Flat Pack Chainless Bicycle from IKEA
ikea.com
ikea.com
- Belt drives are great. They're sturdier than chains, cleaner, and something I love, quieter. The angle of the belt doesn't change, the way a chain does, which means you can add a chain guard, as this bike does. Which keeps it yet cleaner. You can ride to work without worrying about grease on your pants.
- Whatever people ride in the Netherlands, a half-decent bike is a lot more pleasant than something slapped together. The gears don't grind, the brakes work, they weigh less--which hardly affects speed, but makes them easier to lug around, take up stairs, etc. Fancy carbon is unnecessary for commuting or about-town, but $500 for a quality bike that will be easy to maintain is reasonable. I speak as someone who has three frankenbikes in the garage--slapping something together is fun, but it's like getting an $800 car. Likely to be a headache.
- That said, bike shops tend to be snobby, and try to get you to buy more than you need. Regular people don't need carbon, or 30 gears, or to spend >$1k.
- It's nice that this is an integrated system. Fenders are great (again, keep you clean), and are often a pain to get on without them rubbing or making noise. Having them built in is a big plus, and makes the price more reasonable. Likewise, the trailer, racks, and bags that are made for this are all reasonably priced, and presumably work together well.
- If there are hills near you, 2 speeds suck--I live in SF and I'd be pushing this thing up hills all day. I'm also not a fan of coaster brakes. But this is a geo/personal thing, ymmv.
- If you're going to order a bike online and want something cheaper, two people in my office bought a Schwinn Discover on Amazon for about $270, and they're great bikes. They came in good shape, partially assembled, but benefitted from my doing a quick tune-up. Even if you paid a shop to do that for $50, still a lot cheaper than the Ikea bike, which itself could probably use some fine-tuning.
Before my actual bike, I had a mountain bike for something around 15years. I never changed or did anything to the chain. It was perfect.
Now I bought a new one. After 2 years I went to the shop to have it checked. They had to change the chain. When I told them my story with the old bike they told me: "that's how it is today. Chains are not what they were". I'm still in disbelieve. Can you confirm this?
Needless to say, both are likely to get stolen within the first six months. ;-)
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/21/world/americas/21iht-canad...
PS: 2 of my bikes were stolen.
[0] https://bikeindex.org/serials
[1] Wrapping your bike in tape, or otherwise making it look like a POS, is the way to go if you live in a theft-heavy location.
Don't. My bike was stolen by rapidly sawing (dremeling?) through a Kryptolok in broad daylight in a place with some of the most heavy law enforcement presence in Europe. Their locks are much weaker than their marketing.
[0] http://www.kryptonitelock.com/content/kryt-us/en/products/pr...
Certainly there are bigger cutting discs, if you are willing to make a bunch of noise and sparks you can cut them more quickly.
You should keep it just so you can get your money back from insurance if it is stolen..
The bigger point is that it's unreasonable to paint all people who buy used bikes without papers as supporting bike thieves. Anyone buying my bike would not get paperwork with the sale, but the bike is not stolen.
It's absolutely accurate to portray them that way; sure, there are some used, no-papers bikes that are not stolen, but people willing to buy such bikes are what creates financial support for bike thieves, since all stolen bikes sold meet that description, and if people weren't willing to buy bikes in that condition stolen bikes couldn't be sold.
Imagine if people had to drive around in creaking beater cars with leaking roofs because you couldn't store anything nicer anywhere but a garage with surveillance, and even then if someone finds out you have a nice car in a garage, there will be a breakin. That's pretty much the situation with bikes, and police simply shrug at what in most cities is very much organized crime and a huge quality of life issue.
All stolen bikes also have two wheels. I guess buying a bike with two wheels also creates a market for stolen bikes?
This is ridiculous. No one without papers can sell a bike according to you. I get that bike theft is a problem but you don't solve it by blaming innocent people. A lot of legitimate bikes are sold without papers.
Lighter bikes are definitely more fun to ride, but probably at some cost....
However, when I asked the guys in the shop, they had nothing like that.
Also the biggest pro I've ever heard of is Magnus Backstedt at 6'4 and 207lbs. He's a GIANT compared to everyone else on the pro tour. "Big" Tom Boonen only weighs 180lbs and Lance Armstrong was 165. Pros have really good power for their weight, but in absolute numbers the power isn't that excessive.
If you want to see people who are tough on gear, you have to look at track riders. That's where a 1400W rider isn't anything special and 1800W+ starts to become impressive. Also since they're on single gear bikes the torque they put down at low speeds to accelerate is absolutely insane.
So I sacrifised the very highest and the very lowest gear compared to my old 3x9, but this thing never drops the chain off the front end, there is no front derailleur that always gets bent and fails to shift properly, and there are no awkward momentum-bleeding crazy shift-down-one, shift-up-the-other moves. And you save money, weight and complexity, meaning less maintenance and less failures.
Well, maybe if you live somewhere pretty flat. Or are willing to give up some high-end range (>25 mph). 10/11 speed cassettes generally only have a few teeth wider range than a ~7 speed, for example (e.g., you can get a 13-28 7-speed and the bigger 11 speeds are 11-32 (road)) . Mostly, the jumps are just much closer together, which makes for a smoother shift and easier to find a comfortable gear at a given effort.
> So I sacrifised the very highest and the very lowest gear compared to my old 3x9, but this thing never drops the chain off the front end, there is no front derailleur that always gets bent and fails to shift properly, and there are no awkward momentum-bleeding crazy shift-down-one, shift-up-the-other moves. And you save money, weight and complexity, meaning less maintenance and less failures.
Yeah, there are definitely some benefits! In my area (Seattle) with my level of fitness, I'm a fan of 2x front cogs.
