Zester Jester

Seems like a fair review- I have been interested in these bikes as well, but am with the reviewer- you can only have so many problems before deciding to back out while still possible. I think the OP should just get his Xtracycle, stop worrying about other peoples parking. If you owned a car you would take up more room, so just find a telephone pole down the street and a large krptonite chain; most bikes aren't chained, they are u-locked, therefore you aren't "stealing" a spot,cause no one uses poles...

squirtdad

This is a bummer, remember seeing the worksman bikes all over NYC (almost 30 years ago granted) and they seemed totally durable......if heavy

JZ and Mrs. JZ... just out of curiosity.....why a cruiser (thinking big tires,swoopy frame)? Would some thing like an english 3 speed work as well (also due to space check out wald folding baskets)

here is a bike my local bikes shop has said they have not had quality issues with

https://www.linusbike.com/models/roadster-sport/ or a mixte to share with Mrs. https://www.linusbike.com/models/mixte-3/


there is a dealer •

Massey's Outfitters
509 N. Carrollton Ave
New Orleans, LA 70119
504 648-0292

JusticeZero

Worksman:
I'd like to repeat here: I LOVED the design. It behaved like it was indestructible, and dropping a hundred pounds in the basket made the handling respond "Ho, hum, that's all? I thought you said you were going to put something in the basket."

My issues were with QC (Way too many problems in short succession), the bus rack thing, and with the PAINT/METALLURGY. The rust was the big one here. We pulled the bike out and saw significant rusting and peeled off paint on the basket, rust spotting on the handlebars, and rust spots on the frame... on a new, one week old bicycle! That's completely ridiculous. The paint and rust wasn't just the last straw, it was the dealbreaker for me. I'd considered trading down for a Worksman cruiser until I saw that.

I don't live in a factory. I live in a world. If you bought a new pick-up truck from the dealership, were out hauling your first load of tools, got caught in the rain, came home, and saw big peeling rust spots blooming from the hood, you would be rightly alarmed. If a mechanic at the dealership shrugged off your concern by commenting "It's not supposed to be outdoors", you would be more than a little bit upset. A pick up truck needs to be able to deal with a bit of rain. My bicycle is my pick-up truck.

Khosh - I went to the only Worksman dealership in the area. If I want an Electra I go to Bayou, if I want a Trek I go to GNO, if I want a Sun I go to Mike's, if I want a Giant I go to Cycle World, but if I want a Worksman I have to go out to Kenner to East Bank, because they're the ones who have a relationship with them.

Squirtdad - Yeah, the Worksman looked amazingly durable, it FELT completely durable, I have no doubt that it would have taken any amount of abuse I could throw at it without complaint - but the damned thing melted in the rain. That's a bit like being Indestructible like Superman, but having a Kryptonite-like weakness to METAL. The bike's Kryptonite is just too ubiquitous.

Also: I actually did look at the Linus 3-speed mixte; I like the aesthetics and the style. I didn't chose it, because Massey is 1: not an LBS and probably not able to mount or comment on any mods or adjustments, 2: located in a part of town that we normally are not in, 3: had a review which are more enamored of the aesthetics of the bike, while dismissively tossing out a comment along the lines of 'oh yeah, and it rides okay.' and 4: didn't have any price advantage to counter points 1-3. It was down there somewhere around 'Plan D'.

I ended up getting the Giant Simple 3 with the baskets. I wanted to look at the Trek offering, but the Trek store was closed today for some reason. I wanted a cruiser for several reasons:
Slow (dropping ones' wife is not acceptable, and constantly running in too-low gears just to keep slow gets aggravating), Upright, IGH (I spent a few years being asked by students why my pants were rolled up, and occasionally gear-chewed. With a 3-speed hub, I don't have to.), Big tires (post-Katrina roads), compatible with big baskets, low maintenance.

Nightshade

I have to wonder if you've bothered to notify Worksman about your quality issues or you just complained here to harm one of the few American manufactures left.

I've dealt with and ridden Worksman for over 35 years so I know that they will treat you right if you just let them know you have an issue during the one year warranty period.

If it's just a paint issue on the basket take the damn thing off and repaint it yourself with better paint!!!

Yes, it shouldn't be so light on paint but that happens in the "just in time" inventory world when your supplier lays down on you. To keep cost down Worksman still uses an old fashioned air dry booth not a fancy automated paint spray booth or powder coat that would drive up cost ( or cause Worksman to move to China! ) Besides 99.9% of the people that buy Worksman are buying hard core toughness not a pretty paint job.

