[Closed] PSA : The sad reality of a liftime frame warranty

As you can read in the attached article, the life of your mountain bike frame is not the same as your life.

Love it...lifetime warranty is for the lifetime of the frame!

[i]The fact your frame had not suffered from damage in 10 years, speaks volumes for our design and manufacturing, considering most titanium frames last 5 years. [/i]

Is 5 years really seen as a 'a good life' for a Ti frame by most manufacturers? 😯

*sticks with steel*

Bogus state of affairs, Mark. You can see his point about a weld cracking after 10 years not really being a manufacturing defect, but if they're going to take that stance then logically they would never ever warranty a 10 yo frame. So clearly the 'lifetime warranty' statement is marketing pish.

Probably not the sort of bike you're looking for, but CDale were always superb with their warranty claims - had a 5 yo scalpel replaced on a tiny crack by the bb, plus a couple of HTs no quibbles. Few years ago though and the company's changed quite a bit since.

$504 to [i]repair[/i] the frame? Good lord.

Interesting reading, it'll make me double check the definition of a lifetime warranty with any company rather than accept it at face value.

Sounds pretty unacceptable to me, I'd consider that a frame should not crack under normal use regardless of age, and you were sold a lifetime warranty.

Small claims might be worth a punt, misleading sales information etc. Give trading standards or whatever they're called now a ring for some advice - they can be quite good.

Personally I wouldn't let it rest after just a small email exchange - let them know you're serious about following it through. Do your research and write them a letter, including how you intend to follow up if you don't get a satisfactory response. It might get you nowhere but you never know...

Laughable that they consider 5 years an acceptable lifespan for a Ti bike! Cheap carbon and steel is the way to go then.

Will i ever learn .....I'm just looking a new frame from a custom Scottish framebuilder.... Expensive but its got a good warranty !

You getting a Shand?? 😀

We warranty all of our bikes and frames from manufacturing defects for the life of the frame

Excellent a warranty that expires at the exact moment something breaks.
I don't think anyone should offer such vague warranties, put it down in years in black and white so people can make an informed decision.

And re-post this on any other bike forums you can so that anyone else thinking of buying their products knows how long they actually consider to be the lifetime of their products.

it does raise the question as to whether a fatigue failure is a 'design fault' and presumably not then covered by the 'manufacture fault' warranty despite being within their control?

[edit] a few direct links will get this thread up the google rankings for [url= http://www.litespeed.com/ ]http://www.litespeed.com/[/url].

🙁 that is not very good is it! Bearing in mind the cost of a Litespeed frame (yes, I do have one) I would have expected exemplary customer service. That must be extremely disappointing for you.

Would be interested to hear what you are going to do now as, frankly, their responses are pathetic. Their PR people need to get involved otherwise they won't have any customers with an attitude like that.

I have had no problem with Marin and warranties on frames...

Maybe Litespeed have a different interpretation of Lifetime, ie, if its undamaged and working, its alive.. until the nanosecond before it cracks and therefore becomes dead.. and unwarrantied.

Does seem a very poor show...

Sorry, but "lifetime warranty" is a ridiculous thing for any company to contend, I have asked folk in the industry what this means and never got a straight answer.

"the Lifetime of the Frame" is a standard answer, so in other words, when the frame breaks it's life is over, so the guarantee doesn't apply.

It's like saying we guarantee that your cat will be alive, until it stops breathing.

Marketing BS of the highest order.

Ask them under what circumstances they will replace a frame ? I bet thats a short answer.

[i]It's like saying we guarantee that your cat will be alive, until it stops breathing.[/i]

litespeed frame warranty = schrodingers cat

You can only tell if it's there by looking but as soon as you look the warranty is over.

So this line on their website is a bit misleading then...

Litespeed Limited Warranty

Litespeed Bicycle's frames are warranted to be free from manufacturing defects in material and/or workmanship [b]for the lifetime of the original owner.[/b]

Helpfully they follow it up with this gem:

This Limited Warranty Does Not Cover

Any damage resulting from normal wear and tear, including the result of fatigue.

I always wanted a Litespeed frame, after seeing one in MBUK about 15 years ago. I wouldn't touch one with a shitty stick after reading about all the warranty problems with them.

would that be [url= http://www.shandcycles.com/ ]shand cycles[/url] MtbMM?
they look very nice

Was it made of 6/4 titanium?
http://www.ing.unitn.it/~colombo/telai/approfondimenti_sul_titanio.htm

Wry smirk @ wwaswas

lifetime warranty does tend to always translate to reasonable lifetime of the product. sad state of affairs but true. they have obviously deemed 10 years as reasonable

Small claims might be worth a punt, misleading sales information etc. Give trading standards or whatever they're called now a ring for some advice - they can be quite good.