I can't speak much to bike chain quality, but 15 years with one chain seems kinda exceptional. I am also relative child still, so I may just not have been alive to experience chains that last that long. Chains are tested by measuring the distance between links with a tool[0], or by checking to see how much wiggle room your chain has between links when it's on the largest cog[1]. If the distance is too great, that means the chain has "stretched" (which is a bad word for it - the pins that hold the links of your chain together wear, and the distance between each link grows, so nothing has actually stretched). Worn chains usually also start to cause wear to your cassette and cog, so getting them replaced can be important. Make sure to maintain your chain by keeping it clean, adding lubricant once in a while, etc.
[0]:http://pardo.net/bike/pic/fail-004/18164_061544.jpg [1]:https://cyclingtips.com/2016/09/how-to-check-for-chain-wear-...
Also, depends on mileage not years--an old, unridden bike will be fine. You can usually get ~3k miles from a chain without having to change the cassette (the cluster of gears in the back). If you let the chain go too far, it stretches, which wears the cassette out more quickly, then you need to change both. You can judge chain wear objectively by measuring the distance between chain links.
My daily bike doesn't have have indexed gears (it doesn't click when you shift), which will last longer. I use fairly cheap chains/cassettes, and just replace both every 10k miles or so. Simpler.
As I understand it, chain stretch is not due to the links stretching. Instead it happens because the rollers wear down and get thinner. And I don't see any reason the rollers need to be different on 10/11/12 speed chains. So if newer chains wear faster, isn't it something else like materials?
2 years of life out of chains sounds reasonable to me if you drive a lot. Exposure to dirt, salt (from de-icing), moisture, etc can shorten the life of your chains. Keeping them clean and well oiled will make them last longer. And using quality chains in the first place, your bike might have come with cheapo chains.
Honestly, unless you're on a 11sp, chains are cheap compared to any of the other parts.
But it seemed to depend massively on how careful I was with cleaning, and where I was cycling. 99% on roads, with regular lubrication, and the chain lasted ages. Then I moved house, and cycled the same distance, but on gritted paths, and more often in the rain. Chains could be ruined very quickly if I was lazy, and didn't clean off the mud and grit.
It’s one of the reasons hub gears (or, for the true hipsters as the stereotype goes, a fixie) can be so completely bombproof - the lack of dérailleur gears means the chain can be made much heavier duty & lasts much, much longer.
That said, your mountain bike probably did have quite a bit of chain wear, it just hadn’t reached the point that the chain had started to skip. How many gears did it have on the cassette?
A lighter bike is nicer to ride. It is less effort to accelerate from a stop and a 1kg difference will be noticeable when riding up hill.
The trade-off of the thinner drive train components is that they will wear and stretch faster. Continuing to use a stretched chain will cause accelerated wear on the sprockets. When the sprockets get too worn the teeth become very pointy and chain will start to skip on the rear cassette or drop off the chain rings.
Track bikes (fixed gear, single speeds) are the exception, as the chains are still very thick as they are designed to take more force from acceleration from the track sprinters.
Additionally chains and gear teeth can wear together way past the designed for tolerances. So over 15 years things might work, but then you have to replace the chain, cassette, and chainrings. Replacing any piece alone would likely make things MUCH worse.
Generally if you ride daily it's worth replacing a chain annually, or at least checking for "stretch", which is actually wear. Chains are MUCH cheaper to replace than chainrings and cassettes.
- no noise
- no grease
- no shift shock
- no fixed gear
Just curious, one guy on reddit said he didn't trust the thing much.
but he said in the comments; it seemed an exception, got a fix and ride thousands of mountain abuse miles with no issues since
That has nothing do to with belt vs. chain, you can easily combine a chain with a gear hub and add a chain guard.
Eventually the chain tensioners wear out and changing a chain is enough work that I usually scrap the car at that point. Belts are much easier to change, and perhaps more importantly, inspect.
You end up with a choice between sounding like it's broken and having to spend a good chunk of a weekend dismantling it.
Unlucky, it skips a bunch of teeth and bends all the exhaust valves. I managed to salvage one of those too by driving around at high rpm until the valves had...Hammered themselves mostly straight again. Wouldn't recommend, usually you'll get an iffy cylinder or two after that that mysteriously only fire above 2000 rpm
None of them have had issues with the chain or the tensioner.
That could be a testament to old Japanese engines (specifically Nissan) though, two from 1996 and one from 1982.
Also a timing belt lasts 100,000 miles and runs a lot faster than a bicyle belt.
If a bike chain breaks, the bike isn't destroyed, though it could be hazardous if you're honking up a hill when it happens. But for the most part, chains wear out and you replace them.
In my view, the benefit of the belt is not lifetime, but the lack of oil, making it cleaner. With that said, I don't have a belt drive bike, but would consider it if I ever get a new bike.
He once built a bicycle that was so awful that it lasted him a complete undergraduate session at university, then a complete postgraduate session at a different university, and then I got it and it lasted me a complete (four-year) undergraduate session at a third university, and didn't get stolen once.
I only managed to get rid of it by leaving it, unlocked, in the hall of residence bike sheds, over the summer vacation. Even then it was possible the bin men just threw it away. But I like to think that it got thrown back into a river, and is waiting to rise again in future generations and make some other poor student's life a misery...
I guess you could say I got rid of the first half by setting it outside overnight, poorly locked to a post, but it was unintentional.
It holds alright until little things start to get missing, after which the rest of it quickly gets stolen.
To be fair, the angle of a chain doesn't change either, if you have an internally geared hub, as one must with belts.
