Bike pricing disparity.

[greencat]

Re: Re:

And, I know you are just using an analogy, greencat, but I don't buy the Musk story for a second: Are we really supposed to believe that the federal Usanian govt.- who on the face of it haven't been arsed to send a man to the mooon since 1974- are now out-resourced and out-initiatived by one of their own private citizens? That comes across as (suspiciously) great PR for the ideology of 'not taxing rich people'.

I suspect Musk was perhaps more using it as a tool to beat competitors for the US govt's dollar like Boeing with (who have probably enjoyed a good run of charging what they more or less what they like). And he probably does believe it on one level - after all, his predecessors seem quite happy to let millions of dollars of rocketry fall into the sea rather than try and scoop it up and reuse it.

 

[brocklanders023]

Re:

Meh, our sport has always been as expensive as you wanted to make it. As mentioned above, how much of a jump in price did M900 XTR allow manufactures to stick on their halo bikes? In more recent times it was the first batch of 1x SRAM XO/XX and the associated jump in what people would pay for a cassette.

Add to that a weak pound, shortage of supply when demand is huge and a bunch of people with nothing else to spend their money on (with cheap credit available) and it's no surprise manufactures are making hay and the price seems bonkers.

Give it a couple of years and the bargains will reappear for the end of season sales and someone will make a decent but much cheaper ebike that others follow. Same as it ever was.

 

[legrandefromage]

Re: Bike pricing rant.

I think Mr. dyna-ti is pointing out that with the electric bicycles, you are not getting what you pay for when the price is as high as they are.

Mediocre components at the prices charged and no guarantee that the parts to repair or replace will even be available in 2 to 3 years time unlike the quality wood working equipment.

Coming from a manufacturing background;

Product A retailed at £2900 + options

Manufacturing cost was £980

VAT at the time was 17.5%

Trade price was around £1900

This allowed for a healthy dealer margin and the chance to discount if required

Product A came with a two year factory warranty and the option to do software and hardware upgrades as and when new technology was available.

That was 2004, I have just got product A working flawlessly with some 2020 equipment which technically it shouldnt but it does because somebody somewhere decided that certain things should be backwards compatible.

What is happening in the cycling world is that there is a very quick turn over of standards and compatibility often rendering parts unusable too quickly. Theres little cross compatibility with batteries and other parts despite their being essentially the same thing.

So sure, spend your money but there is no guarantee that you'll be able to use it in two or three years time when everything has moved on.

It is already happening in the EV car world; some poor Candian wanted to get a new battery installed for his Nissan Leaf and Nissan wanted around $15,000 Ca, which was substantially more than the vehicle cost 2nd hand or its current worth.

https://thenextweb.com/shift/2020/10/30 ... f-battery/

*whoa!!! New Zealand:

https://insideevs.com/news/453771/recor ... -pack-fix/

 

[jimo746]

Re:

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[FluffyChicken]

Re: Bike pricing rant.

IMO,.

Not sure comparisons with top end 90s bikes are completely right. £4K does not a top end bike buy nowadays.

2k didn't buy you one then either.

It was the just steel welded in a diamond frame comparison, they're charging a lot for just a bit tagging tubes together that's been done for yonks.

Now you get a fancy motor and electronics on it.

 

[torqueless]

Re:

Profit isn’t a dirty word you know!

Yeah it's funny that, isn't it? Profiteer certainly is. I guess they thought we wouldn't notice the discrepancy?

 

[dyna-ti]

Re: Bike pricing rant.

Orange P7 frame.
Original cost up until maybe 8 years ago -£350
Today its £600

Felt the weight of one ?. I bought one of these 2nd hand and was waiting excitedly for it to arrive having had a clockwork all those years.
Pulling it out of the box i was very disappointed by the fact it seemed to weigh twice as much.

A mid range P7 bitd, with LX and XT rear mech and a judy i think was £700, Today it is £2200.

 

[d8mok]

Re: Bike pricing rant.

New P7 frames are £500-540 online from what I can see.

Paul’s had them at £300

https://www.paulscycles.co.uk/component ... blue__4430


So let’s say they cost £500 as the Paul’s deal was too good. £500 now is £250 in 1994 using a inflation calculator. I really don’t see your point as they aren’t even keeping with inflation as they were More than that in the nineties. Even 8 years ago is just about right.

 

[adroitstif]

Re: Bike pricing rant.

I just consulted my April 1995 copy of What Mountain Bike & Accessories magazine.
Orange P7 with rigid fork and full LX is listed at £879.95. Same price at J E James.
I'd guess one with a Judy XC would have sold for £200-£300 more - call it maybe £1100ish, bit more than dyna-ti suggests, as a Judy XC was £399 on its own and the P7 fork they'd be deleting retailed for £49.99.
Frame only price for the Orange P7 was £375 from Mountain Tamers, or £394.99 including a presumably P7) fork from "Magic"'s Custom Build page and same price from J E James.
I hope that settled an argument somewhere, anyway.

 

[d8mok]

Re:

So £375 from 1995 is worth £726 in 2019 according to BoE.