Then we all have to remember that there WILL ALWAYS be early hour minor defects that will shake out in time. Remember, it's a machine made by man so it's not gonna be prefect outta the box!!!!!!

dscheidt

So he should put up with junk because it's american junk? If worksmen want to compete, they need to build a competitive product, and probably not the one the that was competitive in 1946. Shipping the wrong parts to the dealer, using total junk parts (a broken saddle, pedal body, shifter on the same bike aren't 'quality control' problems, it's just junk.), crappy design (zip tie the cables to the basket?, piss poor reflector mounting) are pretty clearly not competitive practices.

Nightshade

Say what you will the question is still open about the OP contacting Worksman about quality issue or just whining about them here.

If the customer fails to notify the manufacture of quality issues they find then it's on the customers head the quality is sub par since the manufacture assumes that their quality os ok due to customer acceptance of said product. Being dismissive of a quality issue by saying it's "junk" doesn't solve a damn thing.

If ya don't tell'em they will never know...........

dscheidt

If you read the thread, you see he contacted them at least once. They replaced parts under warranty. And I think getting the bike returned with a notice that it sucked is going to be a pretty big clue. IF worksman doesn't know it's not acceptable to sell stuff with peeling paint, zip tied cables, broken saddles, shifters, and pedals, they're clueless.

Nightshade

You are aware that Worksmans main business is to heavy industry....right?

This is not to excuse what some in the cycling world see as crude or low quality but in this case Worksman , like any other business, can't afford a double standard for customer quality. So it is that the robust simpler industrial standard that is applied to all product.

This industrial standard is open and plain in all Worksman adverising so to complain after you buy Worksman means that your level of understanding failed to note this industrial standard. Many customers replace parts like pedals ,seats etc. so the Worksman provided parts are just a stop gap until the cyclist choices of replacement parts can be bought & installed.

My new Worksman bike looks nothing like when I received it from Worksman since I dressed it out to suit me and my needs. Worksman promised a rideable bike delivered and a ridable bike is exactly what I got. It's not on Workman that I upgraded the bike like most do here with any new bike.

JusticeZero

The saddle? I don't expect any more from that than I do from a low end saddle I might get from anywhere else. I'm not sure if i'd be able to shrug at a Bell saddle failing after 50 miles.

The pedals? I got the upgrade, so that WAS putting money into it. I can see those wearing out over time. But 40 miles??

The reflector is safety equipment. That sort of thing is important on a work site.

I wasn't expecting an amazing paint job. I figured it would look like a spray paint job with stickers. It was glossier than I expected, in fact. I didn't even care about paint. If the materials had been weather resistant enough, they could have gone with bare, unpolished metal and I would have been okay with that.

It is marketed as an industrial bike. So I expect it to be bombproof, heavy, no-frills, and kind've ugly. That's mostly what I got. It rode great. I was a bit disappointed by the volume of cargo, but quickly found that the amount of weight it could carry was awe-inspiring.

However, it failed to be bombproof in all cases.

The basket is PART OF THE BUILD. It's basically marketed as part of the frame. And the baskets are made by Worksman. So i'm treating it's durability as a core problem, not an accessory problem. And I was seeing rust creeping into the welds after a week. That is something I would find alarming on a piece of industrial equipment. If I got a backhoe, I would expect that it would be in the weather a lot. I would have no problem with the idea that eventually it would rust and generally look non-pretty. But rust on fundamental components after one week would definitely give me pause, and I likely would be checking the competition's offerings more closely.

JusticeZero

I'd like to say something else. I only wrote this up really because NOBODY OUT THERE COULD BE BOTHERED TO WRITE ABOUT THE DAMNED THING. If you or anyone else would have written more than "Worksman made it! It's heavy!" I wouldn't have bothered writing a review. Had anyone else noted the issue with the tires and the rack, I would have chosen differently.

I was in contact with the dealership regularly, and Worksman less often. Worksman is proud of their product, and they happily warranted issues as they came up - but there were SO MANY of them that by the time my wife pointed out the big creeping rust spots digging into the welds, I simply could not justify the purchase to her anymore. If I was a business owner, like the business owners I know, I would still have to justify my purchases to my wife - and having her get upset about rusted welds on a week old bike would affect my buying decisions in the same way. This is a quality control problem. Quality control isn't supposed to happen after the product is delivered; optimally it should happen before the product is even built. Failing that, it needs to happen before the product ships. What's the solution? Maybe a different material that weathers better? I don't know.

Nightshade

(in blue)
Since Worksman is more of industrial bike there is little , if any, press or internet chatter to review what the civilian marketplace thinks of this brand. In my case I knew what these bikes are since I rode one in the factory where I worked for 40 yrs.

(in red)
Please note that when the factory was contacted positive results were had. When the dealer was contacted things got a lot slower or didn't happen at all. BUT you have to remember that your expectations were a little upscale from the industrial market.

