Derailed

I bought a Trek 1000c "comfort" road bike for my wife last year. It has drop bars, and came with Bontrager tape installed. Soon after getting home I noticed that the bar tape had been wrapped incorrectly: starting from close to the stem and wrapping towards the ends of the hadlebars. I decided to not to make an issue of it thinking that maybe it would still last a few years (she's a fair weather, not particularly high miles, rider).

Here we are a year later, and the wrap job is toast. We went to the local shop yesterday for some other accessories, and I mentioned in passing that we needed new tape because it had been wrapped incorrecty. The salesman's response was that many Trek bikes come with the tape wrapped that way, but that it certainly wasn't right, and he'd give enough of a discount on everything that we were buying that day that the tape would be a freebie. Fair enough I thought...in my mind I let so much time pass that it was no longer their responsibility.

I wrapped the new tape and now everything is fine. I am, however, stunned that Trek would ship bikes this way. Anyone else (bike shop employees?) have this experience? Am I missing something? That is, is there any reason one could argue that tape SHOULD be wrapped that way? I've talked to advocates of starting the wrap clockwise on the left and counterclockwise on the right and vice versa, but always that you start from the end of the bars and work towards the stem...

bikerTeen

I've never heard of a bike coming from the factory with the bar tape wrapped like that. However, it sounds like you have a great LBS there for them to give you a discount and throw the tape in free to boot.

"A year later and the wrap job is toast..." : I love changing my handlebar tape! I must do it 2-3 times a season! Most of the time I have no real reason to though...

rmfnla

Years ago this was considered the correct way. One started at the top, wrapped to the bar end and finished the whole thing off with the bar plug (or bar-con shifter). Bar tape used to be adhesive-backed cloth so it would not shift position once it was installed. Even so, many noticed that the up-side edges would get messed up pretty quickly, so people started wrapping their bars "backwards", which is now considered standard.

Grand Bois

I've been wrapping mine "backwards" for about 40 years now. It works just fine, even with barcons.

Phatman

yea, but you have to unwrap the whole bar to remove/reinstall them.

personally, I havent seen any of the trek bikes come wrapped the wrong way. in fact, the few '04s that I've assembled (2 trek 1200's) have come with the tape seperatly, and I've had to wrap it. it seems that the '05s come with tape installed though.