Razor wrote:... I'm just speculating.
No need to speculate, we're happy to address any questions that we can answer.
Correct Tune does not use serial numbers on their hubs, so tracking them can be difficult. Correct there have been some flange failures, I think we've now seen 3 cracked flanges in a little more than 2 years. Of course in that time we've also seen cracked flanges from Chris King, DT, Extralite, Alchemy, and even Shimano. It's not a particularly rare failure to see, but given the number of wheels out there the failure rate of any of these is extremely low.
As for the 170 hub, it is a dramatic improvement over the 180, which in my opinion was a pretty problematic hub (tons of creaking issues). We've only seen a handful of cases where the 170 creaks, and in almost everyone the problem is fixed by cleaning and lubing. The 170 definitely needs more attention than some of the heavier more mainstream hubs. We typically recommend that the 170 be cleaned and re-lubed twice a year (this is about a 5 minute job that doesn't require any special tools.) I'm never going to say the Tune hub is the most durable or bombproof, because obviously as you make things lighter you inherently have to compromise in other ways. What I will say is that of the lightweight hubs I do think it's my top choice. It's pretty ideal for the rider who is chasing weight savings but is willing to compromise a bit for weight savings. If reliability is the most important aspect of a hub for a rider then no it's not a top choice in those cases DT, King and WI are probably the way to go. Of course this compromise of weight vs durability doesn't apply to just hubs.
If the WW poster that contacted you had a problem with his hub, yes we'd take care of it. Not as a favor to Tune, but simply because that's what we do. We take care of warranty issues for just about any company in the industry with whom we have a good relationship. While I realize not all shops will handle the warranty on something they did not sell we do our best to take care of everyone that we can and we regularly honor warranty on items that we didn't sell. It is in a way a "PR move" maybe we earn a new customer by taking care of one who did not shop with us originally, maybe that customer tells his friends about his experience or maybe that customer never returns, but still continues to ride his bike. More bikes being ridden is good for all of us in the industry whether or not that customer is our customer or not. We are a business and do want to make a profit, but we feel the best way to do that is to take very good care of all our customers and potential future customers, and to do it in an open and honest way.
I'm still not sure from reading your posts if you're unhappy with the way we've handled things for you, but if so please let us know so we can do something to address it.
