With the Anthem X having been around for a couple of years now and with the recall on the Anthem X 29'r because of cracks at the top tube/seat tube junction, I thought it would be a good idea to see how many Anthem X 26'r owners have had a problem with their frame developing a crack at the same place as the 29'r.
Out of the three AX owners, myself included, that I know in my area, two have had to get their frames replaced due to the frame cracking.
How many others in this forum, if any, have had the same problem?
The way I see it your options are either accept the (free) warranty frame and change your parts over, or go buy a new bike that it sounds like maybe you don't want to spend the money for. I once had an ugly bird dog, but he could hunt circles around much prettier dogs. A lot of guys made fun of my ugly bird dog, but a lot of them went home with empty game pockets, and I didn't. Ask yourself this: Is that ugly dog of yours going to hunt, or not?
An update to this forum turned up in my inbox, so 17 months later I thought I'd have a look.
My 2009 X1 26er (That looks rather like a 2014 X1 27.5) is still going strong and Cotharyus is still telling you all to buy one, ride the crap out of it and take it back under warranty smile as you receive your upgrade and go and ride the crap out of it.
My 2009 was 5.6 years old when I waved goodbye at the bike shop. With most other brands I'd have been waving bye to a few $k at the bikeshop as the warranty would have been expired from between 0.6 & 2.6 years. I'm still smiling.
Friends with Anthems are offering me their bikes to ride in the hope I can crack theirs to and get a nice upgrade. At this rate though, I wont have to ride mine for a while.
Why do they crack? (I'm an engineer by the way) They are a fatigue failure (riding the crap out of it), not an overload failure (Jumping etc). I'm a bit of a tractor. Reasonably heavy and a lot of torque (not to mention talk). I like playing in the hills and tend to twist the bars hammering up the hills (so I don't bob on the forks. If you've ever been on a bike trainer with the rear triangle locked down and do a big sprint or grind, you'll see how much the frame actually flexes. For whatever reason (and as an example it could be the frames are flexible somewhere else (like in the downtube again as an example. (I say this as the 09 frames downtubes are almost a square section and square sections are far less torsionally stiff than round sections)) and even stiff somewhere else (top tube in lateral bending lets say) and that produces a lot of stress on the seatpost joint, and its just not big enough to take it. Add some heat affected zone for the weld and away we go.
(I.E. The seatpost joint design may be fine on a frame of different design elsewhere on the frame)
Again.
No. of frames cracked globally 1000's *
No of frames sold globally. 1,000,000's
Therefore overall probability of an anthem frame cracking .001 0.1%
Overall probability of me recommending giant due to the awesome warranty 1.0 (100%)
*(Not forgetting that the probability of finding people talking about cracked frames on a forum about cracked frames is 1 (100%) so stop worrying, get out there and ride the crap out of it)
Weird, I Know at least 4-5 guys with Anthems so far no problems. I know they had some with a few of the 29ers, but i have never seen a picture or heard anything about the 26ers breaking.. The good thing is the Lifetime warranty so no worries..
Never heard of any regular Anthems with cracked frames. As for lifetime warranty??? 5 years for giant suspension frames (taken from owners manual version 8.0), 10 years for hardtails.
They must have changed the Warranty.. I'm looking at my owners manual (2009) and it has a lifetime Warranty as long as the original purchaser owns the bicycle..
"Giant Bicycle, Inc. ("Giant") warrants the frame and rigid fork of each new Giant brand bicycle and Giant brand frameset to be free from defects in material and workmanship for as long as the original purchaser owns the bicycle."
Now, I can see how they could get around that by saying something along the lines of "you must have crashed it or been doing 5 foot drops on an XC bike...warranty DENIED!" But on the surface at least it appears that the lifetime warranty is still in effect.
Surprised to hear about cracked ax's. I have about 3k miles off road on mine and our shop has sold a few dozen over the years, with some 250+# guys on them without any issues.
Surprised to hear about cracked ax's. I have about 3k miles off road on mine and our shop has sold a few dozen over the years, with some 250+# guys on them without any issues.
This is good to hear. I was hoping that there would not be a whole bunch of cracked frames, but with the two out of three frames cracked in my area I was concerned that maybe Giant had a design problem with the Anthem X.
With the hassle I and others here in Canada seem to have getting replacement frames, I was contemplating selling my new frame and buying something else. I really like the bike though and didn't really want to do that so I will hold on to mine and hope that the first cracked frame was just an unfortunate occurrence.
