Just had a bike mechanic at a major (many locations) shop in central London refuse to replace a spoke. His direct quote was “we don’t do that anymore” – didn’t even glance at the bike or wheel.
Asked him for an explanation, and he said it wasn’t his call. Has anybody heard of such a thing? Is this normal?
by Character-Barber-385
5 Comments
They probably have so much work, it isn’t worth replacing a single spoke. It sucks, but if no one wants to do craftsmanship that’s how it will be.
Go to a different one. Even a Halfords if you’re really desperate. They definitely do spokes.
Or order and do it yourself, it’s not hard to do honestly
I know a mechanic who can’t build a wheel. He actually has a good reputation.
As far as ordering a spoke yourself. It’s not that easy. You’ll need the correct length and thickness etc.
On a rim brake bike with clinchers and inner tubes replacing a spoke (if you had the correct length to hand) was relatively easy.
Now imagine it’s a tubeless rear wheel. You have to remove the cassette, disc rotor, tyre, valve stem and rim tape just to replace the spoke. Then you have to reinstall all of that and reseal the tyre with new rim tape. So added to the spoke replacement is a tubeless tyre set up charge.
Now imagine you as the customer paid for all that and you break another spoke on the next ride. Do you happily pay for another replacement or go back to the shop and complain?
I’m guessing a lot go back to the shop and complain. So they have decided to stop doing spoke replacements.
Unfortunately if a spoke breaks then often more will brake and by the time the 3rd one pops you realise it would have been cheaper to have a full wheel rebuild.
LOL, even in our workshop in Decathlon we do spokes all the time.
Ok, then you need to go somewhere else.
Definitely not normal for a shop not to fix a broken spoke. Maybe they are just overbooked?