[Closed] Astonished and delighted by Hope

Sent my vision 2 back on Monday of last week - arrived back with new lead by Thursday. No charge at all.

,seems to be a theme here sent a set of lights back that someone gave me as they were not working last Friday came back today repaired 🙂 and for good measure a floating rotor had developed a rattle and that was replaced with a new one.
Doubt I will have the same customer service when i send a pair of Endura shorts back that have worn really badly at the crotch 🙁

I like hope a lot. However.... Spent far too much time fixing and sending off brakes etc for repair (even though free). My shimano slx just work.... Performance wise, as good as my hope 4 pots and require no maintenance. If they break, I could buy x3 sets for the price of my 4 pots

Hope stuff is great... The support is great..... But you pay for it at the outset

+1 for great CS.

If Hope are reading this thanks for sorting out my V4 caliper and I cheekily asked if they would mind sending me some 20mm front hub circlips as the shop lost the set they sent and they sent me a whole set of adapters with circlips!

There is a reason I have 3 sets of E4 brakes, 1 set of V4 brakes, 2 hope stems, 2 sets of hope hubs, several hope headsets and hope seat clamps on all my bikes 😳

And they still support C2s. Which is why I have Hopes on the t*nd*m.

If they break, I could buy x3 sets for the price of my 4 pots

Ime 3 sets won't be enough to cover the life of a hope brake

I've gone around the Hope factory twice and loved it. Having seen the trays and trays of spare parts lying around I can understand why it's no hassle for them to pull something apart and do a quick refurb with new bits. At least all the parts are all home-made so there are very few sealed units from other suppliers that can't be repaired. They're a great company.

Ime 3 sets won't be enough to cover the life of a hope brake

My first set of hope brakes (original minis, 2000/2001?) are still going strong. I rebuilt them about 8 or 9 years ago and upgraded the pistons IIRC. "Sold" them to a friend to get his lad back racing after his bike was stolen. As far as i know his youngest now has them on his training bike. So that's 15 or 16 years, 7 or 8 seasons of racing (me) and another couple with someone else, and about 30 quids worth of parts.
I usually find shimanos last 3 or 4 years with hard use before something unfixable crops up.

I usually find shimanos last 3 or 4 years with hard use before something unfixable crops up.

I find the same with Hope. Whilst they can be repaired, unlike shimano, they are 3 x the price.

Nice looking products, brilliant service, so-so reliability.

Unfixable on Hope?

Most of the stuff i've had you can still get parts for. If you need them.
(some stuff is a bit susceptible to corrosion, but it's easy to keep tabs on and stop it happening, it happens to shimano stuff too)

Or hope will rebuild it for you for not a huge amount.

i found shimanos lasted a seasons - sometimes 2 hard use racing and were scrap due to leaky seal at the pistons - unacceptable for me. While i admit if your just pootling about then they may do you just fine. The final straw was my XT lever failing mid race at strathpuffer - which was just a matter of itme based on previous experiance with them. At least with hopes you can do preventative maintainance by servicing and replacing seals - shimano you just have to accept they will die at some point.

mean while im running 5 sets of hopes between me and the wifes bikes and they all just continue to work year in year out.

reminds me i need to order pads for my race x2s.

FWIW, hard use for me is (was) mostly 90 minute XCO events with three or four XCMs and maybe a stage race per year. Something like 6/12/24 hour events are going to accumulate far more damage.

TBH with the cables on the lights it's classic Hope- yes they're very good at fixing them when they go wrong, which is great, but if the lights were made properly they'd have less failures. My £20 ebay light has better strain relief on the cables, and it's been the same forever.It's not really great customer service to sell an expensive part with a known flaw. But otoh, if they were more reliable, they'd generate less goodwill from fixing things...

I have to admit to being an immense Hope fanboi - ordering my 6th set of race x2s.... could save £100 by going shimano but I just love them sooo much.

What we don't know (and I wouldn't expect Hope or any other manufacturer to say) is the actual rate of returns. It could be 0.1% or it could be 10% (unlikely).

I've a Vision 2, it's about ten years old and has worked flawlessly for that time. I've used it on the bike and for fell running, about the only thing I haven't used it for is picking the bike up. My wife also has a Vision 2 of even older vintage with the same level of reliability. She also has a more recent R4 which has been back to Hope as the circuit board was faulty.

Brakes - currently got Shimano XT on my hardtail, adequate for my needs.

postierich - Member

Doubt I will have the same customer service when i send a pair of Endura shorts back that have worn really badly at the crotch

I had that and sent them back to Endura and they sent me a new pair, no quibble. Email them and see what they say.