GoOutdoors - Calibre Sentry Mountain Bike Frame Failure

[Spinney100]

Hi all,

I bought a Calibre Sentry MTB from GoOutdoors in March 2020. Last weekend, 19 Aug 2023, the bike frame failed, on the chain stay at the point where the rear wheel bolts to the frame. The failure also resulted in damage to the rear wheel and chain, neither of which can be repaired. The bike is three years old, but has really only been used for 1.5 years due to covid restrictions and me getting bored of biking.

While I was looking online for spare parts (of which there are none, see below) I found multiple incidents of the same thing happening to quite a few people, and I mean exactly the same failure on exactly the same bike. At least two people had been fully refunded the cost of the bike by GoOutdoors, although I think they were within the warranty period. This suggests to me that they have previously accepted liability for a fault. I've made a note of the websites where I found evidence of these failures. 

Another issue is that GoOutdoors no longer sells these bikes and there are no longer spares available anywhere due in part to sourcing issues during CoVid. The manufacturer, a company called Calibre Bikes, based in Sheffield (I think), still makes bikes although not my model. I haven't managed to find any contact details for them, otherwise I would be tempted to ask if they have any old frames lying around.

 

I now have a bike I can't use, that can't be repaired (aluminium frame is notoriously difficult to repair even at the best of times) and I can't buy spare parts for. I can buy a frame from another manufacturer and with a bit of messing about I can swap the parts from my knackered bike onto that. This will cost me about £700 and a lot of my time. 

If you've got this far, thanks, and my question is this. Do I have any realistic chance of getting any sort of compensation from GoOutdoors? How should I go about it if there's any prospect of success? I should say that people who have made a complaint previously, as mentioned above, rave about the customer service.

Thanks

[BankFodder]

Yes you have a good chance of success – but you need to give us more detail about dates, price paid, reasonable life expectancy for this model.