Jaegher Cycles

[Peter Polack]

Sorry; I feel for ya' as I've been on the same end of the deal but with another builder.

Unfortunately, as Tim pointed out, you're not the only one to receive poor service or product from Jaegher. Read about it HERE.

Let us know how you make out in getting your frame corrected.

[Octave]

Octave, sorry to hear you're going through such a hassle. There's a thread here on VS by a member named Sascha who had QC problems with the lugged Jaegher frame he bought. They were pretty dismissive of his issues and not overtly helpful (to say the least), as far as I can tell. OTOH, I think I was one of the first here in the US to buy a recent Jaegher frame and it had all its bits and needed very little in the way of frame prep (though we chased and faced everything as a matter of routine anyway). It's a great riding bike and looks super, too. Frankly, I would ride any Jaegher if it is TIG welded but after reading Sacha's thread about his lugged frame I'd be extra careful--maybe to the point of not riding one. . . .

This is TIG welded, and it is beautiful - should everything be properly sorted I will indeed ride the shit out of it. I've got a great build ready, and was very excited until this all came about. They have not been especially eager to fix this in the manner I would expect from someone who sent out a very expensive, time-intensive, defective product.

Sadly, these threads take on a life of their own on the internet and one or two people's bad experience can taint a builder's entire reputation, so I want to emphasize that I got a great bike for a great price, and my interactions with them were fine.

If I were them, I'd turn myself inside out to make you satisfied and beg for you to document it here, but that's just imho.

That's my hope too - but I'm not holding my breath at the moment.

Unfortunately, as Tim pointed out, you're not the only one to receive poor service or product from Jaegher. Read about it HERE.

Indeed, after posting I have been informed about that. I don't really spend any time over there so I was unaware, which is one of the reasons I wanted to mention something - partially in the hopes that other people consider whatever has or will unfold here when making their own decision.

[Tim Porter]

Peter Polack--thanks for posting up the link to the Sascha thread--I mistakenly recalled it was on VS and not Paceline. Tim

[Tristan]

am I being overly cautious to now have skepticism about the rest of the frame? I do not work in a framebuilding shop, so I do not know how this works; maybe everything else was done by a proper expert and it got sent to the brake-stop station where someone less attentive/skilled passed it over? If this happened to you, would you be comfortable riding the frame after it was fixed?

I've got no specific comments about Jaegher but from a production point of view I can see how the error occurred. You asked for no shift cable stops and it's likely that was either written down incorrectly into whatever they use to capture their data and ensure internal communication processes, or the person doing the braze-ons mis-understood and swapped brake for gears.

It's obvious to *you* that it needs a rear brake cable stop, however being a custom product it's likely they've been asked before for a frame without cablestops so someone can run a fixed gear rear hub and no rear brake, or a full length section or housing or something else weird and wonderful.

Assuming the braze-ons looks well made and are installed well I wouldn't worry about the overall quality of the frame. Mistakes happen, and certainly a mistake was made here, however unless the braze-ons look unsafe or there is something in the quality of the workmanship to indicate otherwise I think you can safely assume the error was in communication and not in fabrication.

[takashi]

That Paceline thread is really something.

[Too Tall]

That Paceline thread is really something.

We shall not speak of it...mostly m'kay?

[yashkatsumi]

Morning guys, I can give you guys a quick summary of my experience with Jaegher. Like Octave, the ordering was smooth, and when I paid for full in January 2016, they quoted me 7 weeks for delivery. March comes, they tell me things are delayed for a week or two, then april, then may, then June. They finally got everything together in June, but then sent the frame to the wrong address. A couple of weeks later I finally got the frame and this is what I discovered.
Nice looking frame but,
Rear triangle alignment was off by about three mm to the left
Wrong color
Seat tube not reamed
Bb not faced/chased, head tube not faced, but they pressed the headset in anyways
Brake braze ons in the 6pm position
Fork blades different lengths
They sent me a quality control card, which they are supposed to be checking off as they do their inpsection. The only things which was checked off was the paint.

So after I told them about these problems, they decided to make another one, which took 5 months. The new one was the right color but,

Rear alignment was crooked again
Fork blades were different lengths so the bike would pull hard to the left
And worst of all, the lug work was so poorly finished that there were large gaps between the lug and the tubing.

I tried to reason with Kurt to get my money back since the frame was totally unrideable. At this point he became really unprofessional and irritated and assured me that this type of problem is s first for them, and that I was being too picky, and that the beauty of a handmande product is that it is not perfect. He suggested I pay for shipping both ways from the US, at which point they would inspect the frame to see if it needed to be repaired.

Almost everyone I talked to advised me not to ride that frame.

At about this time, I was also communicating with a german customer who was aslo going through similar quality control issues with jaegher. He was able to sue jaegher since he was in the EU and got half of his money back. They messed up some thing about his bike, fixed it shoddily, and sent it back to him. I saw the repairs and visually, it looked terrible, like someone had taken the minimum amount of effort to fix a problem. When i saw the repair job They did, I decided I had already wasted a year on Jaegher and could not deal with their incompetent company so I gave up and took a $2000 loss on the project and moved on.

I should have posted my experience with Jaegher here earlier so others would not have lose money like I did. This was my 40th birthday present which never materialized. I am hoping the best for Octave, but what they will probably do is do the minimum to get that frame back to him, which means local repairs to fix the braze on issues, and local paint repair, which from what I have seen them do, looks terrible.

