Worst/Funniest experiences buying used bikes?

[Twozaskars]

My strangest experiences come from stuff other than bikes but some of my most memorable purchases were;
A Cannondale super V something that a guy was selling because his shed was collapsing and his son wasn’t interested. He was so glad to see the back of it. Emailed the next day saying he needed it back as said son actually wanted the bike, so made a 4-hour round trip to buy it back from me plus some extra for my trouble. I hadn’t even taken it out of the van.
An Orange Five which a few days after buying I broke my leg, the seller was very understanding and held onto it for 9 weeks until I could fetch it.
Buying a job lot of tools on eBay and going on the bus/train/bus to fetch. Then getting back into a deserted Derby station late, legging it to the bus station with a hold-all containing about 40kg of sockets and spanners hoping I could make the last bus of the day. I was the only one on it, absolutely drenched in sweat and out of breath, and the driver went non stop and made a cheeky detour to the top of my street.
Buying a dashboard for my car and carrying it into the train station toilets, leant it up in the corner and went about my business. A guy in there then started telling me all about the Johnny cash song ‘one piece at a time’.
Buying the same Xizang on eBay 3 times in 20 minutes then having eBay hold a thousand pounds of my money for almost two weeks all because the seller had no idea what it was, but knew by the fact I was prepared to travel from Derbyshire to Glasgow the next day that he had under priced it. I never got the bike.
Just last week setting off to drop my son off for a work placement knowing I somehow had to squeeze a bike I had bought into the back of the car on the way, but he had so much stuff I didn’t know where it was going to go. No bike rack as it’s still in storage following a house move. Two minutes into our 4-hour journey and I spotted a bike rack someone had put out for the scrap man. Absolutely perfect.
Being given countless things by sellers at collection time who just simply can’t be bothered to deal with listing and posting stuff.

 

[ishaw]

Worst experience, well a few.

A owned a set of spin wheels. I wasn't selling them but I was hounded by a guy in here constantly, they even somehow got my mobile number and kept on at me that way too. Eventually I caved, agreed a price, at which point he wanted the cassette and tyres thrown in too. I was weak and gave in, but only on the premise that if he ever sold them, I could have first refusal at the price I sold them for.

He honoured one part of that, and did give me first refusal, but at a seriously inflated price (£160 more and without tyres, cassette). Not cool, I passed.

Another spin related story, perhaps karma. I saw a bad ad on eBay for a 'mountain bike'. One blurry part photo of a bit of a bike, but I thought I spied a spin wheel. It was collection only, but on my commute home from work on a train, so I put a max bid in of £150 and didn't expect to win. Low and behold I did, for a bit less than that too. Got collection details and ended up in a less than salubrious part of Sutton. I feared for my safety. Got to the house, and on entry found myself in a tropical fish breeding ground. Guy was cool with the sale, bike was mint, a green spesh fsr with Judy dual crown forks and spins. I was happy. I kept the spins, now on my team RTS. Best set I've ever had, straight and true, buttery bearings and no damage or wear. Sweet. I passed on my good fortune by giving away the frame and parts to someone who came to collect something and showed an interest in it. I'm nice like that.

A funny incident with a purchase. I bought some fox forks and had them delivered to work. I got a message I had a parcel to collect from the post room so headed down. Just as I arrived there was a large bang, the guys in the post room almost dived for cover. Not sure how or why, but the forks had kind of exploded in the box. On opening the wiper seal on the air side had blown up the stanchion and spewed oil all over the box. Weird. A fork can take riding use and abuse but can't sit in a box? As a result I never post forks with air in them, just to be safe.

Not a funny story, but more good fortune really. An ad for a light aluminium frame caught my eye. I recognised the drop outs so duly paid the £25 and sought help on here for collection and postage. I was right in what I thought I recognised, it was not a light aluminium frame, but a very nice titanium dbr axis TT.

 

[ishaw]

Worst experience. Someone stateside was after help shipping a few things where sellers wouldn't offer postage. Being a generous soul I said I'd help, but it turned into a huge hassle. What started out as a few items soon turned into 3 or 4 bikes and loads of parts. When they arrived, I took pics and sent to the guy so he knew how they arrived. One bine was badly packed and arrived damaged which I flagged. He had paid through PayPal and instigated the process of getting a refund. I was then hounded by the seller, demanding his money from me that PayPal had taken. No amount of convincing him that I hadn't received a penny of his money would suffice, and I received lots of threats of retribution, Interpol convictions etc. Not what I was expecting when helping out with postage.

 

[klunkrider]

I once bought a bike in a public toilet.

It was a Pashley, advertised on eBay local to me. I made the deal and got a postcode from the seller for collection. I turn up at a row of terraced houses/flats over businesses. I presumed the seller was in one of the houses or businesses so I ring to say in outside and he says he’ll be there in 5 minutes. Turns up in a car and instead of going to the terrace, goes across the street to a block of public toilets (locked up and out of use but with male/female/disabled signs on doors etc) and opens the gents with a key. I follow him in to see the place is filled with bikes, wheels, etc.

I sold the saddle for more than I paid for the bike and got a lot of use out of the bike until I stripped it down to use some bits from it on other builds just recently so all in all, a good experience!

