Thorn Cycles Forum

Community => Muppets Threads! (And Anything Else) => Topic started by: Matt2matt2002 on September 30, 2020, 09:06:10 pm

Title: SJS delivery
Post by: Matt2matt2002 on September 30, 2020, 09:06:10 pm
Always good to receive a package from SJS.
A wee treat for the Raven.
Title: Re: SJS delivery
Post by: hendrich on October 04, 2020, 02:39:48 pm
Sad times for us in the states, shipping cost from SJS is very high due to covid.
Title: Re: SJS delivery
Post by: Matt2matt2002 on October 04, 2020, 04:31:38 pm
Sad times for us in the states, shipping cost from SJS is very high due to covid.
Sorry to hear that.
In the parcel were x2 Schwalbe 26"x1.50.
I used them to replace the 1.75's.
A quick spin today between showers and noticed a speed difference. The 1.75's were 3 years old. Only one puncture. Not sure of the milage but I average 2,000+ / year. I think they had more milage in them but had the cash to splash and fancied something narrower.
Title: Re: SJS delivery
Post by: leftpoole on October 05, 2020, 09:48:31 am
Sad times for us in the states, shipping cost from SJS is very high due to covid.

I am uncertain to why this should be? Do you actually mean that cost is higher because Standard postage is taking longer, so one has to use Express?
I again repeat, I see no actual reason for higher costs, simply slower delivery due to illness etc.
John
Title: Re: SJS delivery
Post by: rafiki on October 05, 2020, 12:06:42 pm
In my experience they now only courier to Spain rather than pop things in a jiffy bag in the mail. For example an eccentric BB £30 is offered only with express courier at £38! I've had to start buying from Germany and France or Wiggle UK if available.
Title: Re: SJS delivery
Post by: j-ms on October 05, 2020, 07:12:12 pm
In July I wanted to order some spares for delivery to South Africa and after discussion with the, as usual, very helpful Sarah, decided to wait until the unusual shipping charges due to COVID-19 returned to normal.  Cost of items ordered was 238.19 quid.  Shipping cost was 219.98 quid.  I have enough spares to last at least a year so hopefully things will return to normal by then.
Title: Re: SJS delivery
Post by: John Saxby on October 05, 2020, 09:22:19 pm
Just ordered and received very quickly (via DHL) a set of SKS P55 silver chromoplastic fenders and a new eccentric for my Raven.  Courier costs were about 40% of the total -- COVID costs, wotcha gonna do?  OTOH, the package arrived in about 6 days  :)

I was also looking for a UN 55 BB, 73 x 118 mm - not 100% sure I need one, but I plan to use it as I trace/fix an irritating occasional creaky/clickety in the right front of my drivetrain.  UN 55's now seem to have acquired scarce-as-hens'-teeth status, odd sizes like mine especially.  Happily, I found one at the Bike Doctor in Saskatoon, and that's due this week.
Title: Re: SJS delivery
Post by: WorldTourer on October 06, 2020, 03:33:23 am
In my experience they now only courier to Spain rather than pop things in a jiffy bag in the mail. For example an eccentric BB £30 is offered only with express courier at £38! I've had to start buying from Germany and France or Wiggle UK if available.

Same here. I live on the continent but SJS has been my go-to shop for years due to the excellent service. Sadly, the dramatic changes now occurring in shipping from the UK mean that now I have to turn to continental shops.
Title: Re: SJS delivery
Post by: leftpoole on October 06, 2020, 10:14:06 am
I am not sure why SJSC should be charging so much. I have done a couple of my own checks on shipping to USA with Parcelforce.
Title: Re: SJS delivery
Post by: PH on October 08, 2020, 01:31:00 am
I have done a couple of my own checks on shipping to USA with Parcelforce.
Are you a business account holder?  If not your "checks" are pointless.
I can tell you, as a fact, even without checking, that Parcelforce currently have a surcharge on most international parcels, , it varies by country, but is I think in all cases based on the weight.
Title: Re: SJS delivery
Post by: leftpoole on October 08, 2020, 10:39:09 am
I have done a couple of my own checks on shipping to USA with Parcelforce.
Are you a business account holder?  If not your "checks" are pointless.
I can tell you, as a fact, even without checking, that Parcelforce currently have a surcharge on most international parcels, , it varies by country, but is I think in all cases based on the weight.

