rolliepollie

I bought a new Prodeco Phantom ebike and the rear dropouts are about half an inch too tight - when the left dropout is aligned with the brake and hub, the right dropout is on top of the smallest cog. The dealer said they've been coming like that from the bike company but someone from Prodeco emailed saying hes never heard of the problem. There are no obvious warping or dents and the wheel is aligned well when mounted. I'd hate to go through the return/warranty waiting game as the bike seems often out of stock, and if worst comes to worst, is it possible to bend/pry it out without significantly weakening the frame? Or I can leave as is and hope I don't need to replace the inner tube on the road as it takes an hr or 2 to reinstall the wheel myself.

cranky old road 

Having to distort a new aluminum frame to mount a wheel is unacceptable.

cny-bikeman

No, you cannot bend out the rear triangle - safely or likely even at all, and even if you could that is not an acceptable solution on a $1k+ bicycle. You are going to have to put in a warranty claim, and should have absolutely no money out of pocket. In fact, considering the extent of the problem and the difficulties it could pose while you wait for replacement, I would ask the manufacturer for some compensation. In addition, if the bike is very new I would ask for a replacement bike, verified before shipment as being fully up to spec, rather than the dealer moving everything over to a new frame, as that could leave you without a bike for some time AND the potential for mistakes to be made, especially as the dealer is not greatly compensated for all that work.

Homebrew01

Bad frame, get a warantee replacement. The inconvenience now to replace it is less than the longterm inconvenience of keeping a bad frame.

FastJake

So it's off by 12mm??? Folks will cold set their steel frames when they want to run a hub that's 4-6mm wider than what the frame is at. I'm not even sure it's a good idea to cold set a steel frame 12mm, but since your frame is aluminum you absolutely cannot bend it to fit.

Bottom line, your frame is completely unacceptable and defective. It should be replaced at no cost to you.

rolliepollie

Just dropped it off at the dealer for them to send back. Will hear if Prodeco will accept it come Wed, but should be no reason they wouldn't from what I've read so far. Weird that the same guy said he had another ebike that was difficult to take the rear wheel off, repeating what he said last time as if that's normal! Yea the dropouts are around 12mm inward, hence prying them apart with my foot and arms. Like was said, I'd rather wait up to a month or so for no-worry riding than keep worrying I need to change a tube on the road. Kind of dumb I thought of keeping it now that I dropped it off!

3alarmer 

...........................

dabac

Well, keep in mind that just because something is normal doesn't mean that it's right.

Normal is an impression based on how things usually are. If they've gotten a whole string of poorly assembled or wrongly spec-ed frames (maybe SS/IGH frames?), then tight rear dropouts is normal for that production run.

Still doesn't make it right though, and those bikes should never have been delivered like that. Someone messed up, and now they're trying to sell the mess on.
Make sure that the replacement bike actually have this issue sorted out. Have the shop remove the wheel and verify alignment before accepting delivery of your replacement bike.

Kimmo

Like that creepy American 50s whitebread vibe, where weird = bad and normal = good, despite normal being stiflingly bland, soulless and dead-eyed factory fodder.

rolliepollie

So Prodeco told the dealer and called me themselves to confirm this is in fact 'by design.' The rep said he spoke with the production, his supervisor, and warranty guys and said they all confirmed it. He then transferred me to another production rep and again said it's tight. My dealer said he's gotten over 30 Prodeco bikes like this, too. I'm a little purplexed now. So I'm out of options except ask for a refund (gotta see if the shop still allows it) or keep it. Are other ebikes like this? Again, I'm talking about the dropouts being nearly an inch too far inwards, not just tightness due to paint. I still want to keep it as I can't find any other $1k-2k bike with a 500w motor and 12amp battery. I guess I can hope whenever I get a flat I can actually find the puncture and patch it.

mrrabbit 

Assuming the rear hub is the electric hub AND the electric hub has inverted tanged washers on and the rear frame facing is supposed to be 135mm:

Here's what I think happened...

Producer spec'd a 135mm rear spread frame...so far so good...

Producer spec'd a 135mm rear 7-speed e-Bike hub...

...and then that's where things broke down.

A lot of folks spec'ing rear e-Bike hubs don't understand that the inverted tanged washers define the OLD - in this case 135mm.

But they'll look at the documentation and think the chamfered portion of the axle defines the OLD - and see 137mm in the document...and order THAT hub...

...they'll install the hub with the inverted tanged washers - and wonder why they have to jam the hub in. Those washers bringing the OLD to 145mm....

When they were supposed to order the hub that says 127mm for the chamfered axle dimension and 135mm with the inverted tanged washers installed...

Visit the dealer - ask him if the hubs fit better without the washers...if so - that's what happened - but it doesn't work because then a 5-speed freewheel has to be used...

=8-)

rolliepollie

Even without washers at all the dropouts won't fit. With the left dropout on the hub without washers the right dropout will still sit on top of the last or second smallest cog. Will a 5 speed hub be around an inch less wide than a 7 speed? Even so, I'd rather not downgrade to a 5 speed

gsa103

Maybe there's a reason it was extra cheap.

mrrabbit 

You're pretty much confirming what I've said...

...and this wasn't by design - the producer screwed up.

This is one major reason why several of e-Bike companies have already closed shop in the past 5-7 years. You can't recover from screw-ups like these - at 200.00+ per hub wholesale - you are forced to either sell the product anyway only to support pissed off customers on the support side of things losing globs of money - or recall the bikes and replace the hub/wheel losing globs of money.

You go bankrupt - all because:

1. Someone couldn't bother to refer to common hub specs for OLD and Dimension A in a Sutherland's manual.
2. Someone couldn't bother to slow down and read the documents from the manufacturer of the e-bike hubs.

The lack of specs aware wheel builders in the e-Bike industry has been a sore thumb for quite some time both for hub design and implementation in bikes.

Half the time customers approach me with an e-Bike hub for a build - I have to hand it back to them informing them: "That's a 145mm tandem hub..."

They end up caught between me (one rock) and the seller of the hub (another rock) - with the seller all too often responding with:

"He doesn't know what he's talking about..."

It's a sad state of affairs...

=8-)