Originally Posted by
Iride01
The purpose of the hanger is not only for mounting the rear derailleur, but also to protect the more expensive derailleur from damage. Not sure how a derailleur hanger shatters. I've seen them bent.
A bent derailleur hanger really implies some mishap occurred to bend the hanger whether the owner is aware of that incident that damaged it or not. Possibly being just one month old at the time, REI might have fixed it for little more cost than the part. I don't think REI's bikes are bad bikes. Certainly any other bike with a rear derailleur might have suffered the same damage.
There wasn't even enough left of it for the local bike shop service manager to recognize what it was until I told him. I assumed that that was the case, that the derailleur hanger is supposed to protect the derailleur? The problem with that is a new derailleur of the type that I have for that bike was 1395 from Amazon and I could have got it the next day, I'm still looking for the right derailleur hanger well over 6 weeks later