To be honest if there is an Achilles heel to the Worksman brand it is the paint. Industry would just repaint the rusting part and move on.

FunkyStickman

That's why I'm so surprised the QC is so bad. The Schwinn Meridian trikes at my factory get left out in the weather almost every day, and guess what? A year later, no rust at all... or mechanical problems, either. They carry 25+ pound part crates from building to building, all day long, they are half the price of the Worksman, and a Schwinn trike weighs as much as the cycletruck.

So what you're saying is the stock Worksman parts were meant to be immediately replaced? That doesn't sound like industrial quality to me, man.

Sorry, but you can get a "ridable" chinese bike (with components that need to be immediately replaced) for half the price... I'm gonna have to go with JusticeZero on this one. Not worth the money, at all.

qmsdc15

Consider a 20" wheel folding bike and a lightweight trailer such as Burley Flatbed. Easy to carry up the stairs (two trips) and won't take up as much room as that piece of crap industrial standard Worksman.

JusticeZero

Right. They "promise a ridable bike, and sell one." Sure. Know who else promises a ridable bike? Wal-Mart. By the standards provided, they deliver too. The component quality was highly worrisome, but I might have gotten a freakish bad run on those. The seat? The hub rod? BOTH pedals?? The rust was unacceptable.
And this is a UTILITY forum, here. I'd expect people to be familiar with pretty much any cargo hauling option.
The industrialists I know would do that, sure. Then they would calculate the price they spent on paint, plus the cost to take a worker off the line for awhile to do the painting, plus the cost to set up the painting setup, tsk and grump a lot, add it to the cost paid, and browse the competition's catalogs.

Nightshade

Not to be rude but I can tell that you are not informed well on the gritty business of manufacturing products for heavy industry.

Nightshade

No, sorry but your description is very far off the facts. These cost would be written off as maintenance. Been there.....done that.

JusticeZero

Maybe that's true in a megacorporation where the owner never gets within ten miles of the factory, but the industrialists I know are in their factories and garages on a regular basis. And that's a big part of the U.S.'s businesses.
I remember a commercial where a worker in an office was refusing to use the product advertized because "It's the company's money, not mine. yeah, I don't care about wasting the boss's money!" and meanwhile, the boss had walked out of the door behind him and paused to listen with a disapproving face.

qmsdc15

I'm glad you enjoy your cast-iron "Humvee of Bikes".

I'm happily uninformed "...on the gritty business of manufacturing products for heavy industry". Bicycling is not heavy industry and heavy is not a good thing in human powered vehicles.

I do not hold Worksman in as low regard as I do Humvee, but I see the similarities.

Nightshade

I do very much enjoy my Worksman trike and bike.

I also know that it takes a special kind of person that knows exactly what they want to own a Worksman. Children or the immature need not apply since these are adult bikes in every sense of the word.

You should be glad that you know nothing about heavy industry first hand as I do. It's a real bummer.

qmsdc15

This is a forum for people interested in utility biking, we're not necessarily experts on the subject.

Frankly, I'm surprised you didn't know enough about Worksman to avoid buying one.

JusticeZero

You clearly like Worksman bikes. I'm fine with that really. There's a lot about them to like. However. Are you seriously trying to claim that I am too immature to appreciate the fine quality and sophistication shown by rust creeping into the welds of the basket and spotting on the frame after one week? I guess it must take a special, adult, keen and wise person to want a bike that melts into rust first time it's ridden through the rain. Tell me, are you too gauche and uncultured to enjoy the keen sophistication and acquired sensibilities involved in purchasing a Next, too?

Nightshade

Calm down, already!

If I have intended my post get personal with you I would have called you by name " JusticeZero" which I did not!

FWIW. I do think that you're being a bit anal about a dab of rust that was not supposed to be there but is so damn easy to fix and move on.

That said, it's your money so spend it as you please just don't disrespect one of the last remaining All American bike makers left.

FunkyStickman

Not to be rude, but you don't know where I work, or how long I've worked there. I could spend all my time explaining how flawed your reasoning is, but I don't think it will really matter, and you won't convince anybody here that the Worksman is a smart buy based on this.

JusticeZero: I need to get out to N.O. sometime for a ride or something. I'll have to get with you if I get the chance, maybe one Saturday we could go ride the lakefront and poke fun at the weekend warrior tridorks like JoeyBike does!

Nightshade

Such outright rubbish!

dscheidt

NightShade thinks that worksman can do no wrong. Ignorning him when he starts explaining how wonderful they are, or how the laws of physics don't apply to their wheels, or otherwise enters his worksman propaganda mode is much better idea than responding to him.