Hope Bronze – Very Disappointing

I’ve been in touch with hope and they were very minimal in their response but are encouraging me to to send it back to the wheel builder and they’ll come up with a solution for him. I hope the solution includes credit, as he will have to rebuild the wheels.

I’d call that slightly burnt orange,  it’s not bronze, mind you neither is Burgtec’s, theirs is more brown than anything else, like Nukeproof ‘s so called copper horizon stuff.

I really like the Burgtec brown. Sorry – “Bronze”. Wouldn’t been irritated if I’d bought it to match Kashima forks but it looks great when new. All the colour has since scratched off my pedals, though.

Unfortunately that would penalise the wheel builder and not Hope, which would feel a bit unfair

I think this is partly on the wheel builder, especially as later you say he noticed that everything is different from his first batch.

Why didn’t he just pick up the phone and check with you? Couldn’t be bothered or thought you wouldn’t notice?!

It wouldn’t cost him any money to fix, just time, unless he can’t send the hubs back now he’s built them and potentially marked the spoke holes.

Personally I wouldn’t feel too sorry for him, presumably he has also made some profit on the parts not just the labour charge.

I agree with this, spooky. If the wheel builder is buying parts direct from suppliers/manufacturers, you’d expect them to do the same basic quality checks you’d do if you’d bought the components yourself – damage, cosmetic issues etc.

I’m not sure it’s reasonable for a wheel builder to decide if the shade of bronze from supplier A is a decent match to the bronze components from supplier B.

What a thread 🙂

From page 1:

People enjoying themselves…..

(this is meant to be light hearted banter btw)

Such an inane topic making it to a third page, with the OP still wringing their hands about escalating their gripe with every poor bugger involved in supplying them some wheels all suggests it’s neither enjoyable nor ‘just banter’…

Bikes are for riding, if you’re this invested (financially and aesthetically) in a shade of metallic brown, and hence failing to enjoy riding, surely some deeper introspection would be a better use of your time.

To be clear, I’m OP and I’m not escalating to any poor bugger at all – see above comments, but actually I am standing by the wheel builder. He has small margins and I completely agree it’s not his remit to identify a colour variation that made it through Hope QC.

I intend to find an amicable way through this that doesn’t impact him and is fair and reasonable with Hope as well.

Re aesthetics, I absolutely love building bikes and making them beautiful and it’s part of the joy for me and completely equal to riding. I’m making no apology for this.

It was a light hearted thread until you turned up!

It was a light hearted thread until you turned up!

Course it was 😉

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Google image search “Hope Hub Bronze” and you’ll see all the varied shades as a result of different cameras and light.
I must admit, their press shots look quite different from the pics shared online by consumers and shops

Hmmm, if I google image search hope hub bronze, I mainly only see brown promo shots from hope and a few orange hubs because the algorithm is confused.

There is this video which gives an even better idea of how they look in the flesh than my photos do. Sort of yellow gold with a dash of orange.

https://www.instagram.com/reel/C5Tt-uYxX7R/?igsh=bDNzeTU1c29icWky

I’d be asking Hope – they could even have someone in the factory putting them in the wrong boxes..

I used to work for a company that made products in a range of colours. Some of which could have been described as subtley different from each other(if you didn’t take a proper look). We employed someone new to pack customer orders and started getting complaints about wrong colour items being sent. Turns out he was colour blind and hadn’t told anyone.

Why did this thread not stop after the first response?

Apt username ;0)

Anyways, a few different shades of bronze on the latest dream build YouTube vid

You’re probably right, it has rambled a bit, sorry – They are going back to be replaced with black hubs as suggested in the first response.

I think the wider discussion is valid, ie it’s odd that the product Hope are shipping isn’t the one they originally advertised and it’s very similar to orange, which people might want to know before buying it.

This can be closed now if the admins agree.

This can be closed now if the admins agree.

What? There’s been no flounce yet for goodness sake!

Just read the entire thread from the beginning. That was an enjoyable read about peoples opinions on bronze in today’s world.

