BColeKid

Hey - I was reading this old interview with Richard Burke in Inc:

https://www.inc.com/magazine/20060701/qa-burke.html

He said, "In 1984 we made some bad product."

Does anyone know what he's referring to?

I had a 560 from '84, which I liked, though that might have been manufactured in '83.

Please feel free to re-locate this question if there's a better spot for it.

thumpism 

"In 1984 we made some bad product. Then in '85 we introduced the first bonded aluminum frame, but we didn't know how to build it in a production environment. We went through a year of building bad frames that came back to haunt us."

This is all he says about it, but in a bike-specific publication he might be more forthcoming. I was working in Trek shops at that time and do not recall anything out of the ordinary. Other brands' issues (like the brittle Ross Patented Fork Ends) are much stronger in my memory.

The Golden Boy 

Maybe he's referring to the 600 series Ishiwata fork crowns from the previous few years.

Or maybe the "through the chainstay" shifter cable routing?

BColeKid

I did some basic searching but I couldn't find much else.

Maybe he meant Trek's frames were "bad" in 1984 relative to what everyone else was doing.

79pmooney

I wonder if he was referring to the chainstays that had the flat caps with "TREK" stamped deeply. They cracked regularly across the letters. When I described the crack I saw to the framebuilder over the phone (~83 TREK 400?, 420?) he told me to look on the other side; I would see more. (He was right.) Told me he had done that repair many times.

Ben

Chombi

Wasn't there a problem with some seatstay brake bridges separating from the seatstay(s)? But I thought that was with steel frames and before they built aluminum ones....

acoffin 

Maybe he meant bad like this

Slash5

I've heard that they figured the "Y" MTB frames were a mistake but that would be later.

JohnDThompson 

The problem I recall, having been working in the factory at that time, is that after we sent out the first production run of the bonded aluminum frames, people started noticing cracks behind the lugs. We weren't sure what the problem was, so we simply replaced any frames showing those cracks, and they made an impressive pile in the back corner of the warehouse. Further investigation eventually showed that the cracks were superficial, involving only the paint, and caused by flexing in the bonded joint under the crack. Reformulating the paint so it remained more malleable seemed to fix the problem.

thumpism 

I was repping for Peugeot in the late '80s during that company's recall of its Pechiny process bonded aluminum frames. The Comete model used Euro components and the Galaxy used Shimano 105. Nice bikes. The NJ warehouse had a similar pile of those bikes that had been taken back. I never saw one with a flaw but there had evidently been a few separations or breaks.

miamijim

You ever come across a guy named 'Ted' from upstate NY?

After Peugeot pulled out of the U.S. market we handled of the recall/warranty work for Peugeot. If I remember correctly the Pichiny frames were replaced with 'Triathlon' frames, I cut a lot of Pichiny frames in half.

thumpism 

Ted Makoskie (sp?) from Vestal NY?

dddd

Some 1984 Treks left the factory in a bad state of alignment. My 720 needed front-triangle aligning, which was acknowlwdged by the dealer. I was told that it would take some time for them to get my bike back to me, so I aligned it myself (without taking the bike apart) and it has been fine ever since.

The first year of their bonded aluminum bikes had stainless steel dropouts, which cracked like clockwork under the efforts of serious riders. Subsequent alloy dropouts never seemed to fail, so the factory then went on producing these for many more years.

Late 1990's Trek VRX full-suspension aluminum framesets could suffer multiple broken swingarms per year under a hard rider.

1st-gen Trek and LeMond OCLV (carbon) frames normally suffered paint cracking at the carbon lug joints. These were replaced early on, but later it was explained away to the customer and no more replacements for the superficial cracks at the Bondo line where the overlap commenced. Those were good frames, so again Trek went on producing this version for several more years.

repechage

It would be interesting to read an interview from say, yesterday. The Lance artillery shell having hit the ground and buried itself in the earth.

Chombi

Curious to know wheter there were actual Cometes and Galaxies that came into the shops with separated tubes and lugs......or was it all Al bike and liability paranoia.....
Quite a few were definitely missed by the Peugeot warranty sweep and culling. They still regularly pop up at eBay as complete bikes......Some of them brand new and mint, Some of them well used and quite beat up, but no separated tubes/lugs........

ramzilla

I own a 1984 Trek 520 Cirrus with Reynolds 531 double butted tubing. It's has a deep gray metal flake paint job. Rear derailleur cable runs through the chain stay tube. So far no problems. It's my favorite long distance bike.

The Golden Boy 

The 520 Cirrus would be an 86 or 87.

The 84 would have a TREK 520 decal on the downtube and 500 Series on the top tube, the 85 would have TREK on the downtube and 500 Series on the top tube, the 86 and 87 would have TREK on the downtube and Cirrus on the top tube.

vtchuck

I have a 89 660 True Temper frame with the thru the chain stay cable routing. If it was a problem, it seems like Trek would have changed it by 89

BColeKid

Burke died, I think, in 2008, so he wasn't around to watch the implosion. Armstrong has argued that Trek made a lot of money from his success on the Tour, that he wasn't the only one to benefit from the conspiracy. I am drawn to Burke's perception of the timeline, how the company made mistakes in the beginning and then enjoyed year of continuous growth and innovation, or some version of this.

And thank you to everyone for all of these insights into industry.

thumpism 

As I recall there was at least one separation/break that resulted in a lawsuit by the owner, and that prompted Cycles Peugeot USA to issue the recall of the bikes. I'm sure many were missed and many other owners never considered going through all the trouble to return a suspect bike. How many car owners will never get their Takata airbags replaced nowadays due to that recall?

bikemig 

+ 1. I worked in a shop at that time and we sold a lot of Treks. We had problems like this.

miamijim

Yes. I worked for him from '84-'96.

thumpism 

Ted was a good guy. I did not know him well, but he was one who genuinely seemed to love bikes and who also managed to make a living in the business. That's a combo not everyone manages to realize.