Experiances of On-One bikes

[The Kilt]

Ive had a few On-One bikes in the past, my favourite being a 29er Inbred and prior to that a 45650, which was really good fun to ride. I found both of them to ride superbly with nice amount of flex, and even took the 45650 down 50 shades of black at UK Bike park. (pics below)



What i wanted to know is what are other peoples views on On-One? I know some people think they are trash, but i dont think they have ridden one. They always used to be reasonably priced, i picked up the 45650 compelte build for £1,200, but changed a lot on it. And the Inbred frame i picked up new direct for £180 and built up a rigid on a budget with parts i had and was an excellent ride.

Recently though, looking at their frames and bike builds, they seem to be rather over priced now and unfortunately eveall their bikes seems to have moved to the long and slack craze which personally i dont like. I like my bikes to be playful, which i can hop off the smallest little bump and manual like a mother f*cker. all the long and slack bikes ive ridden havent been that nice. Yes they are fast, but you need to put in a lot of effort to have fun on them.

 

[jax13]

Mate of mine built himself a deedar which rode quite nicely but replaced it with a tiktik frame a couple of months back which is a great little frame. Its a bit small for me being a medium but feels like a bmx compared to my 29er stiff squatch.

 

[davidj]

I had an inbred 26" that I liked at the time, when I swapped it for an Orange P7 26" I realised it was quite numb in comparison. Neither of them are lightweights but the Orange rides much better in my opinion.

What annoys me about them (PlanetX, seems to be their preferred name now) is despite them being a short bike ride from me they won't let me collect and insist on posting items out! Before all the ownership shenanigans they were more accessible.

 

[d8mok]

I had an inbred 26" that I liked at the time, when I swapped it for an Orange P7 26" I realised it was quite numb in comparison. Neither of them are lightweights but the Orange rides much better in my opinion.

What annoys me about them (PlanetX, seems to be their preferred name now) is despite them being a short bike ride from me they won't let me collect and insist on posting items out! Before all the ownership shenanigans they were more accessible.

I’ve collected things inc a full bike recently too. They aren’t set up as a shop, it’s a warehouse really. But I asked nicely and they allowed it and gave me lots of free/cheap stuff too

 

[prezza]

I own a Planet X XLS cyclocross bike which I love. It’s built up as a lightweight race machine and is just as capable as bikes 3 times the price.
I’ve also had a carbon Whippet 26er that I built up as a lightweight XC race bike and that too was impressive..

IMO 5-10 years ago you used to get trickled down bike geometry a few years behind the big brands with modern components fitted at cut down prices…

However in recent years I think that PX have tried to be a bit more up to date with their frames which has had a knock on effect on their prices. Although their bikes (most) still seem great value compared to the mainstream brands, their bike packages mainly start at minimum £1k plus rather than £500 plus in the past.

Possibly just inflation, and what they are trying to achieve with the brand but I agree that the deals just don’t seem so tempting…

I do love their flash sales and the clothing deals tho if you hit them right

 

[novocaine]

Love my Inbred horizontal drop out. only bike that has lasted in my stable for any length of time. great fun to ride, massive tyre clearance and a reasonbly nice geometry. I'm running 140mm forks which provides a bit of slack, without to much lift to the BB, but nothing compared to a modern bike. I can't see me getting rid of it anytime soon, in fact, if I can find someone to lend me a back wheel as proof of concept it's going to be 650b in the near future, I reckon it will fit in the 26" triangle just fine.

It's done everything from touring, downhill (to an extent), single track, jump (as far as jumping goes for this old man), trials (refer to jump) and even the occasional pump track and it's always done it in it's stride. I think it's the one bike for all type of frame which I really like over having 20 different bikes that are perfect for 1 thing only.

 

[shedobits]

I think they're great, my first was an early 456 frame in red. I was so pleased with it I bought a 26" Scandal and built that up to race for a couple of years, only selling it to part fund my first 29er XC race bike.
Today I have a Summer Season which I use as a winter bike . I've built it up strong but heavy so it's not the best climber but it does everything that I want it to. I like it so much that I've often thought about having the head tube replaced so that I could fit a modern fork with a tapered steerer. Maybe one day.
A little off topic, but I was on their site earlier this week and they were selling Ti frames for 50% off.

 

[greencat]

I had an On-One inbred for close on ten years as a commuter/do-it-all bike. Solid, dependable and unremarkable. Eventually the bottom bracket shell rusted out. My guess is that On-Ones of the early 2000s (especially the titanium ones which scored very highly in bike reviews) will become future retro-collectables.

I don't particularly like Planet-X as a company - their customer service if something goes wrong is crap, rebadging of chinese crap with edgy names (eg jobsworth tool range) and their regular sales/discount/pricing changes and marketing speak makes them look like scammers. I still use them for cheap stuff, but wouldn't buy anything high value again.

 

[brocklanders023]

My mate has had a fair few from them (Couple of Inbreds, Parkwood, some Titus full suss) and has always rated them. He still has one of the Inbreds as his main bike after more than 10 years and it's been built in loads of different ways.

To me they started quite cool and made some interesting bikes, only to spoil it with a Sports Direct style direction but now they seem to be knocking out some decent bikes at a reasonable price. I even got one myself, a carbon Whippet with rigid forks and it's a good, if basic bike. I have no real affection for it though and am considering a change.