They seem to be competing with the "Gates Carbon Drive", here: http://www.gatescarbondrive.com/
I know nothing of bicycles, but I do recall when automakers started replacing timing chains with timing belts. The results weren't always great, especially with interference engines where misaligned timing means bent valves.
Edit: Actually I think the main draw was the continuous gear ratios you got, somewhat comparable to a CVT
Belts may not have pins, but it still needs to simultaneously stretch and compress to go around pullies. The deformation and friction losses add up.
With the solar-powered EV the fact that belts lend themselves to a simple and reliable CVT (constant velocity transmission) probably made up for drive train losses. They could run the motor at the optimal RPM regardless of speed, which can make a huge difference.
With bicycling 'race bike image' and fashion plays a huge role in what people are willing to buy.
People tend to want to spend the money on aping 'Tour De France' bicycles. So high seats and low bars for a 'racing position'. Clipless peddles, high dollar light-weight components... Especially going from 32 spoke wheels to as few as 8 or even 4 spokes are all symptoms of this trend.
And that's just road bikes. Mountain bikes have their on trends with the heavy suspension components used for downhill that soak up all the energy from the rider, etc.
It's the bicycle equivalent of trying to use a Nascar or Class B Rally car for getting groceries. You end up with a really expensive, fragile, high-maintenance, really uncomfortable bike totally inappropriate for touring/commuting/trail riding.
Belt drives don't have a place in racing, so they usually don't have a place in most people's bicycles. The reality is that belts drives are a trade off between maintenance and efficiency.
This Ikea bicycle uses a 2-speed automatic geared hub with belt drive. It features built-in lights and a very upright riding position. It has front disk brake and rear coaster brake (you have to peddle backwards). It looks fairly heavy and ruggedly built.
The advantage of this is that it offers very simple controls and should be extremely low maintenance. It should accept abuse and neglect and run for a long time.
So things like... A family bicycle for running to the local store. Going on flat, level trails. It would be very nice for a 'campus bike' for universities or corporate areas were you spend time going from one building to another. Rental bikes.
It should lend itself to any situation were you are dealing with fairly flat ground, leisurely pace, and multiple people sharing the bicycle.
It won't ruin clothing, it won't spray water and dirt everywhere. You pants are not going to get caught in the gearing. You are not going to have rusted chains or dragging brakes. If it falls over you don't need to un-bend things or re-adjust derailleurs, etc.
The things to worry about this is the same for most Ikea products: Non-standard components, sizing and shockingly cheap components that sabotage the rest of the product. if it uses rugged and standard sizing/components for everything then it will probably be awesome... if not then it could be a turd.
They give the weight as 16kg, which I think is fairly light for a bicycle of this type. Most people would add the basket and rear rack though.
They will still be disappointed when they get this one out of the garage next summer to find the tyres are flat and splitting.
The trade off is that they're somewhat heavier and have more rolling resistance than a good air-filled tire.
I do get the impression bike tires have gotten better over the years, because I don't remember tires being that robust in my childhood (but, well, memory and all...).
I think its gimmicky.
If you're going to bother with internal hub gearing, you might as well make it manual-- its even easier than shifting a derailleur and you don't need to be moving. Its not like automatic 2-speed shifting is solving a real problem.
I think there also is an old Shimano design, but that was 3 or 4 speed.
Aside from the belt drive, this looks pretty close to the CityGlide that I have, and at a similar price (on sale). (The CityGlide lists around CA$799, and I got mine at a bike show for CA$450; I’ve spent more since then, including getting fenders.) If I didn’t already have a two-speed automatic, I’d probably look at this seriously.
I also have a Dahon (Speed P8) that I use in the winter, although I might be using the Norco a bit this winter. When I replace the Dahon, I’m strongly considering a Montague full-sized folding bike.
Downsides ... unlike an easy chain repair, you can't repair a belt in the very rare case it breaks. So you carry a spare on a tour. There are suggestions that frictional losses are higher with belt versus chain, though. And belts are apparently weaker when twisted or laterally flexed than chains, so storage and initial setup is more critical.
The transmission efficiency is probably nothing compared to the IGH and it's weight.
http://glendalecycles.com/bike-technology/chainless-shaft-dr...
Fyi, the accepted horsepower-to-belt ratio for motorcycles is around 100hp for every inch of belt width. Beyond that, stretch and slipping become an issue no matter the material. Thats why sportbikes have stuck with chains.
> WARNING - Serious or fatal crashing injuries can occur from furniture tip-over. To prevent this furniture must be permanently fixed to the wall.
High-tensile steal will equate a rough ride. 18 gears and a transmission has a hugely larger number of points of failure, that's just math. And requires regular maintenance, which casual cyclists don't/won't do.
IMO most riders would be best served by Dutch style built-like-a-tank cruisers (which the IKEA is) or lightweight, ultra minimal single speed "hipster" street bikes. But the typical new rider gets a mountain bike for the road, or something designed to look like a racing bike that will be rattling and rusty after one winter.
There's nothing particularly wrong with either, they're just indicators that the bike is overall of low quality.
http://www.bikesdirect.com/products/gravity/g29ss.htm
The wheel size and choice of fixed gearing largely just works, like a BMX was all you needed as a kid.
It is very comfortable to ride! I use it to cycle to my parents which live 12km away from where i live! faster than public transport :)
Bought it here and it is a bike like those ones on the photo. https://lh4.googleusercontent.com/--CYh7a1OuUk/VDVXgX2RiaI/A...
[1] https://www.walmart.com/ip/26-Roadmaster-Granite-Peak-Men-s-...
Basically, the cost of replacing it three times is built into the price.
The one from walmart.com is just plain cheap and low quality, nothing fancy about it.
Maybe it's just because I am a bit of a bike snob with a fairly decent mountain bike, but I thought this looked pretty expensive for the type of riding it would be used for.
