Trying to figure out what to do
 

I have a 2011 specialized vita bike that I use for commuting just about year round and also for short tours. It needs a whole new drive train. Which the guy at the bike shop says should run me $200 dollars. he said the shifters are near the end of their life and the front hub is causing vibration in the fork. Which is all fixable. His suggestion was that I might want a new bike (his suggestion Giant Escape or Liv which the store he works at sells). His reasoning was that if you are going to put $300.00 into fixing this bike up you might want to spend the difference and have a brand new bike. So I would have no issues for a few years. That being said it is hard to make up my mind in such a short time as I am going on an overnight bike ride in two weeks and was not planning on buying a new bike right now. I was never under the impression that bikes are a disposable item, but that is how this whole idea is making me feel.


So I am not asking what to do. I am asking what would you do and what is the reasoning behind it.

What does he mean the shifters are near end of life? They either are working or they are not. Is the shifting still okay? Are they sticking on some gears? Is it not shifting into certain gears? Are they seizing? If it's just the shifters, you can likely find a used set of 8-sp trigger shifters for $50. Is the cassette worn? Chain? What exactly comprises the 'drivetrain' according to your LBS?

Bikes aren't disposable like that. They do require some regular maintenance, and some parts do wear out, like your brakes, chain, and cassette. Replacing those things aren't all that costly, and depend the amount and type of riding you do, you can go quite a few years before replacing.


I would find out exactly what I need to replace. I'd need more information on the shifting, as this seems to be the big issue. As for the front hub, it may need to be cleaned and repacked--a job that is quite simple to do, but you do need a cone wrench. The shop may charge you $30 for something like this. Also, if your cups/cones are pitted, cleaning and repacking isn't going to solve the problem. You may actually need new front wheel.

I'm one that I'd repair the bike. But, that is only if one is using "free labor". As mcours2006 said, just about anything on bikes can be repaired. And the costs aren't that bad if one gets good deals on internet parts and does one's own work.

If the front hub is causing vibration, then something must really need long long overdue maintenance with it.

Another option is buying someone else's problem bike, and maybe one would get lucky :)

If you want a new bike, maybe get something a little different. Road Bike? Cross Bike? Adventure Bike? Touring Bike?

Then take your old Specialized Vita as your maintenance "practice bike". With some luck, you might get the old beater back on the road for your commuter, and keep the new bike for greater adventures.

mcours2006, from my understanding the drive train is rear cogset, chain, and front chainring. The chain is worn he showed me by putting the tool that measures that on the chain. I r

About the shifters being near the end of the life, he said they are sloppy and will start to skip gears and such. At this point that is not happening. Though he did clean the cables because he said that was part of the problem and it is hard to shift. I thought it was just my hands getting weaker, he said no it is due to the shifters being old. New shifters will be crisp. I am not even sure I understand that. You might bcle able to purchase second hand shifters and replace the originals. I am not that mechanically inclined.

he did not seem to say anything about being able to clean and repack the wheelbearing in the hub, just that it would need a new wheel. I am not sure if this is the original wheel on the bike but I would think most likely it is. I do try and keep the bike tuned and working in good condition because i ride almost daily.

I am going to look into this further as I need to understand before I can make an informed decision.

Thank-you for your input.

Get another opinion on what's needed, and a quote for the cost. Making a decision based on what may be an inflated estimate for possibly unneeded repairs is foolish.

Once you have real numbers, the right answer may be clearer.

+1

Second opinion needed for sure. We've had bike mechanics advertising their services on CL in my area. Might be worth looking into if you want to save some money.


For help with future repairs join a bike club and start making friends. Many of us bike geeks are more than happy to help others out! :)

i've never had to replace shifters beccause they were old and sloppy, not even on bikes purchased used. if shifting is a problem, the more likely culprits are cables, chain and cassette. you ask what i would do... if you know or have access to local cyclists, get recs for a mechanic and go to a better wrench.

Definitely get a second opinion.

Now, here's what I thought of when I read the OP, but before looking up her profile. My spouse took our car for an oil change, at the same place where I had taken it several times. They gave her a whole laundry list of problems, including the CV joints, warning her that the car was dangerous to drive. So she called me on the phone. I suggested that she should pay for the oil change and drive home. There was nothing wrong with the car.

We never went back to that shop.

It may be beneficial to ask around and find people who can give some more objective advice about bike maintenance, even amateur mechanics, or a bike co-op.

