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...and get blamed for finding out.
Mate brings bike to my place complaining wheel is difficult to get into dropout.
I suspect broken derailleur hanger, or dropout in frame.
Remove hanger and it shears off into two pieces.
Mate gets hugely pissed off. To be fair, I've been a bit evasive about what could be wrong, because I don't want him to think his frame is ****ed. That would be a 4 figure expense.
Mate pretty much blames me for the problem and takes off. I am left feeling like a Richardhead.
Moral of story: Never spanner for a spannerhead.
You've learned two things by the sounds of it:
1) You now know when his time of the month is
2) That you need a new mate
If he doesn't trust you then he's not much of a mate then is he 😀
What Andy said. Divorce is required I think
And why is he your mate to begin with?
Tell him to go and screw himself.
APF
Should I got Frank Underwood on him and have him pushed under the train next time the Circle Line comes round?
He has been a decent enough mate until now. I think people who've not done any spannering in earnest don't appreciate how much of an MTB is a consumable. Doesn't help that we get ripped off for consumables.
He'll calm down by Monday. Trouble is, will I give enough of a toss to listen to the explanation? Or will I even care? Culling time I reckon.
Send him the bill
Good job you didn't spot a crack on his chainstay. He'd have burned your house down.
He sounds a tad unreasonable.
Why is a borked hanger a 4 figure sum?
And why is a borked hanger worth storming off about?
Wait for his apology before your next move.
It could be a long wait.
It could be a short wait.
Doesn't sound like it will be your loss though.
he sounds like a prick, he should be grateful u spotted what it was or his next ride could have been a funeral pass
A new Mech hanger is 15 to 35 quid.
They are designed to break but not when you take the wheel off
If he replaces the Mech hanger and it fixes the problem I would expect an apology and I would never offer to fix it again. ...
Unless his freehub freezes in which case I would offer to wee on it!
If a new Mech hanger doesn't solve it I'm still not sure I'd apologize as you had good intentions.
Next time spell out the rules before you start. I will fix for free but don't expect .......
It rather sounds like that if it wasn't this episode that enabled him to show his true colour's, then it would have been another at some point in the future. I daresay it's nothing personal to you, that's the way he chooses to be, until he hopefully realises at some point that his behaviour is not the best.
Might he be aware of his behaviour/attitude? Can you be the one to point it out to him? You don't have to if you don't feel its worth your while.
Hopefully, you won't let this/him taint your generous nature with others in the future, and this experience will help you to become more aware of how some people are.
I've typed and deleted three responses to your post.. I feel like I'm missing something in what you posted,
Are you 'involved' in his frame ownership or something? Or do you just help him out with spannering?
I'm confused why it's your fault unless he's a complete knob..
Dhana, the king of the spanner monkeys, wtf have you been up to now?
wot are you, twelve?
Think he was under some pressure. Doesn't help that he doesn't know enough about bikes. Doesn't help that I diagnosed his last broken derailleur as well. One was after a stack. This one he claims to have no knowledge of. Guess sometimes we don't know what's going to break them.
What an a hole.
I don't see what you did wrong?
Sounds uncharitable but never offer to fix anything for anyone. In the event that something does go wrong or it's irreparable then they will likely hold you responsible. A recent experience has hammered this home 😕
Do stuff for mates. Spannering, Fork Services, Wheel builds. Always caviat beforehand that if it goes horribly wrong and I haven't knowingly ****ed up then its on their head.
Ah well Davey boy. We aren't all pragmatic enough to deal with a loose linkage bolt while riding across a Spanish mountain pass. Takes less to break the weaker ones.
he needs teaching some manners and needs to fix his own bike in future.
does he control other people also?
Let the douche sort his own bike next time. 😉
Sounds like a cock! Let him sort his own bike next time the ungrateful bar steward!
as the saying goes "no good deed goes unpunished"
never ever
He probably knocked the bike over and knew it was damaged but was looking for someone to blame.
There seem to be a lot of perfect people on here, and who have such an endless supply of friends that they'll dump a mate over one stupid episode. Don't listen to them. Presumably he's a mate because he has other redeeming qualities apart from being a bit of a tool occasionally? Just tell him you won't do any spannering for him again, and why.