Maintenance-free, always as efficient as a properly lubed chain, clean, and quiet.
They are fantastic for commuter bikes.
> cheap V brakes would be fine
Disc brakes are unaffected by wet/muddy rims.
> This seems to have the cheaper cable pull disk brakes
Mechanical disc brakes are perfectly fine for road bikes. They require less maintenance, too. They are very simple.
> 2 gear system - hardly worth having only two gears in my opinion.
IGHs also require less maintenance than a derailleur. 2 gears isn't much, but I'd rather take that than a single-speed one.
I would have preferred a manual 5-gear IGH, though.
They often use the cheapest high-tensile steel they can find, off-brand rims, mix-and-match groupsets, low-quality brakes, and so forth. The bike you linked exemplifies that - mixed Shimano/SRAM components and "alloy wheels" are in its description. Box-store bikes are also never put together correctly - flipped forks, pinched inner tubes, and sheared screws/bolts abound when they come in for repairs.
Comparing these two bicycles directly, the big things that stand out as pros are the Sladda's aluminum frame and disc brakes. An internal gear hub is also a nice low-maintenance touch. It remains to be be seen how well the Sladda holds up, but $400-500 isn't too unreasonable for a aluminum city-cruiser that's been ruggedized.
I can attest this is not the case. All I,and everyone who are not cyclists,have ever rode are cheap Wal-Mart bikes. Even when I used to do stupid stuff like jump them and fly down hills, I've never had a structural failure occur.
That being said, your experience is a fortunate one. It takes only half a turn in either direction on the headset washers to result in a failure that can break your collarbone. I've seen it firsthand.
mixed Shimano/SRAM components
But for the most part, we're talking about mechanical (not hydraulic) devices that can be tuned/adjusted to work with each other.
However, box-store bikes are usually just built with whatever individual components are cheapest in bulk at that price bracket. More often that not, that means mixing and matching for no good reason other than to save the retailer a few cents.
I'm impressed by the add-on bicycle trailer, obvious being sold as a first-class citizen. A lot of IKEA stuff is modular and eminently hackable --- like, literally today I have assembled 40kg of random furniture into a workbench/desk for my study by bolting together bits of office with bits of bedroom. I'm sure there's interesting things to do with it. It looks like you can restow the towbar to make a convenient handle for pulling it.
Oh, yeah, it's an automatic gearbox, too.
Here's a random review:
http://cyclingbikebible.com/real-user-reviews-ikea-flat-pack...
I reset my pedals when I'm coasting as well, and it's probably fair to say that we're not the target market. My guess is that it'll be popular among (shorter-distance) city commuters and college students who would've bought a Huffy or something equally shoddy instead.
I have a Shimano Nexus 3 speed with a coaster (and hand brakes) that is my daily driver, and where the coaster brake catches is pretty random. I can sometimes make several, as in 3 - 5, full backwards pedal rotations before it catches, other times it catches immediately. I am now in the habit of catching the brake before I descend any large hill. Since I live in Nobb Hill SF, that's every day.
Of course Schwinn today is not the same as they were then.
I have never had a coaster brake failure. Nor have I experienced a problem with engaging the coaster brake as you describe. I have always found the single coaster brake to be more than adequate and to be more reliable than any (set of) handbrake(s). I like the fact that I can skid the rear tire if I apply enough force. I live in a non-hilly area, so YMMV.
What's unusual is having a disc brake as the second brake, but I like those much more than rim brakes.
This is enough reason not to buy a bike from a non-bike store, unless you have the skill to reassemble it yourself.
When I moved to Copenhagen from London, it took me several weeks to get used to a coaster brake rather than disc brakes -- I'd often stop with the pedals in the wrong place.
But you know what? That's what the whole country uses for transportation, every day, and it works fine. It turns out that, in your day-to-day usage of a bike (and this is for a country of people who ride their bikes as their main mode of transportation) it doesn't matter what ridiculous new type of Chinesium your wheels are made out of, as long as they stay vaguely circular. Brakes don't work? Here, put this duct tape on the brake pads, now they work. Chain keeps falling off? Oh, just don't put it into that gear then. And when it completely falls apart one day, or when it gets stolen, then another one costs $50.
When I'm in the US, I ride an $1100 bike. It's ridiculous, the thing is this gleaming sparkly shade of white, fancy carbon fiber parts that are 150% more aerodynamic than everyone else's carbon fiber parts, a frame that is so light you can carry it with one finger, etc., etc. It goes really fast, and is so smooth I forget I'm biking. But when I'm in the Netherlands? I ride a $20 bike that has spokes sticking out and broken, rust covering everything, and sometimes the front falls off. I'm serious, the front actually falls off. Yes, the handlebars and front fork and the whole shebang, in one go.
Somewhat uniquely, American bike enthusiasts are insane about safety. "You could DIE with an improperly maintained bike!", "Not wearing a helmet is like not wearing a seatbelt!" and "Walmart bikes are death traps" are things I've heard recently. But somehow, when the front of my $20 bike falls off (which has happened twice now) all I get is a minor scrape to my hands.
I think that the difference over here is that we pretend that our cheap new bikes are safe ;)
For every snob with the custom carbon fiber frame and the wind-tunnel-tested wheels there's a man in Rotterdam with the front half of a toddler's training bike welded to a Fatboy. For every idiot that says their unlubricated chain is literally unrideable there's a man in the Hague who combined two different-size chains into one and rode on it.
> Brakes don't work? Here, put this duct tape on the brake pads, now they work.
That's something which I have not seen. Not duct tape but brakes. I must be one of the few who don't have coaster brakes. Then again, expats don't really count.
