll be out of my control--what if it gets sent back to the shipper anyway. well then--i'll know its a cursed deal! yikes!

nomo4me

As to arguing that they treated the pkg too roughly - I'll be interested to hear if that flies with them. It is accepted practise for their handlers to throw and drop packages. Yeah it's abusive but UPS & Fedex compete for contracts and they can't afford to have their workers slow down & treat packages with any degree of respect.
Sellers just have to pack to survive anything but a forklift runover or piercing. Anything less shows the seller didn't care to bring the sale to a satisfactory conclusion.

dsellinger

Well you said it's from Ebay so I'll bet you paid with paypal. If the seller is a problem you can just file a complaint with paypal. They will credit your money back once you provide proof of delevery back to the seller. It's very easy to do (and the source of a lot of scams).

Mr. Underbridge

Weird. Good luck, hope everything works out. Let us know how it goes.

fearfeasog

good weird or bad weird? the way this is going it could go either way!

well biked

I've straightened a Surly Cross check frame that was run over by a truck. In the process of straightening it, it took two of us to get enough force to bend the rear triangle back (it was several inches out and twisted). It straightened up, but the amount of force we put on the frame alignment tool to straighten the frame put a small dent (more like a dimple) in one of the seatstays. This was the result of two grown men pushing and pulling as hard as they could, using a long lever to bend with. There's no way just dropping that box during the process of shipping it caused the dent. Maybe it was run over by a forklift or something. Good luck-

cbchess

it was a bad packing job plain and simple , unless the seller works with you
I am afraid UPS is going to take one look at it and tell you you are S.O.L.

I have sold on eBay and shipped plenty of frames and you can NEVER have enough bubble wrap wrapped tightly around the frame and then tons of stuffing in the package so nothing can move an inch. If this frame was able to move at all in the box you need to check the rear dropout as well as every other place that could get squished or out of alignment.

fearfeasog

i hear you man, i agree with you saying you really have to do a good job packing because everyone knows what UPS, FEDEX and the USPS do to packages--its a given. so you have to make your packages bomb-proof. that is my personal ethic, but some folks leave too much to chance...

as for the "deal with the seller, or the shipper?" conundrum--my gut reaction from the start was that i needed to contact the seller right away. but i dunno, something told me that if i could get UPS to cover it it would work out well for me because i'd have the bike and the money and the seller would have the money too. plus its too easy for me to second guess what's going to happen if i do x, y or z.--none of us knows but that i might just get the right person at UPS and have my money in a week or two. or maybe i'm doing the wrong thing and as a result i'll be screwed. either way i'm going to try not to worry too much. BUT if UPS say nope sorry the packing sucked then, too, i have backup that the seller really fracked it up on his end. so maybe this is the best thing for me to do. the worst that can happen is UPS will say nope, seller will be a dink and say sorry, no dice, and i will end up with a damaged but discounted bike for which i can get a replacement frame by saving up another couple hundred bucks. and i even get to keep my health and my life and my limbs! BONUS!

Dzrtrat

That sucks.......Looks to me (if I were a betting man) that the front wheel was just tossed in the box causing the damage......looks like thread marks.