I hate to be writing this, but I need to be upfront with an urgent safety update for your Starling Stainless Murmur frame.
It’s with much regret that I must report that we’ve experienced some failures of these frames.
You must stop riding your Stainless Murmur frame immediately.
On inspection, we’ve discovered that these frames have not been manufactured correctly by our partner factory, and over time fatigue may cause a failure at the joint between the down tube and machined main pivot part. Once this joint fails, the full frame collapses and there is a high risk of serious injury. There are no visible signs that failure will occur.
I'll say this again. You must not ride this frame. If you choose to ignore this, we take no responsibility for any injury as a result of the failure.
If you are no longer the owner of this frame, we need your help to understand who it was sold to and contact them.
Who does this affect?
This failure only affects stainless steel Murmur frames with a machined main pivot part. If you are receiving this email, it means that your frame is affected. It does not affect any other Starling Cycles product - including Stainless frames with a non machined pivot part.
How are we resolving this issue?
First, stop riding your frame immediately and contact us to let us know you have received this message.
If you have sold your frame to another rider, please inform them immediately and send their details to us.
This error is due to manufacturing, but, we're currently not receiving any support from our partner factory in finding a solution.
However, Starling Cycles will take ownership of this issue and work hard with you to get you back riding soon as possible. Your safety and bike-time is important to us and we’re doing everything we can to fix this.
We also need to ensure that the frames cannot be ridden in the future and are disposed of responsibly. We're willing to collect the frame from you and dispose of it at our cost. Otherwise, we can advise you on how to do this yourself.
I’m sorry to say that your frame is no longer in warranty. But we’d like to keep you safe and get you back on your bike as quickly as possible.
We can offer you a replacement front triangle (
https://www.starlingcycles.com/frames/murmur/). We can supply a brand new, current generation V3 853 front triangle as a replacement.
For note, we have had zero warranty issues with these frames and are fully confident in them. As such we will supply a new 7 year warranty as part of the swap. The replacement will be front triangle only, the swingarm and indeed all parts will swap over directly from your current stainless frame. The only part that does not fit is the front shock hardware, we will supply the correct part for this.
As your are a 2nd hand owner of the frame we’d ask for a small contribution of £250 to help cover our costs.
I am sorry to be the bearer of bad news, but safety is our number one priority.
We’re working hard to understand how quickly we can manufacture these replacement frames, and we’ll come back to you shortly with more information.
We’ll also ensure that a small value is documented on shipping information so you will pay zero or minimal duties and taxes.
Please get back to me ASAP to confirm you have read this email and understand. If you’d like to chat on the phone, please let me know. You’re also welcome to come back with any questions, and I’ll come straight back to you.
We can then work with you to get you back out on the trails, with a brand new front triangle and a 7-year warranty.
Cheers, Joe.
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