> Somewhat uniquely, American bike enthusiasts are insane about safety. "You could DIE with an improperly maintained bike!", "Not wearing a helmet is like not wearing a seatbelt!" and "Walmart bikes are death traps" are things I've heard recently. But somehow, when the front of my $20 bike falls off (which has happened twice now) all I get is a minor scrape to my hands.
I think this applies to lots of things in the US comparatively. I can't imagine anywhere in the US having Canals and no guard rails; Jaywalking like you born to; Firecrackers in the middle of street for NYE. I think the US has too much of a "fear" attitude that's probably due to frivolous lawsuits, whereas in Amsterdam at least, it's more laissez faire. That translates to $1000 cycles for recreation vs $20 cycles for transport.
Just speaking from my experience growing up in NYC: I've seen and done all of these things. Of course, that's definitely not the average American experience.
I think a large part of the US's penchant for regulating cycling comes from a tendency to look at bicycles as a toy, rather than a tool. When we think of cycling foremost as a diversion for children, we're less likely to stress the importance of learning to maintain one's own bike and are more likely to stress replace-ability and a misguided sense of safety ("it's just a toy, we'll get you another one!").
But there's a big difference between the 'keep it rolling' mindset and dealing with new-from-factory plastic that walmart et al try to pass off as metal. I've seen axles split in half while coasting down a steep hill, dropping the bottom bracket straight to the ground (and the rider along with it). Derailleurs pulled into spinning spokes, causing an explosion of twisted metal that was thrust into my friend's calf.
I think a lot of the safety insanity you refer to comes from most American cycling experience being on bikes that seem designed to fail spectacularly.
Folks get on those Walmart deathtraps and they explode on an off-road boulder or disintegrate while someone speeds around the wheels of a dump truck.
There's also the infrastructure to consider. If your bike fails in NL, you curse and coast to a stop on the bikeway. If it fails in the US, you may be in the middle of trying to cross a 6 lane road with no bike infrastructure whatsoever, putting your life in danger. I rode a crappy bike in NL (3 month stay in Rotterdam), but I wouldn't want to ride that same bike here in the US.
An easy example, right on red. Statistically, this has been shown to be dangerous. Chance of convincing people of this... Pretty much nil.
Similarly, we'd certainly be safer with lower speed limits.
But we collectively make tradeoffs which may even be informed by some level of data.
That is, I would expect that quality bikes are safer. I still expect many did just fine on them. (Myself included.)
Of course, bikepaths are great in busier parts, but even where they're absent serious traffic injuries aren't common. And that's despite some unnecessary risks (such as lack of lights in the dark) that are taken a little too commonly.
I agree that the infrastructure is a big thing too, though. If there's a chance of you failing on a snowy hill on the side of a highway, you're going to pay a bit more for something that won't fail as often.
Most people I know grew up riding ~$100 Walmart bikes, just as described - steel, heavy, poorly assembled and usually the wrong size.
It's quite harrowing to be riding a slow and breakdown-prone bike on 65kph auto-centric roads, when your chain falls off or brakes fail.
If there was more segregated cycling infrastructure and denser cities, I think it would be much different.
Adding in the fact that most people I know don't know how to change a tire, much less fix or maintain a bike, I'm not surprised they are turned off of cycling entirely by the time they become adults.
After riding department store bikes most of my life, I bought a entry level aluminium hybrid bike with quality components for $400 new (vs ~$200 for a department store steel bike). It was life changing to be able to be able to accelerate and maneuver in traffic, and made cycling much more attractive. I could also ride long distances without worrying about breaking down - and if I do, the parts are standard and I can fix it myself.
I was given an £80 bike once, to cycle to work and back every day. It was ruined within 6 months -- the bearings in the hub and bottom bracket were worn out, the brakes wouldn't line up properly, the wheel rims were almost worn through, the gears didn't change properly. People in the Netherlands simply don't buy these bicycles, they'd rather spend €90 on a second hand one.
However, the £80 bike is OK for a British adult to cycle 10km round a nature reserve, once or twice per year.
I ride a Franken bike that my dad picked out of the trash. It's in good working condition, but in my defense, I simply enjoy tinkering with mechanics as a hobby.
I agree that big-box stores often sell crappy bikes. But one can get a really nice bike from a bike shop for $400-500. If IKEA were selling this at $200 and it were a good bicycle, it might be notable. It just doesn't seem like a great bicycle for the price. It says nothing about puncture resistant tires. It's 33lbs which seems heavy (over 40% heavier than the Fortified). You have to assemble it at that price and there's no included adjustments and tune-ups vs. buying form a bike shop where you can you get something well-assembled and cared for.
IKEA is cheap for certain items and simply not a good deal for others. I'm not arguing that this is a downright crappy bike like many big-box bicycles. It just seems bad for the money given that I can get a significantly better bicycle for the same price and it would come pre-assembled better than I would assemble it with tune-ups and adjustments. What's the selling point of this bicycle? A $400-500 impulse buy when dropping a grand or two at IKEA? Are bicycles significantly more expensive in a lot of Europe and so it seems like a deal in a lot of IKEA markets?
It just seems like there's a wealth of bicycles at my local bike shop that they'll sell me for the same money that are better bikes.
You can indeed get a nice bike from a bike shop for $400-500. What you often can't get is a nice city cruiser at that price - the ones I see at my LBSes are often either substantially more expensive ($600+) or cheaper-made without a belt drive or disc brake. I think what's really attractive about this bike is the decreased maintenance requirements (provided it's assembled correctly, which I admit is a big if) and warranty.