Can't see them being too concerned with UK consumer rights

Probably not the sort of bike you're looking for, but CDale were always superb with their warranty claims

[url= http://singletrackworld.com/forum/topic/not-worth-the-paper-or-website-its-written-on ]Not everyone agree's with that...[/url]

have had no problem with Marin and warranties on frames...

Indeed they bent over backwards to help me.. quite a few times. IIRC they did specify that a lifetime warranty was for 10 years, which I thought very reasonable

I bet they will enjoy when this thread starts to pop up high in google.

Especially if people keep talking about their Litespeed Warranty Issues, Litespeed Lifetime Warranty, Should I trust Litespeed Warranty or even if someone misspells it as Lightspeed Warrantee.

🙂

I'd thought that one of the benefits of a metal frame was repairability, but $500 seems steep.
Does Litespeed do any of these twitter/fb social networks? Reports of shaming companies into action abound when #bashtags start.

If I were the OP I'd have steam coming out of my ears - you seem very philosophical about it all. I think hels ^^^ sums it up best: a guarantee against breakages until it breaks...it is frankly underhand and despicable, it's not like you bought it off a bloke in a pub for a tenner!
EDIT: should I have put Litespeed customer service lifetime guarantee warranty issues in my post?

Probably not the sort of bike you're looking for, but CDale were always superb with their warranty claims - had a 5 yo scalpel replaced on a tiny crack by the bb, plus a couple of HTs no quibbles. Few years ago though and the company's changed quite a bit since.

Not true for Cannondale anymore, as a friend tried to warranty her frame after it cracked on a chainstay and she way told lifetime of frame not lifetime of person, and life of Al frame is < 5 years.

Hence she will never now buy another Cannondale. Shame really as they are nice bikes.

I doubt any company will do no quibble replacements, as didn't PlanetX get caught by this, when some smart arse, hacksawed his frame in half at 23 months to get a new one. (Brant should be able to verify this, and this should now hit his vanity search)

litespeed frame warranty = schrodingers cat

So the frame has both failed and not failed and the OP needs to relocate to the branch of the universe in which the frame has not failed. Perhaps Litespeed should have said this as it's more reasonable than their current position.

So they are saying the fault was in the design (didn't make it strong enough to withstand normal wear and tear) but the warranty is for manufacturing faults only.

But in their response they seem to regard the two stages as one

speaks volumes for our design and manufacturing

If you can't get a free repair, you can at least burn $1000 of their management time dealing with your legitimate complaint, until they redefine lifetime warranty as "sorry sir, your frame has reached the end of its life".

Probably not the sort of bike you're looking for, but CDale were always superb with their warranty claims

I've heard the opposite, they were awful, and were very well known for saying "the lifetime of the frame has ended, therefore your lifetime warranty is over".

Litespeed Bicycle's frames are warranted to be free from manufacturing defects in material and/or workmanship for the lifetime of the original owner.

OP needs to send that to Litespeed and get it amended, they're lying.

100% with the op on this.lifetime should mean lifetime (especially for an expensive titanium frame from a renowned manufacturer).good job i have a cheap bike 😉

A weld is a defect in materials. Its something that is put their to hold to pieces of material together. It failed to do its job, therefore its a defect.

Its not a downhill bike and why say 'lifetime for the original owner'. If they say this for marketing reasons only they should remove it and add

"lifetime for the original owner unless he uses it then it becomes wear and tear".

FAIL.

Just like Specialized recently when I asked for the warranty on the HEEL of the shoe and they pointed to the wear and tear on the TOE of the shoe as reason for rejecting it. Idiots.

It makes those cheap eBay Ti and Carbon frames look even more if a bargain.
Why pay more if it's not going to last any longer?

They would appear to make a habit of this -

http://forums.mtbr.com/litespeed/beware-litespeed%92s-lifetime-warranty-claim-599636.html

Basically they offer a worthless warranty that they have no intention of honouring after a few years. Pretty disgraceful really. They should really offer an upfront time period on the warranty.

Hopefully people will research Litespeed before buying and buy from a reputable manufacturer.

Why pay more if it's not going to last any longer?

Why it could last a for ever, if you can just find the right parallel universe.

Just keep posting it up in numerous places. Google will pick it up. In addition get a few friends to email them saying they've heard about their lifetime warranty and wouldn't consider buying one on the back of this.

