torqueless
Senior Retro Guru
Re:
Err... let me get this straight.. You have a personal fleet of shopping bikes?
The simple pleasures of a cheapo bike
- Thread starter jiveman
- Start date
Re: Re:
Yep, I have no car, nearest town is 4 miles away and I used to have a regular commute involving leaving the house at 6.20am. There is nothing worse than going to the shed still bleary eyed knowing you have a train to catch in 30 mins and finding the usual bike has a puncture etc. So I have a few retro pub/shop bikes any one of which I can simply grab and go. Bit of an indulgence, but has saved frantic fixing in the usually pissing freezing rain and darkness - and most of them have cost me nowt but a few spare parts.
Currently, I have two pub/shopping retro MTBs as well as a brompton and an electric folding bike. I had another couple of retro bikes ready to go, but realised that was overkill and gave them away during the first lockdown. Only the electric folder has flat bars.
torqueless":3mfiwdej said:
Yep, I have no car, nearest town is 4 miles away and I used to have a regular commute involving leaving the house at 6.20am. There is nothing worse than going to the shed still bleary eyed knowing you have a train to catch in 30 mins and finding the usual bike has a puncture etc. So I have a few retro pub/shop bikes any one of which I can simply grab and go. Bit of an indulgence, but has saved frantic fixing in the usually pissing freezing rain and darkness - and most of them have cost me nowt but a few spare parts.
Currently, I have two pub/shopping retro MTBs as well as a brompton and an electric folding bike. I had another couple of retro bikes ready to go, but realised that was overkill and gave them away during the first lockdown. Only the electric folder has flat bars.
Re: Re:
Exactly. You actually need a fleet.
You need a summer shopping bike, a winter shopping bike, an errand bike, an errand SS bike, a regular pub bike, and a posh pub bike.
Foreigner":c1y1u2yy said:torqueless":c1y1u2yy said:
Err...you do not have a shopping bike?
Exactly. You actually need a fleet.
You need a summer shopping bike, a winter shopping bike, an errand bike, an errand SS bike, a regular pub bike, and a posh pub bike.
Regarding cheap bikes, for me I think a factor as to why we like them so much is that, for me at least, I am getting a bit fed up with being bombarded with the industry's seeming obsession with expensive bikes.
I get the impression that a bike has to cost £5k to be considered 'decent'; of course the reality is that most people don't really spend this sort of money on a bike, but with Youtube videos featuring these sort of bikes, the GCN show which constantly tries to prove that the next new thing is the bees knees, magazines such as Cycling Weekly testing bikes mostly at least £3k+, it sort of really skews what cycling is all about.
The general attempt is to try and make out that to enjoy cycling, you need a top quality aerodynamic frame, electronic gears, tubeless tyres, and disc brakes - everything I believe to be unnecessary for a bike to be.
Don't get me wrong, the industry has to advertise and make money, of course, but when I look at the bikes and the technology that has come into cycling today, I feel that the whole thing has become bordering on ridiculous.
Without trying to go into a huge discussion, as some of the topics do generate a lot of debate, we have disc brakes on road bikes, electronic gears, fat tyres, etc etc - none of which, in my view, does anything to make cycling better.
I am also staggered as to the weight of bikes today. Bikes costing upwards of £6k weigh close on 8kg; my bike, a 1998 Trek with 9 speed groupset, standard wheels (Mavic Open Pro) and all aluminum components weights 7.5kg.
My bike is fantastic to ride, has all the worthwhile innovations you would want on a road bike; a good quality carbon frame, STI gears, good quality tyres, etc. The key point here is that the basic design of the parts are good, and that not much has come along since to really move it forward in terms of an improvement to make cycling better.
To get that sort of weight in a bike today, if it had disc brakes, would cost probably £10k.
So this brings us back to cheap bikes; when you look at a typical top spec bike, it makes you sort of appreciate the basic simplicity of a bike more.
I get the impression that a bike has to cost £5k to be considered 'decent'; of course the reality is that most people don't really spend this sort of money on a bike, but with Youtube videos featuring these sort of bikes, the GCN show which constantly tries to prove that the next new thing is the bees knees, magazines such as Cycling Weekly testing bikes mostly at least £3k+, it sort of really skews what cycling is all about.
The general attempt is to try and make out that to enjoy cycling, you need a top quality aerodynamic frame, electronic gears, tubeless tyres, and disc brakes - everything I believe to be unnecessary for a bike to be.
Don't get me wrong, the industry has to advertise and make money, of course, but when I look at the bikes and the technology that has come into cycling today, I feel that the whole thing has become bordering on ridiculous.
Without trying to go into a huge discussion, as some of the topics do generate a lot of debate, we have disc brakes on road bikes, electronic gears, fat tyres, etc etc - none of which, in my view, does anything to make cycling better.
I am also staggered as to the weight of bikes today. Bikes costing upwards of £6k weigh close on 8kg; my bike, a 1998 Trek with 9 speed groupset, standard wheels (Mavic Open Pro) and all aluminum components weights 7.5kg.
My bike is fantastic to ride, has all the worthwhile innovations you would want on a road bike; a good quality carbon frame, STI gears, good quality tyres, etc. The key point here is that the basic design of the parts are good, and that not much has come along since to really move it forward in terms of an improvement to make cycling better.
To get that sort of weight in a bike today, if it had disc brakes, would cost probably £10k.
So this brings us back to cheap bikes; when you look at a typical top spec bike, it makes you sort of appreciate the basic simplicity of a bike more.
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<looks in garage>
Cheap bicycles! Fasssins' of 'em sir!
Cheap bicycles! Fasssins' of 'em sir!
Dr Winston
Retro Newbie
Re:
I only restore cheaper end entry level 501 or 531 bikes from back in the day. There’s a lot of them about and can be picked up for small money. It’s a nice niche as most people try to hunt out the mid to high end bikes.
It has the added benefit of concentrating the mind. It’s quite easy to become a butterfly buyer drifting from one sort of bike to another and ending up with a shed full of different types of bikes....as oppose to a collection of bikes.
I only restore cheaper end entry level 501 or 531 bikes from back in the day. There’s a lot of them about and can be picked up for small money. It’s a nice niche as most people try to hunt out the mid to high end bikes.
It has the added benefit of concentrating the mind. It’s quite easy to become a butterfly buyer drifting from one sort of bike to another and ending up with a shed full of different types of bikes....as oppose to a collection of bikes.
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