If this bike was left on a bike
rack outside a college dorm for
a school year it would be
perfectly fine
The last time I walked into a bike shop I turned right around and walked out. Since when did bikes get so unbelievably expensive? I just wanted one for tooting around the neighborhood and maybe popping a curb or two, and the cheapest I could find was around $500. Most were easily in the $1000-$3000 range.
I think younger people have been trained that bikes need to be expensive but unless you're doing some very very intensive mountain biking or road racing you probably will never encounter a problem with a Walmart-class bike.
Every year Costco sells some bikes for around $300-$400 and they're in the class that I care about. Probably "better" than Walmart, but not these outrageous prices in bike stores.
IKEA quality is also often very questionable, the "Family" price seems closer to reasonable. $400 otherwise? No way.
I really just want a Hyundai Elantra bike, not a BMW M3 or a Ferrari.
No one wanted a good bike because a good bike was too good not to fix, and no one had the money to fix a good bike.
It was also the kind of town where if you had a good bike, it would get stolen for sure.
I mostly had cheap bikes as a kid, and they held up really well. The quality was lower than that of a "good" bike, but not remarkably so. My first two bikes, a Huffy (from K Mart) and a Ross Piranha (from Toys R Us) had Chromoly frames and forks, and held up to years of intense abuse (ramps, dirt jumping, lots of falling and running into things). When I started earning my own money, I bought a General RL Osborne, which was a significant upgrade...but, not orders of magnitude better.
The quality of what is sold at Walmart today, at least in the general case, is really low. I wouldn't trust the linked bike to be safe on day one, much less to hold up to years of service. I tried to fix up a friend's low end Schwinn, that was less than ten years old, but it would have been cheaper to buy an all new bike than to fix everything that was wrong with it (shifters didn't work, derailleur was broken, brakes were soggy and couldn't be adjusted to work well, the fork had shocks and would bottom out when applying brakes even lightly). The frame was definitely not chromoly (might have been aluminum, as it was pretty light weight, but could have been thin steel, too I guess). On the other hand, I have a mid-range Giant mountain bike that I bought in 1994 for about $480 that has often been my primary mode of transportation. It's needed new shifters one time, a couple of new cassettes, one new set of brake and shift cables, a new seat, one new rim (I ran into a fire hydrant at a pretty decent clip), and tubes and tires. It's taken a beating over the years.
I dunno what I'm trying to say, exactly, but I think the overall quality of bike-to-dollar has gone down, especially at the low end of the market. The mid range of the market still seems pretty good, when inflation adjusted, though I will note that finding an all chromoly frame and fork (or other high quality material) bike is much harder than it used to be, and it is impossible in the low end, where it used to be very easy.
I sold my last bike for $50 after a decade of really hard city and trail riding, even taking a couple dives off the edge of a 20 foot fall and getting in a minor car accident.
That owner kept it for another decade and outside of normal part wear and repair, used it well for some pretty hardcore trail biking. It's now on at least it's 3rd owner and last I heard was going strong.
I bought that bike new in the late '80s for no more than $200 IIR, but the story of the bike sounds more like what I hear from modern $2k-$3k bikes...except without most of the fuss.
I feel like the market has really bifurcated into two segments:
a) what I'm willing to pay, but not made well
b) more than I'm willing to pay, and offers more performance than I'd ever conceivably use
I, and I'm sure many consumers, really would like some kind of middle ground.
If the frame and fork were decent quality, you could upgrade over time (which was common in my day, when solidly constructed Chromoly frame and forks were available on <$150 bikes), but they're just not. Even the $500 bikes of today will have lower cost aluminum or steel forks, even if the frame is a high quality material (like a better quality of aluminum of chromoly).
I don't understand the flight of American manufacturing well enough to know what was causative and what is merely correlation, but nearly all of the bikes when I was a kid were made in the US. As manufacturing has gone overseas, the quality has gone way down. I know that Chinese factories can make high quality bikes (because they make most of the high end brands, as well as the cheap ones); but, a lot of brands that used to mean "decent cheap bike" like Huffy and Schwinn and Mongoose mostly only mean "cheap", today (Schwinn still has some decent bikes in their higher end).
I've clearly got a lot of grumpiness about bikes! I may love bikes too much.
So we could reasonably predict, ignoring technology changes, that your $200 bike was at least twice as good as a $200 bike bought this year.
[1]: http://www.dollartimes.com/inflation/inflation.php?amount=20...
My first bike (the Chromoly Huffy I mentioned a couple of posts back) cost a little less than $100 in about 1983. That same $100 is $242 today. $242 will actually buy an all Chromoly BMX bike today ( http://a.co/5vAYzBc ). So, I guess we're keeping pace with inflation, and I need to tie an onion to my belt, as was the fashion at the time. We just need to re-arrange our expectations to match current reality.
If you want a cheap bike, buy a good one used. Craigslist is an excellent resource. A quality frame lasts forever (unless misused or left in the rain) and decent replacement parts aren't crazy expensive.
Quality bikes have always been expensive. You can still go buy a cheap bike at Walmart as the parent post points out.
"unless you're doing some very very intensive mountain biking or road racing you probably will never encounter a problem with a Walmart-class bike."
Nonsense, riding a quality bike is a much better experience in every single aspect. They're lighter, they have better brakes, shifting is smoother and more consistent, they're more comfortable. You can get the exact size you need instead of a one size fits all approach. Also, one of the most important factors in a bike's reliability is how well it's assembled, and you can be sure that places like Walmart will do a terrible job.
I bought a cheapo WalMart bike on vacation when mine was damaged in transit in a minor car accident. I was riding on a bike path, swerved to avoid something and went off a high curb. The impact cracked a frame weld.
It's a weird market. There's a market for cheap stuff that doesn't get used, and outrageous stuff for fanatics. No ,idle ground.
