Salsa Stem Recall - READ

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Permalink Reply by terryg on February 27, 2009 at 4:40pm

indeed. This is mighty bad.

Since Salsa and Surly (among others) are all distributed through QBP, and these bikes are fabricated in Taiwan, I wonder if there's any reason to believe that (for instance) stems provided on complete Surlys are also questionable.

I regret that I have second-hand experience with the weld breaking on a Salsa stem. My friend that had the first hand experience was remarkably OK, though. Scary.

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Permalink Reply by vxla on March 2, 2009 at 8:35am

I'm gonna bump this a couple times over the next week or two; sorry, but it's a safety issue that warrants bumping.

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Permalink Reply by yellow jello on March 2, 2009 at 1:12pm

I'm glad you put this up - I was just about to.

I had purchased one online and just this morning mailed it back. The seller was kind enough to reimburse me for the return shipping as well.

A couple of things to note is that the recalled ones are chromoly steel stems longer than 80mm. The story I heard is that three have broken, with one of the breaks resulting in the rider breaking his wrist. The breaks are apparently on the faceplate.

I was extra sad because this was the last affordable (barely) steel stem (that I know of) still being manufactured. Back to forged aluminum.

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Permalink Reply by Natalie on March 2, 2009 at 3:20pm

That "friend" was MY husband, and I've never heard a scarier sound than the crash after he hooked his bar on a post (the ones they put on the Prairie Path trail to keep the cars out), snapping his purty painted Salsa stem and sending him splatting to the pavement. He was exceedingly lucky--he walked away from this crash, although by the end of the train ride back to Chicago, he could barely walk, and he had a fat leg for weeks. The stem snapped cleanly at the weld. I've never seen anything like it.

When he took his bike to the LBS, the guys there called Salsa/Surly/QBP, who were not even interested in hearing about his broken stem, since it happened in a crash. But I've smacked into things much harder than he grazed that post (think girl on bike going 12-15 mph T-boning a car going 15+ mph) and never broke a stem. The guys at the bike shop certainly had never seen anything like it.

For several months he has used an identical (though black, not painted) aftermarket Salsa stem, which our LBS replaced the day of the recall with a new, forged aluminum, non-breakaway stem. He got credits for both Salsa stems. We don't know whether his was one of the three reported breakages, but we feel vindicated. It kinda soured me on Salsa, though. Not that I care--when I met my new Jamis Aurora Elite, all daydreams of an overpriced Casseroll Triple evaporated.

Sorry I didn't post the recall here when I learned of it--I never even thought about it. (I was busy daydreaming about my bike.)

terryg said:

indeed. This is mighty bad.

Since Salsa and Surly (among others) are all distributed through QBP, and these bikes are fabricated in Taiwan, I wonder if there's any reason to believe that (for instance) stems provided on complete Surlys are also questionable.

I regret that I have second-hand experience with the weld breaking on a Salsa stem. My friend that had the first hand experience was remarkably OK, though. Scary.

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Permalink Reply by terryg on March 2, 2009 at 11:54pm

Yes, that was an epic experience. You know how nature "stops" at the moment of an accident? It was like that, and he was in the middle of it. I am so glad he walked away from that.

Your Jamis is beautiful, btw. I can't wait to see us all out on the long roads!

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