Cassette typically last longer than the chain. You could likely benefit from a new chain if the old one hasn't been changed since you bought the bike.

The shifter either shifts or it doesn't. If there's nothing broken in the internal mechanism it should shift as well as the day you bought it. Maybe spray some WD40 in there to clean it out if there's gunk buildup. If it's not shifting well it is more likely that the cables are the culprit, as someone has noted. Changing those would be much cheaper. A new chain would help in this regard as well.

When you take the front wheel out and spin it in your hands do you feel vibrations or some grinding sounds coming from the hub? Unless the wheel is severely out of true, you could try to repack it yourself. It's not difficult to do, and could prolong the life of that wheel for another few thousand miles. Lots of videos on Youtube on how to do this.

Is there a bike coop near where you live? If so you can visit them to see if there's someone there who can advise you for a second opinion. But definitely get a second opinion. As much as we enjoy helping, it's difficult to diagnose a problem without actually seeing the bike.

Good luck.:)

Add to that list, cable housing. Some people replace it on a regular basis.

Another option to look at is if there is a bike co-op that might help you out with advice and tools, or perhaps some local maintenance classes/groups that you could attend.

The price tag seems plausible for MSRP parts plus shop labor. I'd do the work myself and buy discount parts and tools, but if you're not inclined...

How many miles are on the bike? After 10k miles on my road bike the rear cassette and chain needed replacing (I failed to do proper chain maint or the cassette might have had more life). The front chainring doesn't get used nearly as much and I'm surprised yours needs replacing. The rear cassette had rounded cogs on it :-) The front chainring still looks fine after another 2500 miles. They also replaced a section of cable from the right brifter as it had worn away. They also trued my wheels. I think it was like $250 out the door after the 10% discount. So the quote you have been given does not seem unreasonable. It is not unreasonable to replace pieces of the drive train. I agree with getting another quote.

I see no reason to purchase a new bike, especially if you like the bike you have.

Is it even possible to need a whole new drive train all at once, if you've never replaced parts of it? Not even including the "end of life" shifters which I'd disregard on general principle, but I think wear the cassette, chain, and/or cables would make the bike unrideable before the chain rings get very worn. Unless you have some kind of ultra-light aluminum rings or something?

Perhaps the shop is making the might-as-well-do-all-at-the-same-time-to-save-on-labour argument. OP did mention that the shop measured the chain with some kind of tool, so I change that first. It's the lowest hanging fruit in this whole thing.

Thank-you everyone for your input. I am not buying a new bike after reading all that everyone wrote. I am bringing back the bike to the bike shop where I purchased it and ask for a second opinion(which is not where I went on Friday evening). I plan to do that first thing tomorrow morning as i have the day off.

I think you've made the right call, sounds to me like this bike shop guy was fishing for a sale.

Chains are wear items, it is not surprising one would need to be replaced if you rode a bike regularly since 2011. Cassettes and chainrings are as well, but they don't go as fast as chains, it doesn't make sense that they would suddenly all need to be replaced at once.

"he said they are sloppy and will start to skip gears and such" -- do you find them to be sloppy, or do they shift OK for you? Are they skipping gears now, or will they start skipping gears in the future? And yes, cables need to be replaced (or at least drip a few drops of lube in) every year or two or shifting gets sticky -- that doesn't mean shifters are bad. Also, are you experiencing this vibration in the fork from the supposedly trashed front hub?

At best, this is a high-end cyclist who is projecting his refined racing sensibilities onto you and your (presumably more utilitarian), at worst this is a salesman pressuring you into buying a bike even though you have a perfectly fine one.

My best advice: spend an hour watching youtube videos about bike maintenance; you'll see how easy it is, and armed with this knowledge, you can free yourself from the tyranny of bike snobs. Replacing a chain and cables and housing and even shifters if you want, can all be done with non-specialized tools (allen wrenches, screwdrivers, although if the chain doesn't have a quicklink you might need a chainbreaker). Servicing a front hub does require cone wrenches, and skill, but a new wheel can be had for probably $50 -- if you even really need it.

:popcorn

A lot of us ended up riding bikes with parts that were replaced with something that better suited our needs as the original ones wore out. If you like the bike and it works for you I'd recommend first getting the second opinion and then replacing/upgrading as needed. You'll probably be pleasantly surprised if you go this route.

I took the bike to the bike store today and his opinion was the same as the first bike stores opinion about the work needing to be done. So I called my brother who is a car mechanic and asked if he would do the work with me. He said yes. So I have to go online tonight and find the parts that fit my bike and then send him the link so he can check it out. Then I can order the parts and we will fix it together.