The apollo outrider (as it was then called) was always pretty shoddy, but mostly just for the look and feel of the components, a bit heavy etc. We didn't get that many of them back in for repair.
But you don't know if they're actually used.
My mum and sister have cheap bikes from Halfords. They see less than 50km of use per year.
I used something similar (maybe Asda or Tesco's version?) and it was ruined with 1000km or so of use -- every bearing worn out, the wheel rims worn ... it was miserable to ride it.
If you want a general around town bike, I usually recommend the Trek FX series or Giant Escape hybrids. They're a light aluminium, but sturdy, use standard, durable, entry level components, have wider 700c tires good for handling potholes and curbs, mounts for racks - and worlds better ride quality then your run of the mill department store bike.
They're also common enough that you can find them used for under $300, or new starting around $380 or so. Models climb in price as they start adding higher level components but the entry level is usually good enough.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m3vI2bYhCrk
For the record, I'm probably a slow beginner leisure rider on beginner trails, I probably wouldn't be doing even half of the things in the video so I wouldn't be very alarmed.
He has some other tests of the bikes and what kind of realistic destruction these kinds of bikes can endure.
"It’s a belt driven automatic 2 speed integrated into the rear hub. The belt drive eliminates need for chain maintenance meaning it’s open to people who know little about bikes or people who do not have the time to do so. Amazingly the belt itself is guaranteed for 10 years which is exceptional length of time to offer in our opinion! Along with a 25 year guarantee on the frame itself it speaks volumes about how this bike was built to last!"
It has:
broken one chain
suffered multiple rear brake failures
unfastened the handle bars so they dangle from the fork
When one thing was fixed, another thing broke. The brakes failed repeatedly, and warranted full replacement.
The handle bars are especially treacherous, because putting weight on them risks failure, and then steering becomes impossible.
Accessories and repairs now outweigh the original cost of the bike, meaning I'm looking at over $300 all-in. Meanwhile, this thing feels like it will eventually cost me some teeth.
Best off going on Craigslist and buying something (probably japanese) from the mid to late 1980s that was at one point a good quality bike. Get something with chromoly steel. It will be a lot more reliable and bike mechanics and you will be better able to fix it. It'll have all ISO standard parts.
If you plan on more than going around the block, the lesson is buy a real bike, from a bike shop.
I chalked it up to poor assembly by a new guy on a Monday morning.
Considering this model of assessment, I realize that department store bikes aren't measured with the same sort of warranty ratings as perhaps cars. Too bad bikes don't use the same sort of 100,000 mile power train warranty as a mark of quality or durability.
If you look closer the IKEA bike looks much fancier. It's not hard to make a bike at $250, it's hard to make a good bike at $400.
Taste aside, those walmart bikes are the biking equivalent of a Ford Pinto. Plenty of folks bought them and did just fine, plenty of others had engine fires.
The Sladda is a little expensive, but there is real value to the convenience of just walking in and buying "bicycle" without having to deal with the salespeople and misanthropes who staff most bike shops.
Or computer stores, to circle back... between the pared down selection, and paying a bit of a premium for a great warranty and a familiar name, and quibbles from industry types about superior specs from companies civvies have never heard of with, this feels very Apple Store. Not for me, but I'd suggest one to my parents with no hesitation.
Mainstream bikes are generic. You send a list of frame dimensions, colors, and components, to a factory in China, and they make some bikes for you. It's like getting circuit boards made.
It may seem expensive unless the value of the Ikea brand is considered. In fact, this would be just another of many "city" bikes to emerge on the market, and is only newsworthy because it's Ikea. They may be able to tap into a market for people who wouldn't go into a bike shop, but who would look through the Ikea catalog. I remember LL Bean selling bikes many years ago.
- 2 speeds 26in wheels addes to that weight ensure that you can only ride flat terrain, specially if you aren't a fit experienced cyclist...
- disc brakes are great when good quality but also require regular maintenance and truing unlike traditional brakes
- bikes twice the price don't have 25 limited frame warranty. they have life warranty.
so basically whats good about this bike?
well, the belt drive. thats it. at this price, i dont know if I'd recommend it given the issues and that nobody has really tested the bike yet
The flexibility it gives is amazing. You can basically ride on 30%+ inclines by shifting speeds (albeit slowly). I don't see myself being able to do that on a heavy 15kg 2 speeder, and if I have to get off a bike, then by definition it failed its purpose.
I've never tried to find parts for a bike that old before, so that might be the challenge. I did have a late 70's Schwinn that I converted to a fixie and had no issues there, but that was a much more invasive job. At the end of the day, I'd replaced almost everything on that frame, so I had less compatibility concerns.
Ordering a replacement belt will take several days, if not weeks.
Removing the broken link from a chain takes a few minutes with a portable tool that I carry with me. I can still get to the office on time.
Failure-mode operation is more important to me than keeping my hands clean. Sure, my bike's noisy and dirty, but it's a whole lot faster than walking.
edit: nevermind, i missed the manual. It looks like it will attach to just about any bike as it just attaches to the bicycle's rear wheel.
Have you ever tried braking while going down a steep hill? (e.g. San Fran hills?) You know, to stay at a safe speed? Front brake will flip you over in an instant, I know because I've done it, even at slow speeds, when my rear brake cable snapped. After a couple tries I walked home, since bicycling without a rear brake was clearly suicidal.
And your linked article just talks about the rider flying over the handlebars because the rider isn't "bracing themselves against deceleration" -- whatever that means. I'm talking about the bike itself flipping.
That's because you simply do not know how to ride a bicycle. In such a situation you need to get your weight back behind the saddle and modulate the application of the brake.