Indeed, following further investigation it appears most sellers around the World are doing the same due to shipping costs. However EU to UK are the same as usual!
John
Title: Re: SJS delivery
Post by: hendrich on October 09, 2020, 09:43:10 pm
Just ordered and received very quickly (via DHL) a set of SKS P55 silver chromoplastic fenders and a new eccentric for my Raven.  Courier costs were about 40% of the total -- COVID costs, wotcha gonna do?  OTOH, the package arrived in about 6 days  :)

I was also looking for a UN 55 BB, 73 x 118 mm - not 100% sure I need one, but I plan to use it as I trace/fix an irritating occasional creaky/clickety in the right front of my drivetrain.  UN 55's now seem to have acquired scarce-as-hens'-teeth status, odd sizes like mine especially.  Happily, I found one at the Bike Doctor in Saskatoon, and that's due this week.

Yes, indeed, hopefully I do not yet need to hoard square taper BBs and the BB depression is yet another covid depressing coincidence. UN55's have been out of stock most place for sometime now, so I picked up an Interloc BB (just in case).

Regarding sjs shipping cost, I was going to order another pair of the magical Duremes (2" 26's) among other items, but the shipping cost was ~US 100. I can wait.
Title: Re: SJS delivery
Post by: PH on October 09, 2020, 10:24:30 pm
UN55's have been out of stock most place for sometime now, so I picked up an Interloc BB (just in case).
I understand Shimano has discontinued the manufacture. 
Title: Re: SJS delivery
Post by: hendrich on October 09, 2020, 10:31:42 pm
UN55's have been out of stock most place for sometime now, so I picked up an Interloc BB (just in case).
I understand Shimano has discontinued the manufacture.

I have heard this before, but people gave evidence on the bike mechanic (bike forum site) that this was not the case. I hope it is just a covid depressive rumor.
Title: Re: SJS delivery
Post by: Andre Jute on October 10, 2020, 02:13:17 am
UN-xx is Shimano's Bottom Bracket generic code. Higher numeric numbers are of superior material or design or construction. I too have UN-55 on at least one of my bikes. I bought it because the UN-2x I wanted, which was the previous best value almost-generic Shimano BB had gone out of stock everywhere simultaneously, all of a sudden. Without any announcement that anyone here saw (we discussed or at least mentioned it about ten years ago), Shimano had made the UN-55 their new quality/value standard. COVID-19 upsets aside, I expect that soon a UN-xx where the the xx is definitely a number higher than 55 will be the Shimano price/performance leader at everyone's LBS and from all the mail-order houses.
(https://imgs.inkfrog.com/pix/coronadelmar/Shimano_BB-UN71_70x113_Italian_02.JPG)
Shimano UN-71 Bottom Bracket, photo ex Ebay
Trivia: Through all this, the best (highest numerical coding) Shimano square taper BB has been the near-mythical UN-71. I've never met anyone who has seen one in the flesh though they have been offered for sale; here one sold for just short of USD140 delivered: https://www.ebay.com/itm/New-Old-Stock-Shimano-BB-UN71-Bottom-Bracket-70x115-mm-Made-in-Japan-/272192192462 (https://www.ebay.com/itm/New-Old-Stock-Shimano-BB-UN71-Bottom-Bracket-70x115-mm-Made-in-Japan-/272192192462) The question arises, When Shimano runs out of numbers below -71, do they give us the -71 for a popular price? My bet is they'll renumber the -71 as the UN-101 to give themselves breathing room.
Title: Re: SJS delivery
Post by: martinf on October 10, 2020, 08:12:41 am
Trivia: Through all this, the best (highest numerical coding) Shimano square taper BB has been the near-mythical UN-71. I've never met anyone who has seen one in the flesh

I have one of these in a long axle (127 mm) version, on a Brompton converted to use double chainrings.

In use, I haven't noticed any difference as compared to the UN-55, which I have on our 3 Thorn Raven Tour bikes. These UN-71 and UN-55 units have all been trouble-free up till now, but none have yet done huge distances.

As the UN55 units were offered at clearance prices a few months ago on a French website I bought 2 spares in the 110 mm/68 mm size used on the Raven Tour frames.

