Ok it’s not what you think. I snagged what I think was a hell of a deal off eBay the other day. Trek sc 9.8 with zipp 404s for $ 3.6k. Seller said it was in functional shape but a bit cosmetically rough, rusty bolts, paint chips etc. who the hell cares, right? Stainless hardware would be like what, 25-30 at most? For less than 4,000 it would be a fast bike and a good fit for me. Plus a pair of zipps to throw on the road bike or use as training wheels. Awesome, right? Seller contacts me after I had already paid for it to tell me that the zipps are cracked and the frame may also be!!! To his credit he also offers lots of reasonable options including a full refund which i take him up on. So that part was good. Just bumming about the deal not working out…was already blocking out some time to do an overhaul and fitting day with it 
. I guess don’t count your chickens right?
Of course with $40,000 one could buy a lot of bike…
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Great incentives and pricing currently on Speed Concepts at Trek stores… Considering one myself but need to sell my Felt DA first…
Dude, consider yourself lucky. I thought this was going to be a rip off story. Another deal wil turn up. You’re thinking what could have been, but you have to consider what could have been.
Dude, consider yourself lucky. I thought this was going to be a rip off story. Another deal wil turn up. You’re thinking what could have been, but you have to consider what could have been.Absolutely , could have gone that way too, I am really just whining here since my wife is already fed up with my obsessive bike stuff. PayPal and cc are usually enough to give some protection that I don’t worry too much. Also a reputable online store was the seller so I figured the risk was low.
Great incentives and pricing currently on Speed Concepts at Trek stores… Considering one myself but need to sell my Felt DA first… hmm hasn’t really hit here yet. Our local trek stores (yeah we have two trek stores plus two other shops that carry them) are basically out of SCs. They are just ordering new 2012s at full price from the factory afaik
Great incentives and pricing currently on Speed Concepts at Trek stores… Considering one myself but need to sell my Felt DA first… found this! I went to check out another store and SCs were in stock and going cheap! Thanks for the heads up, would have just assumed pricing was the same across the boards.
Trek Stores in Columbus have some 2011s for a steal and there is a medium on Ebay right now for a decent price for SC 7s.
When I read the title of this thread, I thought, “finally!” Figured the cat was going to come out of the bag. I know at least 8 Speed Concept owners and NONE are happy. One hassle after another. And I know Slowtwitch “wisdom” is that weight of the bike doesn’t matter, but that’s nonsense. Some of the common builds of these bikes are absolute PIGS! Wade through the Speed Concept Owners thread and you’ll see where there’s one replacement part after another. I’ve got a ton of replacement parts. I’ve felt like I’ve spent half my life replacing parts on this damned bike. I dropped a whole lot of money on her … more than on any two bikes I’ve ever owned before. I have not been happy with it and I’ve not had good race results on it. I wish I could have the races back that I did on her this season. I have no doubt I’d have had better results on my P4 or any of my other, older bikes. My season would have sucked had I not given up racing the SC and fallen back on the P4.
I really hate to write this. I’d love to be able to sell this bike here on the classifieds. But in good conscience, I couldn’t ask the kind of money I’d need to recover for this … pos. I love TREK. I’ve owned TREK bikes for years. I’ve been a very loyal customer. This is the first time I’ve been disappointed by them and, in my view, this bike is VERY disappointing!
When I read the title of this thread, I thought, “finally!” Figured the cat was going to come out of the bag. I know at least 8 Speed Concept owners and NONE are happy. One hassle after another. And I know Slowtwitch “wisdom” is that weight of the bike doesn’t matter, but that’s nonsense. Some of the common builds of these bikes are absolute PIGS! Wade through the Speed Concept Owners thread and you’ll see where there’s one replacement part after another. I’ve got a ton of replacement parts. I’ve felt like I’ve spent half my life replacing parts on this damned bike. I dropped a whole lot of money on her … more than on any two bikes I’ve ever owned before. I have not been happy with it and I’ve not had good race results on it. I wish I could have the races back that I did on her this season. I have no doubt I’d have had better results on my P4 or any of my other, older bikes. My season would have sucked had I not given up racing the SC and fallen back on the P4.
I really hate to write this. I’d love to be able to sell this bike here on the classifieds. But in good conscience, I couldn’t ask the kind of money I’d need to recover for this … poc. I love TREK… I’ve owned TREK bikes for years. I’ve been a very loyal customer. This is the first time I’ve been disappointed by them and, in my view, this bike is VERY disappointing!
