Litespeed Warranty Problems
 

Hi - I'm shopping for a new bike. Considering buying a Litespeed. Have run across three different LBS, all reputable, selling top quality bikes, who have dropped Litespeed due to problems dealing with the company. All of them have complained about long waits, and stonewalling by the manufactuer when dealing with warranty issues.

Does anyone have experience with Litespeed bikes, and in particular, experience with warranty issues? Or, do you know anyone who has dealt with the company? I am looking to make this a lifetime bike, and the warranty support is important to me.

Thanks,

Phredd

I got my Litespeed from this store:

http://www.hi-techbikes.com/

Drove down from Orange County to San Diego to pick it up. You might want to call them and get their 2 cents. I've never had any issues with my frame so I can't comment on LS warranty problems.

FWIW, I got mine in Sep 02. Sep seems to be when LS and Merlins typically get price-dropped a bunch, as in over 30%. I never could find a comparable drop on Trek (5500) so I opted for a Litespeed. Originally, I wanted the Merlin Agilis, but the Ghisallo went on sale (w/ fork) so ridiculously low, I got it instead (I had to drop from a D/A to an Ultegra build in order to get it past the "Committee").

Sep is right around the corner - you might want to see what shakes loose in a month.
Best.

Checking the members section of Litespeeds site doesn't appear to indicate to much of a responsivness problem. Seems from the posts there that most seem pretty satisfied.

When I first got mine, I damaged a decal on the bike. I emailed thir customer relations and they said no problem and asked if I had any of their Litespeed water bottles and if there was anything else they could do for me. I told them no and they packaged two of the bottles with 3 sets of decals! Honest, this was 3 years ago, maybe its different now but it left me with a good feeling.

I haven't worked for a Litespeed shop in a little over a year but they had been excellent with warranty issues, particularly decals and the like.

I have never been so disappointed with a company as I have been with Litespeed. I came to Europe this year to teach English but mostly to fulfill my dream of racing in France. Accordingly I bought my dream bike. A 61 cm Litespeed Vortex. Found a head tube crack right before my first race this season. I wont go into details but basically I gave the bike to the local litespeed dealer in Late March and now in August I have still not seen it. At every stage when I learned there was a delay (and I was never informed, I learned of them by harassing from my own end). I just found out that it is up for servicing for August 23rd, so I should see it by mid september. Problem is that I wont live in France anymore then and now I have to arrange to get the shipping address changed. I basically begged them to get me a bike before the end of the racing season to no avail. Everyone was always super nice but basically in the end I have no bike and its always me who calls. Every time they messed something up they made no effort that I could see to speed up the process or to keep me informed of the status of my bike as evidenced by the fact that the two month delay they have originally quoted is turning into five months and will be six by the time I finally get it, if I get it when they are telling me I will. My racing season went great on my shiny Colnago Dream. I won six races and will be doing some UCI ranked stage races at the end of the season with teams like Saunier Duval etc. In a last ditch effort, I called them and tried to explain that I would be happy if I could just get the bike back in time for these dream races. It didnt work, although someone did call me back that time.

Next year I will be fully integrated in the elite team here in France and will have to race on a specialized, as the team is sponosored, although this is somewhat of a dream for me, it looks like apart from the pre season crits I did, I will never really get a chance to race on my litespeed. I did get some great training and low level racing in on it the year before racing in europe but that wasnt why I bought it. I made a huge investment for me personally and I regret it very much. Just my two cents. I am sure plenty of people have a perfectly satisfying experience.

Did they try to sell you another bike they happen to carry?

I've had my Litespeed for a little over 3 years and haven't had any problems.
Warranty? What's to worry about? They're built to last! :love:

A friend of mine has a Litespeed Antares (Aluminum frame)
It had a small paint bubble on the top tube after about a year.
They replaced the frame with a brand new one.

Wow - sorry to hear about your experience. It seems to fit with what I have been hearing. Out of curiosity, was your bike shop a small Mom and Pop type place? Most of the horror stories I have heard are from small independent bike shops. I just talked to some guys today who bought their bikes at Eddy' bike shop in Stow, Ohio...the biggest bike store in Ohio and one of the biggest Litespeed dealers in the Eastern US. One guy had a frame issue and was perfectly happy with the service he got. I'm starting to get the impression that Litespeed as a company is not very friendly with small bike shops.

Phredd