The mechanic at the second bike store told me the reason for purchasing a new bike when the cost got that high is because my bike is an entry level bike and the cost difference of paying to for the new parts and work is not much difference between a new entry level bike. That being said I am not paying for another new bike in the near future.

Thank-you everyone for your help. I feel so much better fixing this bike and doing the work with my brother will be a great learning experience for me.

Good work. I'm sure you will benefit a great deal from the experience of learning how to work on your bike yourself.

Not sure what the exact prognosis is, but if you are experiencing shifting issues, I would recommend:

* new cables/housing (kits can be bought off eBay for under $20)
* reinstalling cables means adjusting derailleur alignment for crisp shifting, videos are all over youtube
* new chain (again eBay, $15 or less, make sure it has some kind of 'quick link' so it can be installed/removed without special tools)
* light chain lube (tri-flow or comparable) to lube all pivot points of front & rear derailleur
* watch videos of how to remove, clean, and reinstall rear derailleur jockey wheels and do that too.
* investigate the front wheel more to decide for yourself if it has a problem and what that problem might be

After all that, evaluate how the bike is working for you, I bet it will be fantastic, enjoy and ride! If not, come back here and ask questions, we'll be glad to advise

FWIW, I rode an "entry level" Giant hybrid ($320) for 10 years, putting 30,000 miles on it.

In that time, I rebuilt the rear wheel (about $60, my own labor, new spokes and rim), eventually entirely replaced the rear wheel, replaced the bottom bracket once, and then normal wear (replacing chains, cassettes, derailleur wheels, brake pads, etc).

It's still running fine as far as I know. I gave it away with about 32,000 miles on it. So don't worry too much about putting money into an "entry level" bike.

Also IMO don't worry too much about fixing every last thing that a mechanic mentions to you, unless it's actually bothering you.

FWIW if you look at new bikes, Giant IMO does not build great wheels. The $300 hybrid broke spokes so fast you'd think they were dry spaghetti. 12 broken spokes in < 1500 miles. That's when I gave up and bought good spokes (wheelsmith) and a new rim. One of my current bikes is a $1200 Giant Seek 0. It's better but it still breaks spokes. The wheels I built, I've run for 20,000 miles and never broken a spoke or needed to true them after initial tensioning.

This is a good point. A Specialized Vita may be an entry level bike, but at least it's actually a bike, unlike the BSOs ("Bike-shaped objects") many people buy at *Mart.

Without seeing the bike it's hard to say if you're getting the business or not. If the chain checker goes in, maxes out, and still wiggles around before contacting links, I usually recommend a new chain and cassette. We test ride the bike and check for skipping on the front gears if the chainrings aren't visibly worn. We have problems replacing individual chainrings on entry level hybrids because those riders spend 90% of their time in the middle ring (in our area, at least), and the chainrings are riveted together. We can't just change the middle ring, so they get rung up for a $40-$50 crankset (with replaceable rings) and the labor to replace it instead of a $15 chainring. If we're going to have the cranks off, I usually recommend replacing the cheap VP bottom bracket with a UN-26 or UN-55 while we're down there, and I won't charge labor for both crankarm and bottom bracket installation. People look at the FX, FX1, 2, and 3 in our shop and wonder why they are priced differently. Obviously you get more gears as you progress, but the bottom bracket (fx has a horrible unit), chainrings being replaceable, rear hub quality, rear hub design (freewheel vs freehub), and rims (single vs double wall) all get better as you go up the line. That's hard to explain to first time bike buyers, or people looking for the cheapest bike, without giving people a serious case of information overload. I'm not saying this is what's going on with OP, but it's very easy to get into a $150 parts and labor drivetrain replacement on a <$400 bike.

I'm also inclined to believe the mechanics are blowing smoke about the shifters. Shimano shifters are known for gumming up and not working, but it's when they're 10-20 years old, with most of that time being parked in a barn or shed. If the cables aren't rusty or crusty, and the housing isn't kinked, clean them with a degreaser and lube them up.

I think I'm still riding an entry level bike. That doesn't matter to me though, it still gets me where I'm going. Essiemyra, your brother should be able to figure out what needs to be done pretty quickly, but he's going to need some specialized (not the bike brand) tools to change parts of the drivetrain. He'll be familiar with the idea of what quality tools to buy, and a trip to the bike shop with your brother to see what tools he may need would help.