Bent seatstay?

I bought a new bike - a (new to me, but not new) Terry Isis. Yay! It arrived yesterday and I couldn't, for the life of me, get the rear tire on. Not yay! DH and I both labored over that thing and there was no getting the tire on.

Took it to the LBS today and the guy there couldn't do it either. He said the seatstay was bent. When I asked what to do, he said ship it back. :confused: He said you can't bend aluminum. When I pointed out that it was actually steel, he manhandled it a bit more, managed to get the tire on, and said, "actually, that should be okay."

So...I'm not sure what to do now. I left it there for a tune-up, but he seemed to think that the bike was okay after he did his manhandling. Would you do anything else or just leave it? What else is there even to do? And should I try to contact UPS about the damage? I didn't technically pay for him to shove the tire on, so I'm not sure what I can do.

I wouldn't ride it. You paid for a bike in proper working order- with a straight frame. Call Terry.

It sounds like she bought it used, not through Terry.

I bought a used bike for bf on Ebay, and it arrived with a bent fork (even though it had been well packed, there was a hole in the box, shipper's fault--not fault of the seller). My lbs had a jig and bent it back, good as new. I think since it's steel, your bike should be fine. As long as there was no visible signs of weakness (a buckle or dent) I'd ride it.

First of all, you need to determine if it is bent or not. On some bikes, the seat stays are not symetrical. I just looked at my 2003 steel isis, and I would say the seat stay on the casette side is wider than on the non-casette side. Does the wheel move freely now that it is mounted? Does it rub anything?

If it is bent, you need to deal with the seller and/or shipper.

I'm not sure it was bent longwise as much as the two rear forks were bent in closer together, so the tire wouldn't fit on. Does that make sense? So the LBS guy pulled at them and shoved with the tire and ended up getting the tire on. After pulling and pushing at the seatstays, he said it should be fine.

I'd like to put an Xtracycle on this possibly and maybe do some longer touring, so I don't want it to just "be fine."

I plan to file a claim with UPS, but I don't even know how you actually fix it or what to even put on the claim. Where do you take it to be sure? This is the LBS I really like, so I'm not sure if I should get a second opinion or what? Who would fix steel?

Ugh - what a headache!

(BTW, I did buy this used off eBay.)

If he bent it back into shape and it is working now, I think it is better than 'just fine' but ask Running Mommy since she owns a LBS (or rather I think just fine means just that, its just fine, nothing to worry about, normal, etc.).

If it were a brand new bike, I would have called the company out of principle, but what do you want UPS or the seller to do. If you want the seller to take the bike back, I am sure you could get your LBS to document that it wasn't packed correctly and arrived damaged.

I think the fundamental problem is the seller failed to put one of those spacer thingies on the fork blades and seat stays to prevent compression during shipping. But in the end, the 'fix' is what your LBS shop guy did, cool it was steel, and it was done for free, so its not clear what you want either UPS or the seller to do. If it were me I would just enjoy the bike. If the LBS guy wants to be paid for seat stay straigthening, ask him to write you out an invoice and send that to either the seller or UPS.

Yeah, I suppose you're right. I guess I was thinking of a CYA kinda thing in case it wasn't actually fine in the long run. But it's true - there's not much that UPS can do, since I didn't actually pay to have it fixed. I guess it's just one of those unfortunate situations that (hopefully) worked out okay. The seller sent it padded with newspaper! :eek: I mean, no wonder it got bent! I'd really prefer to keep the bike. I posted on the Terry forum to see if they have any thoughts/insight that maybe I should be aware of.

So yay for steel, since the LBS guy said if it was aluminum, it would have been shot. :eek:

Now I just have to wait to bring her home so I can try her out! :)

I bent a steel bicycle similarly once... not shipping it, but rather I rode off of a very high curb at a pretty high speed.... not intentionally, the pavement was new, the curb was white and it was noon, which all added up to a very pretty optical illusion that it was a 2 lane bike path with a white divider in the middle rather than a 4 inch drop off.... I went off of it a probably +20, I landed it without falling fortunately, but the rear wheel taco'd about a mile later and after wearing all the teeth off my rear derailleur's jockey wheel a week or so later I found out that I'd bent the seat stay too. The guy at the shop bent it back and all was well. I had that bike for several more years without incident and without it rebending.

What the LBS guy did was not to bend the stays back to their original place, but to pull them apart and put the wheel in. So you'll have to pull them apart like that every time you take the wheel in and out. It can be done, but it's a PITA. You can have a framemaker cold-set it back to it's original position, and check the alignment and dropout faces. If you otherwise like the bike and can get the seller or shipper to pay for this, it would be the way to go.

Thanks for the info! I can't even find a framebuilder in my area. I spoke with the head mechanic at the LBS and he said he was able to spread the seatstays enough to get the wheel on and that it should be fine.

If I find that I'm struggling too much with that rear wheel, I may see if I can look into that. :)

When you pick up the bike, try the rear wheel. That way, you know soon whether it's wide enough or not.

You don't want to find out you can't get the rear wheel back in when you're trying to change a flat on the side of the road.

CA