 

[MattiThundrrr]

I went to check out a "Rocky" mountain bike. Clearly, the seller didn't know what he was selling, there were various cheapo junk bikes in pieces, the aluminum Rocky Mountain was clearly out of place. Looked like he made a bit of money scooping up whatever bikes he could at a low price, and sell it for a slightly less low price. The bike was in crap shape, completely flat fork, worn, bulging tires, cables a complete mess, etc. Nonetheless, I decided to take it for a spin. Less than half a crank of the pedals, and the chain snapped, I shredded my shins on the pedals, groined myself on the top bar, and slowly rolled back to his driveway, to the delight of the hood rats gathered round. He was kind enough to offer another chain off one of the Walmart heaps, but I was already in my vehicle, speeding away
Every time I go pick one up with @Ingola it's an adventure. There's tons more to share. That last one, I was 80% certain that the cops would show up when he brought out the bolt cutters and started hacking through locks

 

[Ingola]

I went to check out a "Rocky" mountain bike. Clearly, the seller didn't know what he was selling, there were various cheapo junk bikes in pieces, the aluminum Rocky Mountain was clearly out of place. Looked like he made a bit of money scooping up whatever bikes he could at a low price, and sell it for a slightly less low price. The bike was in crap shape, completely flat fork, worn, bulging tires, cables a complete mess, etc. Nonetheless, I decided to take it for a spin. Less than half a crank of the pedals, and the chain snapped, I shredded my shins on the pedals, groined myself on the top bar, and slowly rolled back to his driveway, to the delight of the hood rats gathered round. He was kind enough to offer another chain off one of the Walmart heaps, but I was already in my vehicle, speeding away
Every time I go pick one up with @Ingola it's an adventure. There's tons more to share. That last one, I was 80% certain that the cops would show up when he brought out the bolt cutters and started hacking through locks

We went to pick up a Norco custom cruiser the guy was getting married so he said he would lock the bike up and give me the combo day came to go to Ottawa I sent the guy a deposit but he forgot to give the combo. So on the way we stopped at Canadian Tire and got bolt cutters and off we went. We pull up to the guys go past the gate in the back lifted up a tarp and there it was. I pulled out the bolt cutters cut the lock and freed the bike. While Mattie was poking around to see what this guy had I turn to face the busy parking lot and take a wiz. Mattie was a nervous wreck.

 

[Caj Remtiw]

My most "unique" experience was back in the late 80's when I bought NOS 1950's Hetchins track bike from a fellow in LA. He had me meet him on the back side of Los Angeles airport at the private plane hangers. I got there before he did and there wasn't a soul around, dark, and creepy. I'm thinking to myself... This is the perfect place for someone to rob/ kill me and decided that if the guy didn't show up in 10 minutes I was OUT OF THERE!

So about 5 minutes go by and I hear this high performance engine "pinning it" on the entry, then was stunned when an absolutely pristine 60's Ferrari 250 SWB pulls up besides me! The guy hops out and apologizes for being late then opens the rear lid and pulls out the Hetchins and it was everything maybe even better then he said it was when we first talked on the phone (before the days of internet).

We did the transaction and i complimented him on his Ferrari then asked why we met in such an odd place. He replied that he was about to fly down to Puerto Vallarta and I asked what that had to do with the location...

He laughed then walked over and unlocked the hanger door and pulled it open... And my jaw dropped when I saw his private jet! It made his Ferrari look like a VW bug!

 

[SirLurkalot]

Has a slightly odd experience when I bought my Clements frame last year. I'd arranged to pick the frame up from the seller which happened to be on my birthday.

He was about 25 miles away in Waterlooville so we thought we'd make a day of it and carry on to a favourite place for lunch and a wander.

We pull up outside the sellers house in a fairly upmarket road and notice a neighbour two doors down staring at us. Anyway, I get out and my wife stays in the car with all the windows open because it's a hot day.

I knock on the door the seller comes out and gets the frame out of the garage, I hand over the cash and we start chatting about bikes. All of a sudden the neighbour appears, completely butts into the conversation and said to the seller "Do you want some rhubarb?"
The seller replies "No thanks we've still got some you gave us two days ago."
Then the neighbour starts talking about someone having their bike stolen. At that point I thank the seller and get in the car leaving the seller with Mr Rhubarb who's still bending his ear about something else.

My wife is cracked up because she heard the whole thing and was watching the neighbour bobbing about trying to hear what was going on.

"You didn't want any rhubarb then?" She said as we drove away.

 

[dyna-ti]

Picked up what was described as an XL palisades trail,. but turned out to be 17". and it was the seller who was XL. at about 6'5" and rather sturdy looking.
It was disappointing, I let him know I was disappointed. we arranged a slightly better price, and that was that. Bike was in great condition. Though I did tell him that he was really oversized for the bike and would have looked a proper sight pedaling along the road. Looking back it was a bit cheeky of me. Could have been taken badly

 

[Suprachrgd82]

I had an Iron Horse Porter dirt jumper on OfferUp. Crank Brothers wheels, Saint crankset, XTR components. An absolute tank of a bike. 34lbs of beefy bombproof double gusseted CNC bike that has survived the past 20 years with only a few scratches on the top tube.

Someone messaged about it, “It’s old and might break, what if I taco a wheel, is the frame sturdy enough for dirt….” Countless questions went on leading me to believe this was some adrenaline pumped teenager who was going to ride it off the second story roof into the neighbor’s pool, followed by 60mph blasts over Bear Valley ski jumps. I was beginning to think that this bike might not survive the coming summer riding season.

This went on for days, followed by “I’m not very tall and only weigh 150lbs”.

The potential buyer showed up and turns out to be a 4’ 11’ girl who can’t even balance on the bike to test ride it up the street. I can even mash the seatpost far enough into to frame for her to climb aboard. “Put one foot on the pedal and swing your other leg over to get rolling” I say, followed thereafter by a tangled lump in the local school parking lot.

“Sorry, this is not the bike for you” I had to explain, “I don’t think you want a dirt jumper”.

Here I am a month later answering messages about how to find seatpost clamps and playing virtual mechanic for her to this day for some Alivio equipped train wreck found elsewhere.