[doomridesout]

There are so many professional builders out there who do their best to make it right when mistakes happen... even if these are truly rare incidents why would you gamble with your business? Even if Tristan's theory that it's a communication issue instead of a quality issue is right (and it sounds plausible), the fact that there's no one at the end to take in the gestalt of the finished product and check it against past communications and a broader standard of quality is terrible. With communication being recorded in writing in email, checking the finished product against what was requested is part of QC. Having someone do a final check of this stuff is just fundamental.

[Octave]

Tristan, I understand you wanting to make sense of the situation, but let's take a quick gander at how that could have played out: buyer specifies he will be using eTap, wireless shifting [check], seatstay bridge with rear-brake mount installed [check], cable stops for non-existant shifter cables installed [check], vertical drop-outs [check]... "oh yeah, he's probably looking to run this fixed gear with no rear brake."


I do not for one second believe that this was an error in a communication chain. This is an error in production, which along with the improperly threaded bottom bracket makes it an unusable product. The fact that I had to argue to get him to pay for return shipping, and the fact that he brushed it off as not a big deal, is the part that really irks me. If the response had been an immediate, "Wow, I can't believe we screwed up. Please rebox the frame, I have arranged for FedEx to pick it back up tomorrow and you will be bumped to the front of the que for a fast repair, repaint and turnaround" I would not even be posting this thread. But that was not the response. Instead the (belated, lackadaisical) response was "hmm, can you send us a picture?" followed by an eventual (days later), "Okay, ship it back to us and we'll see what we can do. Don't worry, shipping shouldn't be too expensive."

So in the end, combined with the other notes I have no read, it sounds like they have a real problem with a) quality control and b) communication/relations. The bottom line is: this is not how you run a business that relies on personal interactions, large up-front investments, and customized products.

[Jaegher]

Hi all,
First of all I want to thank Richie for letting me know about this thread.
I prefer not to post on forums because my English isn't good enough to do this.
We always try to keep a positive communication between our customers. When I got to know about the problem of the cable stops I agreed immediately to repair it. It's a mistake from us, I have to say that it's not a major post to check when we do our quality control, but once again that's not a reason to forget them. We 'll repair it as soon as the frame comes back.
In the past we had two clients with whom we had some problems, I don't think this is the place to start a discussion about it, but if someone has questions about it. Feel free to drop us a mail.
We do what we can and we have more and more happy clients.

I wish you all a good day.

Kurt

[Too Tall]

Thanks Kurt your response is appreciated.

[Tristan]

Tristan, I understand you wanting to make sense of the situation, but let's take a quick gander at how that could have played out: buyer specifies he will be using eTap, wireless shifting [check], seatstay bridge with rear-brake mount installed [check], cable stops for non-existant shifter cables installed [check], vertical drop-outs [check]... "oh yeah, he's probably looking to run this fixed gear with no rear brake."

I don't have a dog in this fight, and I think the situation you're ended up in is terrible. All I'm saying is one of the perils of making semi-custom things is the capture and accessibility of information, and the people completing the work need to what is captured, not what they think might be right. If they think something isn't right they should ask for confirmation from whomever did the capture / signoff, however by and large you'll see more production errors if the people completing the steps do 'what they think is right' rather than what is specified in the info capture.

I had a really similar experience with Vanilla / Speedvagen: All that pretty paint hides a company lacking in basic organisation, workflow, and information capture.

[yashkatsumi]

There are so many places during the production cycle where this problem should have been identified and remedied. The fact that it went through so many different people, who did not notice that there was something wrong, is what leaves me with very little confidence about this company.

Welder should have noticed that he did not install the braze ons
The painter should have noticed that something was missing
The guy prepping the frame should have noticed
And the guy doing the final inspection should have noticed.

If you are building frames for a living, day in and day out, it seems like missing brake braze-ons should be glaringly obvious when you look at the frameset. This would be like me going to work and not putting on a tie, or forgetting to wear pants. It should be that obvious, and if it isn't, there is a serious underlying problem. But then again, I was one of those customers who go burned by the lack of quality control at Jaegher so my opinions may be more pointed than most.

[devlin]

You would think it would be obvious and maybe a tick and flick checklist would help but things like small braze ons can be missed. A painter is not paid to inspect the frame for missing braze ons. Yes it's all quality control but even the most rigorous quality system has a fuck up at some point. It's disappointing that it happens but I guarantee every builder has forgotten something more than a few times.

[takashi]

We shall not speak of it...mostly m'kay?

Why is that?

[Tristan]

If you are building frames for a living, day in and day out, it seems like missing brake braze-ons should be glaringly obvious when you look at the frameset.

I agree wholeheartedly with this. If you're selling a customisable product then you need to be able to deliver on what has been ordered by the customer. Since humans make mistakes that means having systems and processes in place (and followed) which ensure the correct widget is built. That's the difference between being an amateur and a professional.

[Chik]

I agree wholeheartedly with this. If you're selling a customisable product then you need to be able to deliver on what has been ordered by the customer. Since humans make mistakes that means having systems and processes in place (and followed) which ensure the correct widget is built. That's the difference between being an amateur and a professional.

True enough, but found infrequently...