That'll rattle/worry them.

My mk1 Chameleon frame is nearly 15 years old. Very, very well ridden but as far as I'm aware (ie, it was still in one piece last night in the cellar), its not fallen apart.

Thats disgusting TBH.

Considering ti frames are billed as 'for life', the number of threads about broken ones vs broken steel or alloy frames is very high (especially considering ti frames must be a tiny fraction of the number of frames out there).

More of the same, but with some interesting suggestions:

http://forums.roadbikereview.com/litespeed-merlin/meaning-lifetime-warranty-272184.html

It looks like, in Litespeed speak, a lifetime frame warranty lasts 5 years...

The fact your frame had not suffered from damage in 10 years, speaks volumes for our design and manufacturing, considering most titanium frames last 5 years.

Should that read:

The fact your frame had not suffered from [i]weld failure[/i] in 10 years, speaks volumes for our design and manufacturing, considering most titanium frames last 5 years.

For the google bump

Litespeed customer service lifetime guarantee warranty issues

Is 5 years really seen as a 'a good life' for a Ti frame by most manufacturers?

Sweet merciful Zeus! Only five years life expectancy? :/ Sod that.

Does seem a bit like “Your frame is guaranteed until it breaks”. I’d expect a lifetime guarantee to be just that – a warranty against all cracks and faults that have occurred through normal use. Which seems to be what the blurb on their website suggests too

Does anyone from the Evans buying team come on here? I'm sure there is at least one member of the team.

They should be interested to know that a product they are selling with a 'Lifetime Warranty' is unlikely to have that warranty honoured by Litespeed once the frame has been used.

That is just disgraceful. "Lifetime Warranty" = FOR EVER. Not the "Life of the frame".

How do you quantify "life of the frame"? It's either 1 year, 2 years, 5 years....... or "for life".

The more I read about Ti frames and the cracking and warranty issues with the makers, the more I'm put off. At least you know that any mug, and I mean me here, can bash out a steel frame repair. I've done it in the past so I speak from experience.

"Bike for life". Not if it's a http://www.litespeed.com/

Remind me not to buy a Litespeed.

Hope you sort it out ok.

neninja- if one does I'd gladly ask him/her why a 1yr old pair of Specialized SPD's was refused a warranty within the 2yr warranty period by them.

I had a good friend have almost a mirror situation with litespeed over a road, I wouldn't buy anything from them and will tell anyone who will listen their story to warn them. I will add the op's tale to this to. Company of shister's.

So if 5 years is a standard lifetime on a fancy and bloody expensive Ti frame, that are generally regarded as very long life frames. Then whay is the expected life of my 6 year old Aluminium FS frame? Will I die soon?

My LBS stopped selling Litespeed for this reason. They were spending too much time (and money)trying to appease owners of failed litespeeds.
The cost of the repair is high because they remove the failed tube. So labour is quite a bit more than welding a new tube to a new frame. But it still doesn't cover the £500 plus carriage.

Get it welded, and ride it:-)

That's a sad tale, indeed. Also sad that lifetime warranty means nothing or any real extended warranty and better in some ways to go for the cheaper throw away frames than invest in something.

I might be wrong but think Trek are pretty good warranty wise, a few years ago when I worked in a bike shop a guy bought his cracked trek aluminium frame that he bought in 1991, we phoned trek and they said "yup post it back with the original receipt and will will send you out a new frame". We sent a very worried looking man home to search through his old paper work in hope that the receipt would emerge! Not sure if he found it or not.

I think warranty like Curits bikes free repairs for life are more meaningful or crash replacement schemes, yes your less likely to get a shiny new frame for "free" but at least not all is lost.

I hope you get something out of it, you could asked the citizens advice bureau if you have any leg to stand on, or sometimes uni's have free legal advice session. May your not wanting to go down that route but might be worth finding out and letting Litespeed know that your doing so, might shock them into doing something!

was the frame purchased direct or through a UK retailer?

My philosophy with building frames is we have a deal - you give me money to build a frame to do a job. If the frame ever ceases to do that job, I'll fix it - if the job changes (you go downhilling on a touring bike), then you've broken your end of the deal.

Seems reasonable to me 🙂

Just read Litespeeds warranty on the website http://www.litespeed.com/inner.asp?content=re-warranty

Some quotes from the warranty: "not used for it's intended pupose", "trail riding", "jumps". So MTBing in general then?

In short = This warrany is void if you ever claim on it.

...considering most titanium frames last 5 years...

In the end, however, I had the frame welded up by Vernon Barker. Cost £75 including postage, very neat job, and it is still going strong.

