Total Loss: Specialized replaced my Vado 2.0

[Dave E]

At the beginning of the month I took my "new-ish" Vado 2.0 in for some warranty work. I've posted about the problems here already, but the two issues were a grinding noise down in the crank region and the speedometer surges that would cut out the motor when I was climbing hills. After a few days, my LBS got back to me and told me that Specialized told them to just exchange the bike and give me a new one. It took another week or so for the new bike to come in, and Friday I picked up a brand new Vado 2.0. I was so sad to see my old bike go, after only 616 miles on it, but this replacement bike sure shows me that the “old” one just wasn’t quite right.

I have to hand it to Specialized and to my LBS, Performance Cyclery, for taking care of this so quickly.

I love my bike so much that I bought one just like it (only smaller) for my wife for our anniversary. We had a blast riding around town all weekend. Logistically, it wasn’t easy to surprise her with a bike. I hired a Lyft driver to come get her and do random laps around town so that I could ride my bike down to the shop and be there waiting for her when she finally arrived. She was pretty surprised. I had texted the shop before they closed the night before and asked them to plug her bike in and charge it overnight.

(Sorry to digress.)

Anyway, how many others here have had their bikes totaled by Specialized? What do you recon they do with the old bikes? Do they recondition them and dump them on Woot?

 

[e-levity]

...I love my bike so much that I bought one just like it (only smaller) for my wife for our anniversary. We had a blast riding around town all weekend. Logistically, it wasn’t easy to surprise her with a bike. I hired a Lyft driver to come get her and do random laps around town so that I could ride my bike down to the shop and be there waiting for her when she finally arrived. She was pretty surprised. I had texted the shop before they closed the night before and asked them to plug her bike in and charge it overnight.

Great story! Glad it all worked out.

 

[Dave E]

Great story! Glad it all worked out.

I just realized that my avatar photo is of the two of us from a couple of billion years ago. That was when we were first dating and she brought me "home" from college to meet her family at camp out in the desert. She asked me, "Oh by the way, you know how to ride a motorcycle, don't you?" I figured if she could, I could. Oh man did she prove me wrong. It took me decades to finally catch up to her.

 

[MrBritton]

My Vado 3.0 was also replaced, just a couple of weeks ago, due to a series of issues with it, after close to year of use.
However, I upgraded to a Vado 6.0, and payed the difference, which my bike shop was, no doubt, happy about.

 

[Uphill Both Ways]

I had the same issue although I would describe the noise as a dry creaking like two pieces of lumber rubbing against each other under pressure. Specialized apparently gave my bike shop a couple of quick fixes to try and then threw in the towel. My bike shop was given the option of a new motor or exchange the bike. They took the second option as they did not want to absorb the labor cost. My Vado 3.0 had about 300 miles on it. New bike is fine so far after 100 miles. Only change is the rear light was relocated from the rack to the fender.

 

[christob]

Nice to read stories of bike makers cutting to the chase in certain problems, after a reasonable amount of troubleshooting, and simply starting the customer over on a new bike. I'm not on a Specialized, but my bike was replaced this same way by VEB, after it suffered a mysterious electrical death at 850 miles... first they sent a new battery bracket/controller/wiring harness and when that didn't resolve, they sent a new bike. (Unrelated to, and before the electrical death, they'd also already sent a whole new rear hub wheel assembly to resolve a constant chirping/squeak that developed on that first bike---which in hindsight, I'm now thinking was perhaps caused by my weight, at that time... I've been blown away by their dedication and commitment and willing spirit in resolving these issues.)