i bought a kilo WT from bikesdirect at the beginning of the summer. after a month, the seat tube had cracked horizontally about an inch from the seatpost clamp. i wasn't sure what happened, so i sent it back to bikesdirect in august. after a month of waiting, i got a replacement frame. that frame was damaged by bikesdirect while removing the parts from it and again in shipping. after another week, i finally got a damage-free replacement frame at the beginning of october and bought an extra long 26.8 thomson post to replace the stock one.
long story short, the frame began cracking again in the exact same place, so i decided to measure the inside diamater of the seat tube. lo and behold, it actually requires a 27.0 seatpost, not the 26.8 that the frame is sold with. so now i have a useless 26.8 post that i bought, and i have a bunch of beer can shims stuck in the seattube so i can keep the thomson set until i can afford to buy a new one.
i emailed bikesdirect again about a month ago and never herad back from them.
has anyone else had a problem with their WT frame cracking and/or needing a bigger seatpost?

the problem is bike direct made a booboo in their description and the frame actually requires a 27.2 post not 27.0. I have one and the thing came with a 27.2 post which I was surprised and relieved over.

My issue with the frame was I had to dremmel a compression slot to actually hold the post because it was not cut out. Besides that, it's a wonderful bike which I'm happy with

+1 for shimming a Thomson with beer cans. Pretty big "oops" on BD's part there.

can beer shimming be done with 25.4mm riser bars on a 26mm stem?

Yep.

One thing I learned early on is that you can take bd's dimensional specs with a grain of salt. Sometimes they are correct and sometimes they are not. In the case of the Kilo WT, I think bd just carelessly transfered some of the specs from the Kilo TT to the Kilo WT, even though the two frames use a completely different tubeset. The Kilo TT does indeed use a 26.8mm diameter seatpost, so that number was used in the description of the Kilo WT. I almost bought a 26.8mm seatpost for my Kilo WT, until a forum member pointed out that it was actually 27.2mm, and when I removed the seatpost it was indeed stamped 27.2 on the bottom. If you actually received the original bike with a 26.8mm seatpost installed, then it's no surprise that the frame would be damaged when the seat binder bolt was tightened.

You can also get incorrect info if you email bd about specs. I inquired as the stem length and bar width on a size 43cm Motobecane Messenger, and bd replied 90mm and 400mm respectively. When the bike arrived, the actual dimensions were 120mm and 460mm, which were way too big for me.

BD quality is hit or miss, and this is the main difference between their bikes and more expensive name brands. In my case the problems were minor, such as a stripped seat binder bolt and rear dropout spacing that was off by nearly 5mm. I didn't bother to call bd, and simply found another M6 bolt in my parts bin and cold set the rear dropouts back to 120mm.

my response from bikesdirect:
so apparently using a superior product voids the warranty.
i really don't trust them with my entire bike, since they can't even ship a frame without letting it get damaged.

No, but using the wrong size seatpost does. You need to establish what size seatpost came in your frame originally. If you still have it, it should be stamped with the size. If bd installed a 26.8mm seatpost originally, then you have a case. If it was a 27.2mm and you replaced it with a 26.8mm, then you don't. Also, was the original post raised above the minimum insertion mark? If you did that, it might well have resulted in the original failure that you've described.

Seems like they don't want to take responsibility for their lack of quality control.

and yet they still havent changed the specs on their website.

still have the original, it is stamped 26.8. post was not raised beyond the minimum insertion, although it was within 2cm or so. that's part of the reason i got a thomson, b/c it has more length.

that's a shame, but it sounds like maybe you had too little of your seatpost inserted with your original set up and then you accidently replaced it with the wrong size, they were nice enough to replace the frame once from your mistake, you can't expect them to just give away frames everytime you make a mistake can you? granted they should fix their website but still, luckily it's not that expensive of a frame to have to learn from your mistakes on

sorry, your answer came while i was typing my reply and voided what i said, that's a shame though, they shipped it with a 26.8 seatpost originally?

Except that apparently bd did in fact supply this particular bike with the wrong size seatpost, and the OP simply replaced it with the same size, which also corresponds with the incorrect specs shown on the bd website description. Obviously, the bd QA person doesn't know this and needs to be made aware of this critical piece of information. If bd persists in sandbagging in this case, then they face a massive retaliation on this site.

Unless its a very obscure seatpost size, a replacement should be readily available.

Sounds like you've got a case.

Agreed.

does the bikesdirect guy still post on here? i'd be interested in hearing what he has to say.

You could certainly try to PM him.

But the release of lugged Kilo was the last time he was here, I would think that he might care about your feedback.

I haven't seen Mike on here for a long, long time.

Agreed.

Email BD again. Threaten them to send a letter of bad custmer service to the apex. i did that and they sent me free brakes and a new wheelset. I only needed pedals. Seriously. I have pictures and emails. I sent 3 differnt emails. And when i sent them that letter. a week later 2 differnt people emailed me with an apologies.

Agreements.

So you blackmailed them...

No i made complaients about my pedals and rim and brake. And i requested a new pedals for my kestrel because i was already upgrading my wheelset and brakes. And they never responded so i was going to report them and i did put down a complaint to APex and the triple A for slow compliance.

I had the same problem. Frame cracked in the exact same spot. Decided not to bother with pursuing BD..chalk it up to online buying. Hate taking the hit, but it is what it is...