So they can say the 'lifetime' of the frame has expited once it cracks? Therfor don't have to honour the warranty since the frame has reached it lifetime.

Thats pish and very misleading. I would keep this thread going for as long as you can and I certainly wouldn't leave it at that.

"trail riding"

So what is mountain biking? The word 'Mountain' conjures up quite rugged landscape. Maybe send them this link: http://www.google.co.uk/search?hl=en&q=mountains&bav=on.2,or.r_gc.r_pw.r_qf.,cf.osb&biw=1280&bih=845&um=1&ie=UTF-8&tbm=isch&source=og&sa=N&tab=wi&ei=SSC2T6mYELCo0AXR8q2aCg

....and they should rename their product 'light loose earth use product'.

I've had cause to use the Marin/Whyte (ATB sales) warranty service a few times and they've always been superb, my Whyte 19 Ti made by Litespeed but I'm not expecting it to fail any time soon.

I agree with all the disappointment expressed here, but unfortunately according to my mate who is a Trading Standards officer (who are generally very pro-consumer), 'lifetime warranty' does not actually mean your lifetime. Instead it means 'reasonably expected' lifetime of the item in question.

The example he gave is if you buy a saucepan as a newly wed and use it every day for 70 years, and then the handle breaks, do you really expect to get a new one no questions asked. Because being reasonable you wouldn't really expect a saucepan to last 70 years, would you?

The issue here then is what is considered a reasonable lifetime for a Ti frame. Unfortunately, most of us buy into thinking that Ti frames go on for ever, and evidence shows that isn't the case. Is 5 years reasonable? What would the average MTBer in the street say? Now it becomes a contentious issue.

So i suspect sadly you don't have a chance other than through getting a deal on a replacement. And in turn; Litespeed (and others) should fess up on what they really think the expected lifetime of a frame or component is because this 'lifetime' warranty is just misleading marketing.

My Raleigh Titanium is now about 16 years old and still going strong (fair enough it is a road frame), maybe someone should tell it it should have died 11 years ago!!

I can sort-of see where they're coming from - titanium, like aluminium, has a finite life. Even the best-made frame with perfect welds will eventually fatigue and crack - it's an intrinsic property of the material.

So they should be more clear about what they mean by "lifetime" and the difference between fatigue and a manufacturing defect.

I experienced another interesting interpretation of warranty terms with Bianchi. I had an alloy road frame crack at a weld after less than a year. They replaced it with a new frame (actually the next model up) which was very nice until it also cracked after a few months. At this point (having also seen someone else's frame crack in exactly the same place) I decided I didn't want to risk any more Bianchis, and asked for a refund on the original bike purchase.

Bianchi refused, and then attempted to claim that my warranty was void because I had used my road racing frame "for racing"...
After much complaining, the best I managed to get was a refund for the value of the frame and keeping the components.

I guess the moral of the story is that all warranties are not created equal.

If litespeed expect a frame to last 5 (or 10) years then should say it is a 5 (or 10) year warranty. They have deliberately misled by wording the warranty in a way that implies something greater than they are willing to honour. Poor service.

After breaking 2 FS frames, I paid particular attention to the warantee blurb - especially with some companies limiting cover on the rear triangle, setting rider weight limits etc etc. My view is that if it breaks within 2-3 years of normal riding, then it's not fit for purpose. I would be f*cking livid if I was the OP.

Fyi, the Rose warantee is an unambiguous 10 years against frame breakages.

"If litespeed expect a frame to last 5 (or 10) years then should say it is a 5 (or 10) year warranty."

There is the problem though isn't it. They are a premium brand and one of the selling points they use is that they imply it will last longer, all helps justify the stupid price tags compared to other bikes.

If they change their marketing material to say 5 year limited warranty, not as many folk will buy them.

I guess its up to what strategy they want to achieve.

titanium, like aluminium, has a finite life. Even the best-made frame with perfect welds will eventually fatigue and crack - it's an intrinsic property of the material.

Really? I was of the impression that titanium, like some steels, has a fatigue limit such that if subjected to alternating stress below a certain value it would have infinite life.

That may only be for pure Ti though, you got any data for 6-4?

If litespeed expect a frame to last 5 (or 10) years then should say it is a 5 (or 10) year warranty. They have deliberately misled by wording the warranty in a way that implies something greater than they are willing to honour. Poor service.