Bummer, sorry to hear that. I guess I am bypassing some/all of that getting a Q3 '11 “used” bike thats been mostly updated from what I can tell. I agree, weight still makes a difference even if its just in our heads. Mine is going to be a sub 18 lb build but I cheated a little bit . Coming from a 16 lb road bike and a 19 lb tri bike that’s not going to feel bad at all.
So what have your issues been? Clearance on the front brake with HEDs or FCs? Draft box stuff? Seatpost slippage? Rusting hardware? Fork paint crack? All of the above? Other stuff?
I’m on the lowest stem configuration. The front brake simply will not work. I know some people have dumb-lucked their way into precisely the right cable housing length or whatever it is that it takes to make it work. I’ve re-worked the front brake cable literally 30 times and I simply can’t get the front brake to function cleanly. (Neither can my Trek dealer or anyone else.) Got a model with a different stem, you probably won’t have this problem.
The entire front end was rattling horribly. Ultimately, they issued a new steer tube nut that was supposed to correct the problem. Well, it helped, but it didn’t eliminate the problem.
I was very disappointed to see that the Di2 battery was just slapped on the outside of the bottom bracket shell. What a terrible “solution” to the battery placement problem. I’ve taken care of that with an RC battery in the seatpost, but it’s ridiculous that they went to so much trouble on this bike and then were so lazy with the Di2 battery.
I’ve had extensive rusting of critical hardware. I’ve spent $130 of my own money on a bike that I’ve owned less than 8 months to replace parts that are completely rusted out. I might have been able to get warranty replacements, but it was race season. I just needed to get it done.
I crushed my seatpost despite using an Effetto Mariposa torque wrench set several pounds below the torque spec. Paid out of my pocket to replace it because I had a key race a couple days later. That sucked!
I completely re-worked the aerobars from what came stock. I took a pound off of them. A FULL POUND … just off of aerobar attachment hardware. Ridiculous! Completely overbuilt.
Paint is discoloring. The bike looks like it’s 5 years old. Not less than one.
And finally, I’ve recently discovered cracks in the front fork just above the brake area. May just be cosmetic, but who wants to chance it on a fork? And I’m SO SICK of all these issues!
The bike is a CONSTANT hassle. It’s ALWAYS something. I’m really into working on bikes, but I’m totally sick of having to constantly work on this bike.
Too bad I found another bike, sounds like a winter project to me if the price was right 
. Not that a new bike should be that, definitely sucks to have so many hassles. Hope my experience will be more like the folks I know locally with SCs…mostly good, a few hassles.
If you’ve got cracks in your front fork or any other frame damage due to poor manufacturing you should be eligible for a free frame replacement. I had a Madone which had some damage inside the bottom bracket which was discovered about 18 months after I bought the bike. They replaced my frame with a newer and better model Madone at no cost to me.
I’ve owned many Treks over many years and have quite a number of warranty replacement frames. I honestly don’t want a warranty replacement of this bike. I’d prefer my money back. I haven’t asked if there’s a way to make that happen. Maybe I should. I’ve always had the utmost respect for Trek. They’ve always treated me right in the past.
Where do you live? Trek Store of Tampa is blowing them out. Especially the 2011 models.
Can you send instructions on how to remove a pound from the aerobars? Seriously. That’s pretty good information to share.
Regards,
Puskas
Thought I’d chime in since this thread seems so one sided. I haven’t had any problems with parts breaking. I’ve taken it apart about 8x to fly to races and it’s been smooth.
Hey you live in Tampa? I see you are a skydiver…jump at Z-Hills? I don’t jump any longer but still have ton of pals @ the DZ. I still have an old Sabre 170 from my student days and Cypres Expert I never sold if you are in the market. Do you know Tony Hathaway? He’s a good pal from the old days.
it seems like everyone is liquidating their hed jets too. im not quite sure why though. the hed jets are faster than everything but the zipp firecrests.
Thought I’d chime in since this thread seems so one sided. I haven’t had any problems with parts breaking. I’ve taken it apart about 8x to fly to races and it’s been smooth.
Good to hear, as a new speed concept owner I am glad the positives outweigh the negatives. Trek is a great brand imo and on top of their excellent customer service, they set Carl loose on us too. Having a guy who is available daily to answer questions on here is just awesome. Not sure this thread is really one sided though, just derailed a little bit. Definitely not meant to be a bash thread. Originally it was a post about being disappointed with buying a used trek sc that had problems unrelated to it being a trek. It was just a whine post with a leading title
One guy posted his unhappy experience with his bike and it sounds like he has some grounds to complain from what he’s posted…hopefully he goes back to his dealer or talks to trek customer service and gets some resolution.