It's been a while. I'm not a huge forum user, much as I try. I used to BBS a lot wayback, and the layout web forums use just seems to bloody inefficient by comparison I can't stay glued as much as I'd like. Since I've been around last I've relocated from Texas to Washington, and... that's about it, other than the notable for the forums: Had a problem with my E+, in particular the service, unfortunately. As they say, "people aren't happy unless they're complaining", so allow me to lift my mood a bit, and hopefully yours as well, because no matter how bad your day's been, at least you're not me.
The majority of the following I'm sending in to Brammo, subtracting the parts they're already aware of.
Quick recap:
Purchased 2013 Enertia+ in early-ish 2014. Dealer stopped carrying the Brammo line a week after I purchased. Never charged properly. Adam sent parts and Justin to repair. Finally got it working as designed. Fit/finish was less than stellar (plastic not lining up, nut-serts not seated properly, etc). All corrected at the same time. Yay!
New:
At 801 miles I noticed the fork seals were weepy. Adam suggested I try a simple plastic tool for cleaning the fork seals. Tried, and no-go. I was minus a dealer, but also starting the process of relocating from Texas to Washington. Adam suggested, if I can, to wait until I relocated and take it to a dealer here, Seattle E-Bike, which I did. While addressing fork seals it was determine a rebound damper was bad. Brammo sent an entire fork leg to swap in. While my bike was there, the shop had a fire. The entire inventory including repairs were taken offsite to a company to handle smoke/fire remediation. This delayed repairs, which I understood when I heard the news, but never pressured for repair; my calls were usually to get a feel on status to know how I may need to juggle weekend plans, as I live close to an hour from Seattle E-Bike. I picked up my bike yesterday. Below is a list, both technical and aesthetic, of what I found.
In no particular order:
- Bike went in for leaky fork seals. During this it was determined a rebound damper was bad. An entire fork leg was sent to swap in.
-- This apparently was never tested, as the seal on the new leg leaks (read as: back to where I started).
-- Apparently the lower fork clamp was a tight fit, and grease was used between the clamp and the fork leg to get the leg to slide through. The back of the leg between the upper and lower clamps was left filthy with grease.
-- The top of the fork leg has a hex fitting, and a set screw. On the factory leg the screw is at 12 o'clock. The replaced leg it's around 5 o'clock. A minor nag, but it's aesthetically awful not having it match. Every time I look down at the speedo I can see this, and it's just tacky and annoying.
- Wiring I cleaned up shortly after purchasing the bike (where the bundle enters the chassis at the top of the lower plastic) which I had done with looming and friction tape, had about 2-3 inches of friction tape unwound and literally hanging free. Spotted this in the shop before I left, it did not come loose in transit.
- Headlight on low beam was pointing higher than high beam should. Housing was visibly pointed up without even turning the key on and looking at the beam. Housing was loose and moved way too easily by hand without taking a wrench to it. This was solid and aimed properly before being taken in.
- Top 'tank' plastic was smudged and overall filthy; greasy/oily smudged and hand prints all over. This may have been to hide the 5" long scratch on the top/side of the tank plastic, which also was not there when bike was taken in.
- Zip ties on the bars that held some of the wiring, around connectors, were no longer around the connectors. Too tight for the connectors now, but way, way too loose by up to a 1/4 inch for the wire itself. An easy fix by myself, or anyone that worked on the bike, had they been paying attention.
- Returned home. Put on charger. Leave a few hours to balance. A few hours later, check in, and it's at 100%, but silent. Historically, it's always had the low fan speed running the entire time it was 100% and balancing, no matter how many hours later. I recall it did, at least. Which is right? Always on low speed while balancing, or should it have never done that before? Looking at old vs. new logs, it's not clear were fan RPM is, so I cannot tell if this has changed, but I'm *pretty darned sure* that previously, if I left it plugged in for 14 hours, 14 hours later it would have the fan spinning at low-RPM. It's not now, and I'm not sure if something's "wrong".
Overall, I've never had a bike returned to me more filthy and a bigger, disorganized mess than it was when I took it in. I don't expect my bikes to be cleaned and detailed, ever; I often told my old BMW dealer to not clean anything they didn't need to in order to perform service since I felt bad for how dirty they sometimes were. But none were ever as dirty going in as the Brammo was coming back, however. It was fairly sano going in, too (always garaged, dusted down after cooling off). Twenty years, close to a dozen bikes, and I've never seen this happen. The mountain bike shop I worked at as a teen gave a decent wipe and shine to every bike that came in, caked with mud or not. The "quality" of the install stinks of "rush job", the lack of something as basic as "bounce up and down and make sure the new leg isn't leaking", not noticing the headlight wasn't aimed well (doesn't every motorcycle shop do this on every bike that comes in as a basic safety inspection, along with turn signals and a quick check for nails in tires?), in addition to the abuse and mishandling that led to a giant scratch, and the overall neglect to details is just... disheartening. I'm tempted to call insurance and the bank, tell them it was in a fire at the shop, and just let them total it out.
To recap the neglect in proper treatment:
- Still-leaking fork seal on new leg
- Misaligned headlight (speaking of safety checks, from tire was at 22 PSI when I got home, drastically low. Seattle E-Bike apparently doesn't do safety checks as a courtesy to non-paying warranty customers)
- Tank plastic scratched
- Tank plastic smudged, all over
- Grease left over several inches of upper fork leg (including a ring of grease visible around the fork leg at the top of the lower clamp, that's only going retain dust and dirt from here forward in time)
- Friction tape unwound and left flapping loose
- Something done to cause zip ties to slide around but not fit back in previous position
... overall, this has left a beyond sour taste in my mouth. It went in for warranty repair, and came back a mess. This is apparently an acceptable level of service at Seattle E-Bike. I encourage anyone thinking of shopping there to think twice. Then, a third time.
I realize at this point in the game Brammo's not going to be expanding their dealer network, but I have a bad fork seal. Still. And, I do not want Seattle E-Bike touching my bike, ever again. What I don't understand: They have a high profile storefront immediately adjacent to a major sports arena, the first unit in a row to be seen by approaching traffic. Rents in this area tend to hover around "astronomical". Their overhead has got to be ungodly, I have no idea how they retain customers with this level of "service", fire or no. They called me Friday to tell me the bike was done and ready for pickup. In the five ensuing days no one could've taken a clean rag and some spray polish to it in that time to at least get off the gunk they put on?
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