That's the crux of the matter; expecting a 'lifetime warranty' to last 100years or whatever is un-reasonable and it's fair enough that the manufacturer suggests what the 'reasonable' life time of the frame is.. what is definitely not reasonable is for them to sell it without explaining exactly what they consider the lifetime to be.. they were quick enough to tell you when it failed that it was 5years, they ought to be able to tell new and potential purchasers as well.

I believe it depends on the heat treating, though I don't work with the stuff so not an expert 🙂

@ funkyDunc. Absolutely correct.

But a true premium brand would have every issue sorted they would either have a "no quibble, don't worry son we'll see you right without any questions asked" warranty or they would be clear and unambiguous with their wording in the first place. What these types of warranty issues point to is that they are a premium brand in terms of price only.

There can't be that many people that have the same frame for over 10 years, have the original receipt and suffer a weld failure rather than crash damage. The numbers must be so small that they would be better off fixing the frames and making a big deal about it. That is the sort of marketing exposure that would be worth it's weight in gold.

Something along the lines of " muppetWrangler bought a frame from us in 1993, recently he noticed a small gap appear in the head tube welding. muppetWrangler was unhappy and that made us unhappy we fixed up his frame free of charge and now muppetWrangler's happy again. Here's to another twenty years of trouble free riding."

Reading up some old books - the material itself (like steel) has a fatigue limit. The problem comes with welds where there can be micro stresses and edges that produce loads above the fatigue limit.

Not sure if that's an intrinsic problem with titanium welds or not - maybe Raleigh had the right idea with bonded tubes...

Do people really expect their frames to last forever? Where do you ride them, around the house (but only on carpet)?

I am not very sure on this, but i think Ti has a serious issue with welding which is the root of many problems. ANY contamination and the welds are likely to go, and the heat generally isn't appreciated by the joints.

Anyway, broke a 7? year old Trek Lemond, no arguments, i was asked what colour scheme i wanted and a new frame was shipped over from the states. Then as the model i had was no longer made they gave me an upgrade and for some reason also sent me a new fork. Which i wasn't expecting but was appreciated as the frame had gone from a 1" to 1 1/8" headtube.

The welding is critical - I imported some Russian MTB frames and components many years ago, only a small batch (luckily). Some stuff broke right away, some within a year, some is still going strong - I'm still using some of the tubular titanium cranks on my commuting bike.

I had a good friend have almost a mirror situation with litespeed over a road, I wouldn't buy anything from them and will tell anyone who will listen their story to warn them. I will add the op's tale to this to. Company of shister's.

could a premium member add litespeed and warranty to the tags? ^

kimbers - Member
could a premium member add litespeed and warranty to the tags?

obviously all that effort to convince numpties that Ti bikes are made of magic and are AMAZING and so therefore should be massively premium has obviously started to have consequences.

🙂

So if you really want Ti, buy a "budget" brand and put the change towards a replacement in a few years time...

I'm sticking with steel.

VOLVO FOR SALE is back! 😛

Hmmm, I don't think there is a lifetime warranty on my 95 DBR Axis TT, but it's still going strong.

ransos - Member
So if you really want Ti, buy a "budget" brand and put the change towards a replacement in a few years time...

if it were me, I'd get it in an SEM and have a look at the microstructure of the crack, and then issue a science smackdown.

I had a Litespeed made Cove Hummer. It cracked at the reinforcing weld and the aluminium insert they put into the head tube that the headset attached to came out when I was swapping out a King headset.

Litespeed and Cove got into a protracted period of debate over who should pick up the warranty with Litespeed and Cove offering differing warranty periods with Cove now sourcing the Hummer from Lynskey. From what I can gather, Litespeed weren't interested in picking up the cost of repair.

In the end, Silverfish came to the rescue and sorted me with a brand new Lynskey made frame. I was delighted with this but disappointed that the importer didn't get the support I would reasonably have expected Litespeed should have given them as the manufacturer.

Woukd I ever buy a Litespeed product? Er, no. I have no desire to give my hard earned to a company that based on my experience doesn't support their dealers nor their importers. Clarity over what a lifetime warranty actually means with examples would go a long way to helping folk decide whether to buy a frame or not. I suspect it would mean that Litespeed lose more customers than they might gain though. 😀

The numbers must be so small that they would be better off fixing the frames and making a big deal about it

This!^

Do they expect more than a handful of people to be returning frames 10+ years old? of course not, so why not just take those costs on the chin - understanding that they are the true cost of offering a much fanfared "lifetime warantee"? If their marketing department had half a braincell between them they would realise that this is a fantastic opportunity for them to do some really positive PR.

Start posting on their facebook page - I bet their CEO isn't on the "claims committee", but I expect reads that!