Broken Derailleur

devnull

Hi All,

I am in the UK for a short period and needed a cheap but well made bike for a short while, so I went to Decathlon and bought a Btwin Elops 300, since my budget was 200 euro or so, so it fitted the job perfectly, rather than one of Halfords ****ty own brands which I hear horror stories about.

However the Derailleur broke after using it for as little as 25km, all gear shifts were a bit rough and then in the middle of nowhere of course, the whole thing buckled and snapped and now it's like as you can see attached.

I picked it up from a Decathlon store and took it on a train and then rode it for 12km to where I am staying and it was fine, I then went out into the countryside in the middle of nowhere (as sods law dictates) and the back broke. I attach pictures of what it's like.

I know it's not a super expensive bike, but the issue I have is that I'm a long way away from Decathlon store and I'd have to walk 12km with the bike as it's not an easy bike to carry on the back of a car for example let alone be sure of fitting it on a train.

So I need to get a repair man to fix it. The question is, how much will it cost to fix and how bad is the damage? I can send it back to Decathlon by Courier who will fix it, but I don't even wanna think about the cost since their procedure is to box, it, pay for it and then they will refund me if it's a fault.

Thanks!

magicbastarder

no pic attached.

devnull

Photo

magicbastarder

that derailleur seems to be STG£8 online - so i suspect a mechanic, once s/he can source one, wouldn't charge much more than 20 or 30 quid for supply and fit?

devnull

I saw the one online, but that appears to be long cage, and this bike seems to be short cage, at l
http://www.decathlon.ie/elops-300-city-bike-black-en-s103.html

I spoke to guy who runs a mobile bike clinic nearby and he reckons that it got damaged in transit but he can come around, but most likely doesn't have the parts so he'll need to call out a second time when he has.

Type 17

To give the mobile bike clinic guy a chance to turn up with the correct replacement part, you can tell him that it is a short cage derailleur with an axle mount (rather than a hanger mount) - loads of cheaper Shimano or other-brand stuff will fit in place of that Sun Race (which looks to be a copy of an older Shimano derailleur anyway).
As mentioned above, £20-30 will fix it, and is a better solution than shipping it to Decathlon, who would likely tell you that it was accidentally bent after you took delivery, which caused it to get chewed up in the wheel - this could be true, but it could also be true that the limiter screw wasn't set up correctly by them, allowing the derailleur to enter the wheel when you changed down to the lowest gear. However, once the derailleur gets bent, and is also non-functional, it is virtually impossible to say which of these two scenarios was the case, so for the sake of all the hassle, get it fixed locally.
For future reference, ask the mechanic to show you how to visually check the derailleur alignment, so you can avoid a repeat if, in the future, you suspect that it took a knock (bike falls over, etc).

devnull

I tried to actually locate the part online for fast delivery before he came but all I could find was long with mount or hanger or short with hanger., the only place I could find short cage with mount fitting had delivery times that were over a week.