My 4th Thorn frame, a Raven Sport Tour, uses old TA cranks, so I have a TA Axix bottom bracket on that bike (and 3 other family bikes). TA Axix uses replaceable cartridge bearings. A few years ago I bought 10 of these bearings at a reasonable price from a bearing supplier, so should be able to keep these TA units going for a long time. AFAIK TA Axix bottom brackets are still available in a range of sizes, but they are much more expensive than the Shimano UN-xx units.
Title: Re: SJS delivery
Post by: PH on October 10, 2020, 10:28:11 am
Trivia: Through all this, the best (highest numerical coding) Shimano square taper BB has been the near-mythical UN-71. I've never met anyone who has seen one in the flesh
More trivia: UN7X were commonplace around twenty years ago, they were my BB of choice, the rarity then was the XTR series UN9X.  The UN classifies it as a sealed cartridge and the first digit used to assign it to a group. 
Quote
The question arises, When Shimano runs out of numbers below -71, do they give us the -71 for a popular price? My bet is they'll renumber the -71 as the UN-101 to give themselves breathing room.

They seem to have reversed the numbering process and divorced them from the groupsets, the ST BB's listed in Shimano's compatibility charts are the UN1XX (Currently 101 as 100 has already been discontinued) and the higher quality UN3XX.  My understanding is that these recent ST BB's are assembled from third party components, whereas previous versions were entirely manufactured in house. Considering the only Shimano ST cranksets are at the lower end, and their disinterest in backwards compatibility, I'd be surprised to see UN55's back in stock.  I have no insider information, just what I read and hear. 
Title: Re: SJS delivery
Post by: rafiki on October 12, 2020, 10:11:09 am
I just thought I would check back with SJS for new brake blocks for my Brompton in case things have changed. 2 pairs Swiss Stop = £22, total with shipping to Spain £60! Thanks but I'll have to look elsewhere. I do hope they can get back to normal postage soon; they have never been the cheapest but this is daft. I like to buy from them because I trust them and they are always so helpful but these shipping costs are just too much.
Title: Re: SJS delivery
Post by: Andre Jute on October 12, 2020, 11:27:40 pm
More trivia: UN7X were ... etc

Thanks, Martin, Paul. Looks like being satisfied with the UN55 caused me to miss out on spending more money.
Title: Re: SJS delivery
Post by: Robin Thorn on October 13, 2020, 09:21:19 am
Hi, Robin here from SJSC...here's the low down. Yes carriers are applying surcharges to some countries, yes there are some cheaper services to some countries available that we do not offer at this time...why? ... because in many cases these take a long time and it is our experience that customers are not keen to wait, when we did still offer these services we found the work of replying to "where is my item" emails too great, we are incredibly busy, we simply don't have the human resources spare, this is the same reason that we have continued to not allow shop visitors or click and collect. I've not read all the b/b bits of this thread but...yes Shimano have dropped the UN-55 b/b, the new model is the BB UN-300 BUT it's not available in 73/107 or 110. We have commissioned the manufacture of some high quality units to fill this gap, keep your eye on the sjsc website.

 
Title: Re: SJS delivery
Post by: rafiki on October 13, 2020, 10:29:40 am
Hi Robin. Thank you. The order I made a couple of weeks ago was sent by DHL next day service which was not necessary. I would have been happy to have had their 3-5 day service. The smaller items always used to arrive by Royal Mail/Correos which took a week but was fine. The brake blocks I need are now on their way from Germany, shipping cost 8,95€ - coincidentally by DHL. As mentioned in an earlier post I really do want to purchase from SJS as I have since I purchased a Dawes bike from you in 1994 but it's becoming impossible.
Title: Re: SJS delivery
Post by: steve216c on November 10, 2020, 08:27:25 am
I just thought I would check back with SJS for new brake blocks for my Brompton in case things have changed. 2 pairs Swiss Stop = £22, total with shipping to Spain £60! Thanks but I'll have to look elsewhere. I do hope they can get back to normal postage soon; they have never been the cheapest but this is daft. I like to buy from them because I trust them and they are always so helpful but these shipping costs are just too much.

I'm not affiliated with this bike shop in any way, but have ordered twice from them for Rohloff (and Shimano) parts without issue. They appear to ship pretty much worldwide. https://www.starbike.com/en/ (https://www.starbike.com/en/)

If postage fees elsewhere are getting ridiculous, then they might be a alternative source with more competetive postage from Germany.
Title: Re: SJS delivery
Post by: rafiki on November 10, 2020, 09:28:57 am
Useful. Thank you.
Title: Re: SJS delivery
Post by: John Saxby on November 10, 2020, 05:39:52 pm
+1 for starbike