Last month I purchased myself a recumbent Actionbent bicycle. It took a good while to get here. I had purchased it at the end of June with the hopes of having it ready for a trip to New York near the end of July, and it cut pretty close. It was a little confusing to assemble, since the instructions provided consisted mainly of small low quality pictures and very few words. I had to look at several different pictures and pages on the website to figure it out.
Unfortunately for me, I still was not able to get it finished for the trip: The seat they sent was missing a bracket to connect it to the frame. I thus could not attach the seat at all as it was supposed to be. I also was having trouble at that point with getting the rear derailler to work, but that simply required connecting the cable a little differently. I emailed the Actionbent guy. He gave no reply, but promptly sent something to me. It arrived while I was in New York. I was hopeful to ride the bike, but unfortunately, when I got back, I discovered he had sent the wrong parts. He sent to pieces that I already had. I sent him another email, but he neither replied nor sent anything this time. I guess I’ll let it slide: it’s a small two person business which as far as I know only has two employees. So for now I have tied the seat at the one point with a rope. I could probably fashion something similar to the bracket out of two properly sized right angle brackets, but I haven’t gotten around to that.
I had ordered a rear rack and a bag from Actionbent as well. I was a little leary about the bag, as only a brief description was given. It was one of those trunk kinds, but the description said it had zipout panniers. I didn’t figure they’d be very big, but I thought they’d be good enough for day trips. When I recieved it, though, there were no zipout panniers at all. Only regular pockets. I’ve since discovered that it’s a Sunlite Top Loader 1, while the Top Loader 2 and greater have the panniers. They sent me another pack when the sent me the new brackets, but it was the exact same pack. I got two packs from this, so I guess I can’t complain too much. Plus the panniers would only gain me about 100 cubic inches for the 2.