Problem of cracking Anthems X (26 ones) exists in Poland and is getting bigger.
I own 2010 X2 size M, and today i purchased longest Thomson Elite post (410mm) hoping that it will prevent my frame from cracking- now OEM post sits in minimum insert of 5 inches...
Frames are cracking at seat tube top tube junction under 70-75kg (155-165lbs.) riders with seatpost inserted 5 or more inches in frame.
The problem is that Polish Giant distributor refuses to replace frames under warranty, infact Giant is known in Poland that they build good frames in decent price but when it will crack they won't replace it on warranty.
So far never heard of any Anthems cracking here in the UK, mine is a 2009, with Thomson Masterpiece post(350mm), inserted into the frame 115mm (4.5inches) and I weigh approx 87kg in riding kit.
I have already had one frame replaced and am awaiting the outcome of my second frame failure, both developing cracks on the top tube seat tube junction next to the weld. Both frames less than 12 months old. First frame replaced no problem currently being told the second frame failed due to damaged bearings??????? so not covered by warranty! personally I'm not sure how a bearing should affect the structural integrity of a frame, you would have thought they would have taken these things into account during development.
I have been offered the second frame for a third of the retail price but am not happy with this as I believe its a warranty issue and they don't. Do you think I have a case for argument?
I live in the UK and both frames are standard 26" wheels.
I have been offered the second frame for a third of the retail price but am not happy with this as I believe its a warranty issue and they don't. Do you think I have a case for argument?
Try to find "customer right representative"- loose translation from polish , he should help You with your problem. In Poland they are helping with preparing paper work free of charge,
I was told they should have a warranty replacement frame available by the end of March. I was offered a trance x frame immediately but declined and will have to wait. Hopefully they will be in soon as the snow is melting quickly around here.
I have already had one frame replaced and am awaiting the outcome of my second frame failure, both developing cracks on the top tube seat tube junction next to the weld. Both frames less than 12 months old. First frame replaced no problem currently being told the second frame failed due to damaged bearings??????? so not covered by warranty! personally I'm not sure how a bearing should affect the structural integrity of a frame, you would have thought they would have taken these things into account during development.
I have been offered the second frame for a third of the retail price but am not happy with this as I believe its a warranty issue and they don't. Do you think I have a case for argument?
I live in the UK and both frames are standard 26" wheels.
Sounds to me like they are looking to shaft you on the replacement. Was the first frame replacement just the front triangle and if so who did the tear down and rebuild?
I was told they should have a warranty replacement frame available by the end of March. I was offered a trance x frame immediately but declined and will have to wait. Hopefully they will be in soon as the snow is melting quickly around here.
So it has been about 20 weeks so far? Even though it is winter that is still unacceptable. I hope you do get it in time for riding once the trails dry up.
Sounds to me like they are looking to shaft you on the replacement. Was the first frame replacement just the front triangle and if so who did the tear down and rebuild?
No the first replacement was a complete frame, new shock etc. This time my bike has been stripped down to the frame by the shop and the frame then returned to Giant UK for investigation and what I mentioned in my original post were their findings.
I've emailed them direct over the weekend but still awaiting a reply.:madman:
I found a crack at the seat tube-top tube junction on my '09 Anthem X today. I stopped by the shop where I bought it and I should be getting a new one soon. I'm just wondering what replacement options I'll be getting. If they offer me a current frame, I'm not sure how I'll go about adapting my fork to the newer, tapered head tube or the cranks to the newer press-fit BB.
Mine (2010 Anthem X frameset) cracked at the seat/top tube junction as well, I'm 75-78 kgs, ride an XL with a 400 mm seatpost pretty far extended, but still with enough in the frame. Giant was great with replacement, within a week I had a new 2011 frame, the new frame has a sticker at the junction warning about seat post insertion. Getting a headset to fit my conventional fork in the tapered headtube was quite a nuisance as I needed the bike back in order quickly. Also I was running square taper cranks on my old AX so had to buy new cranks, I can't really complain though
For what it's worth, two riding buddies also have "old" AXs and they also cracked them in the exact same place, but again, Giant does an admireable job around here. I see plenty of guys riding AXs around here and from what I understand the problem is pretty limited, but those using their bike a lot and riding it pretty hard seem to have a great risk of cracking their frame.
sort of... they may give you a crash replacement deal, which will be cheaper. That's the risk you take with buying any used bike. I'm not aware of any companies honoring a warranty for a 2nd owner.
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