Buy a new mech hanger and fit it for him. £20 or so and calm is restored. Then explain that it breaking is one of those things and that it was broken before you touched it, hence his wheel not going in properly.
Or explain about it already being broken and tell him to stop being such a dick about it.
I'd probably go with the former.
Everyone behaves like a tit at times. It's usually triggered by something so if he's a mate then I'd ask him what's up.
Did you tell him the mech hanger was designed to fail to save the frame in a crash ?
Is he under the impression that the dropout has failed and therefore the frame is borked.
If hes a mate buy him a new mech hanger on CRC , if hes a knobber kick him into touch.
Don't know why he was behaving that way. I will check if he calls me. Bit knobbish taking out your own frustrations on a mate though.
Just going to tell people to fix their own shit from now on.
People are c@@ts. Avoid.
buy more cats
I don't tend to do spannering for mates but I have in the past. And yes when you tell them the whole drive train is shafted because they haven't a) kept their chain clean and lubed and b) replaced the chain when you advised, some can get a bit arsey.
So I don't spanner for people now but I will happily assist and guide them do their own spannering. Teach a man to fish and all that.
It does boggle my mind the number of riders who will happily spend $$$$ on carbon/xtr/etc/etc but a don't keep things running smoothly and won't go on a simple maintenance course.
I have a mate who is a complete mechanical clutz so I end up doing all kind of little jobs for him, especially as he lives just around the corner. He is however , incredibly grateful for what I do and when I break the news that something is irretrievably farkled and needs money chucking at it , he is very philosophical and still thanks me anyway.
Manners and a sense of reality needed.
Its mountain biking, things break. He needs to accept that or find a different hobby
I think you need to kiss him, full on the lips, with a bit of tounge.
It does boggle my mind the number of riders who will happily spend $$$$ on carbon/xtr/etc/etc but a don't keep things running smoothly and won't go on a simple maintenance course.
When i worked in a shop, the general customer view point was if they're spending more, it should be less likely to break, then if it did break, since it cost loads, it was the shops job to suck it up.
Or at point of sale trying to convince the same kind of customer that their new £1000 forks are going to need tlc pretty much after every other ride or else they'll run into expensive repair bills a year or two down the line, atleast a lowers service every 3-6 months went down like a lead balloon.
What customers (a horrific amount of STW too) think they should have for a pittance and what doesn't defy the laws of physics, boundaries of current technology or is deeper in cost than their pockets are completly different worlds.
It does boggle my mind the number of riders who will happily spend $$$$ on carbon/xtr/etc/etc but a don't keep things running smoothly and won't go on a simple maintenance course.
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This is why I dont have any mates , makes life so much less stressful 😉
Had a guy in store who was complaing he'd had five punctures on his road bike since he bought a tube from us, I asked him what pressure he was running them at and he said he didn't know. I checked and they were about 55 psi and all his punctures had been snakebites. I explained why it was happening and he bought a new tube and left happy. Some people's basic knowledge is non existent.
When i worked in a shop, the general customer view point was if they're spending more, it should be less likely to break, then if it did break, since it cost loads, it was the shops job to suck it up.
So many of us are buying the equivalent of F1 components (which are usually backed up with F1 mechanics when used by our "heroes"), then expecting to get VAG service intervals.
Maybe shops should do a better job of explaining "this fork is the MTB of McLaren F1, if you're not prepared to dervice it every 10-24 hours of riding, may I respectfully suggest this Golf GTi, or possibly this Skoda Roomster?"
Still they need some folk who want to pay £900 for a fork.
OP, you're "mate" sounds like a first class pr**k, sorry.
Maybe bike parts are poorly designed? If hydraulic actuators on industrial equipment and agricultural machinery needed servicing as often as Fox forks then nothing would ever get done.
Yes there is some allowance that has to made for something to be as light and responsive as possible but most things stink of poor design.
I've got a mate like the OP who helps me with some spannering on my bike, he's very helpful and normally spots faults on my bike that just don't notice, I'm pretty useless like that, anyway although it's annoying having a broken bike I don't get pissed off with my mate for spotting faults, I thank him instead for saving me from a potentially nasty accident. I always get nervous when he starts checking my bike over now.
That reminds me he needs to bleed my brakes