Originally Posted by
GAAP
don't rule out shipping damage because the packing materials are intact. I've had frames damaged by UPS and the boxes / packing materials looked fine.
The frameset came in a big, roomy carton, with the frame and fork wrapped in many layers of bubble wrap, and the fork firmly attached to the seat stays. There's some minor denting of the box but nothing that could have impacted upon the fork from an appropriate angle (let alone left no other trace of itself other than the buckling of the fork blades). To bend the blades you'd need to brace the fork against something - the packaging style they use just doesn't allow that.
I've also spoken to the tube manufacturer, who understand this kind of fault very well and how it hapens, and what they do when it happens to forks in their factory (they throw them away).
Originally Posted by
GAAP
I'd bet that is not how the fork left the builders shop - and if he knew what it looked like now he would run to your house to get it back.
A nice notion, but in fact on their business terms I've had to cover the cost of shipping the faulty fork back to them (more on the upshot to this below).
Originally Posted by
GAAP
Why go showing it around a local bike shop? You aren't happy, that is enough - send it back to the builder and he will replace it asap. He'll be glad to do it asap and he could probably tell you what happened to it. The builder won't want that fork floating around bike shops and forums representing his work.
Again, doubtful it left the shop like that.
You seem to be mistaking this framebuilder/manufacturer for one with your own business values. I showed this fork to others more knowlegeable than myself because when I contacted the manufacturer I was greeted with extreme scepticism and the suggestion that I was being overly perfectionist. I had no reference point for how much "uneveness" was allowable for a fork blade, so needed to consult others, in order to avoid paying both for return shipping of the fork to the manufacturer and (if they thought it non-defective) their cost of shipping it back to me. About $50.
I can understand your empathising with the builder, but I haven't told those bikeshops who built this fork, nor this forum (and boy, did those bikeshops want to know). But since my concern extends to customers as well as framebuilders, I may yet do so. Any business can have an untypically bad day, but when it's indicative of habitual sloppiness, then I think others should know about it, don't you?
So now for an update to this unedifying tale: upon receiving the returned fork, the manufacturer agreed there was indeed "something wrong" with it, and replaced it with another. Which would been the end of the matter, except that the replacement:
- has an approximately 2mm fore-aft misalignment of the dropouts,
- a loose piece of flux rattling around in one of the blades,
- and is missing the countersink for the recessed brake hole.
There's a bulge of some sort above the bolt hole (I can't tell without scratching at it whether it's excess paint or how this fork crown was cast), leaving the bolthead flush againt the fork on only one small part of its circumference, which isn't very reassuring. The other fork did at least have that countersink.
You'd think that with a replacement for a defective item, they'd take a bit of extra care - but clearly, no.
So I'm now considering taking the fork to another workshop that can at least align the blades, and countersink the brake bolt hole (they obviously won't be able to do anything about the rattling flux), because I despair of ever getting anything "perfect" from this manufacturer (by "perfect" I mean "built with due care and attention").