I like tarty colours on bikes, but wouldn’t have them on mine, personally, as it’s embarrassing to have a bling bike, then flinch at doing tiny drop offs and running out of puff on small inclines.

Your hubs definitely aren’t bronze though, op.

Are you a crow? If not go ride

Looks like Hope are starting to update their stock images now. Promo on the left and the current website version on the right.

Colour I wanted v colour I got

Much closer to Chris King (current) gold than bronze.

Copper colour rather than bronze on the left in the pic above.  Shades of pink

Going to look grand on night rides though

Nicolai do bronze ano on their frames.  There was huge variation in colour from ‘almost silver’ to ‘almost black’ – I think depending on how long the item was in the tank (and presumably by quite fine increments of time).  But it was never tending to orange.

I may be misremembering but I thought that’s because it was the same bath as the black but shorter dip.  It looks like the hope bronze is maybe a long dip in the orange tank

(someone who knows about anodising will come along and say this is complete nonsense very shortly I expect)

someone who knows about anodising will come along and say this is complete nonsense very shortly I expect

I think they just throw it in a tank and Hope for the best.

I had a tour of the Hope factory and saw the anodising tanks. Can’t remember how the different colours are achieved but remember being told that the proccess is strictly timed.

theirs is more brown than anything else, like Nukeproof ‘s so called copper horizon stuff.

I’m not sure if you’re saying NP’s “copper” is brown or not, but I have some of the pedals here and they are deffo a nice brown colour.

This thread is awesome BTW, and I’m happy to hear Hope are giving OP a happy finish.

Next week I’m hoping for a least 3 pages on… “Anodised purple, not as 90s looking as I remember it looking in the 90s”

Well, I’m currently looking for grips and anodized parts to match my NP pedals, so this thread is very useful.

mattrockwellFree Member
Next week I’m hoping for a least 3 pages on… “Anodised purple, not as 90s looking as I remember it looking in the 90s”

Well let’s get on with it then…

🤢

Well let’s get on with it then…

What a boring looking caliper. It’s a halfhearted bling attempt. Orange, purple, black, and is that blue or kind of grey 😕

Black with a smidgen of colour here and there looks so much better.

beadlesaboutFree Member
Interestingly, the wheel builder (who is very helpful and honest which is why I don’t want to drop this on him) says the first set that came in were as advertised and very nice, but all subsequent sets are like mine.

I think this may indeed indicate they had an issue in production.

their pic is bronze and yours is golden, I’d say the ball is in Hope’s court if they have changed the colour as your builder days. What does a wheel build cost? £30? + the teardown cost (use the same spokes) get a quote then get Hope to replace with the right colour and pay half towards rebuilding.

I’ll join in (equally light heartedly) as just been stung by EXACTLY the same issue), having built number of Burgtec Bronze components on my British Racing Green Whyte hardtail I thought my new Hope wheels with “Bronze” hubs would be the cherry on the icing on the cake… they still are, but not quite the match I thought they would be – they look perfect match in the garage with the lights off 🤷🏼‍♂️🫣 (still love them though)

Can you get some silver bits so it looks like a podium?

I returned mine ages ago for black, which was the right call, but nice to see I’m far from alone in my disappointment – https://www.facebook.com/share/p/Y2ConZm7eC2Fa3sX/?mibextid=WC7FNe

It’s amazing just how different they are from the early production – https://www.instagram.com/p/C5BaEiOoKXj/?igsh=em80aDVqY2FtNDRk

If you got the wheels first would you be annoyed Burgtek didn’t match Hope.  Its less hassle to change a stem than rebuild wheels

Seriously the answer might be to only go out in the dark though you’d risk your rear lights not matching

I don’t think he’s complaining about the colour, but simply that the colour advertised is not the colour received by an enormous margin.

It does seem to vary between components and lighting etc. but mine seem to be closer to their original photos (but definitely more gold/orange than my Nukeproof ‘Copper’ Hubs) but to be honest until I built the bike up I’d forgotten I had those anyway and assumed they were black so I was never expecting/hoping for them to match.

I’ve mainly just contributed so that people can get irate about the ‘rustic’ state of the garden…