O.P. is one hundred percent correct that you do not need a rear brake -- and I speak as someone that rode for several years in without one including in SF.
http://www.bikeforums.net/tandem-cycling/52661-shaving-arai-...
I don't know how your particular weight is distributed on your particular bicycle or what, but you're spreading dangerously wrong ideas.
If you're going downhill and a child runs out in the street from between cars and you need to stop, and you're a normal person on a normal bike, you need a rear brake, end of story.
If you modulate your front brake to not lock up, that simply means you stop far too slowly, and hit the kid. Even at what seems like otherwise a safe speed, things (like children, or soccer balls) can run out in front of you at the last second and you need to stop suddenly.
You absolutely need a rear brake for safety. Just because you could get by without one in most situations doesn't mean you can get by without one in all situations.
"You should always apply the rear brake, and slightly in advance of the front brake, so that a slight skid at the rear will warn you if you get close to the hazard point at which the bike may tip."
"Flat asphalt is one thing, 30 degrees sloped rocky road is another. My hold is that in the second case the back brake is MORE important than the front brake."
"I myself got into the accident once. It happens so fast that you never have time to lean your body backwards and provide more tractions for the rear wheel like other have stated."
"Depending on where your center of mass "hovers" over your bike, you may need a different strategy."
"Having had more than a few over-the-handlebar incidents back in the day, there is no situation in which I would ever even consider using only the front brake again."
"On the road bike you are alot lower and therefore don't go over the front quite as quickly."
"If you learn to move your weight back (ideally behind your saddle) during strong braking then going over the handle bars is nearly impossible (except under very steep hills)." (Note the "steep hills" part, which is my whole point about safety.)
"On mountain bike, the momentum partly transferred to seat and pedal as a result from a more up-right pedalling position. Remember that your body is about 3-5 times the weight of the bicycle, and they are on top of the bike. So the higher you are from the ground, the easier for you to toppled up."
[1] http://bicycles.stackexchange.com/questions/10918/do-skilled...
[2] http://bicycles.stackexchange.com/questions/25856/why-do-we-...
It would be refreshing if you were able to demonstrate a capacity for admitting that perhaps you have something to learn. I would advise taking a mountain bike class and coupling it with something like the U.K.'s Bikeability or the U.S.A.'s League of American Bicyclists equivalent.
I fear, instead, that you will spend your time hectoring internet strangers about the dangers of bicycle riding based on your own incapacities and incapabilities.
Good luck.
If you're going down a hill and you need to do an emergency stop, the back wheel won't do you any good. The rule of thumb I was taught was that the back wheel will only provide 1G of deceleration, under ideal circumstances. If the road is wet, or there are leaves, assume less.
If anything, the rear brake can be used to slightly pump up the front fork, which allows the front wheel to find its own way through mud/leaves/snow. Basically, apply a touch of rear brake when you go through a slippery curve, squeeze the frame between your thighs, and let the bike find its own path.
If you take into account that during braking, and even more so during an emergency brake, all the inertial weight lies on the front wheel, it makes a lot of sense that the rear brake is so useless.
In France, bikers call their passengers "SDS," which stands for "sac de sable" (sandbag). Very useful to increase grip of the back wheel when accelerating strongly. Not when braking.
I've actually faced the "child jumping out from behind a parked car" before, and I passed that test. When I jammed hard on both the front and rear, both tires locked, the rear tire swung around the side until even with the front (at that point it was no longer behind the COG so it rotated down instead of up), and I twisted my back foot to unclip and stomp. I looked at her, she looked at me, then she ran on across the street. Glad I wasn't driving a car!
I'm riding downhill with my bikes, and I can safely do that with front brake only as long as that thing doesn't overhead. Even things like front-only braking on steep stairs is no problem with the correct body position (not over the front wheel) and brake force applied.
I have been riding for 15 years without a rear brake and have never come close to going over the front. Not that I would recommend it to other folks, the redundancy argument is valid, but it is not unsafe at all.
Bike brakes aren't a binary system. You can adjust your touch on the brake levers to apply varying levels of friction against the braking surface to shave off speed.
Bike brakes aren't a binary system. You can adjust your touch on the brake levers to apply varying levels of friction against the braking surface to shave off speed. Hope this helps!
It is more powerful because as the bike rocks forward the wheel is pushed into the ground and has more friction with the surface. The rear brake will loose grip under braking because it rises up from the ground. Aggressive braking in the rear is more dangerous because the wheel can lock up and skid, which can send you over the handlebars. The back brake tends to be setup to be more relaxed to stop people doing this. Maybe that is why people think it is safer.
With a bit of practice you can get much better braking force from a front brake. Try it out on some grass, and see how far you take it before the back wheel starts to rise. You will find that you can stop much faster, which will make you safer. Just try it and see.
Using only one brake also avoids confusion between them, so you won't by accident slam the front one.
(This bike does have a rear brake too, so it's fine)
Edit: About winter biking, cables tend to freeze in the winter if you're not meticulous about maintenance. So automatic gears and coaster rear brake are good for this reason too.
If you slam on the rear brake only or simply much harder than the front brake, the rear wheel locks up before coming to a stop. The bike will continue forward with the front wheel rolling and the rear wheel sliding. If there's slight braking on the front wheel, the rear starts sliding around the front, twisting the cyclist.
The problem is someone who uses the rear brake 99% of the time, then grabs the front brake when someone steps in front of them...
When you use the front brake, you can brake harder because this torque is pushing the front wheel into the ground. Instead, the limit on front wheel braking is the torque required to toss the rider over the handlebars. This is a function of their weight & how far back behind the saddle they can get their backsides:)
(This second limit means that a car can significantly outbrake a cyclist. Bicycles need more stopping distance than cars do if they need to carry out an emergency stop.)
In this case I assume it means the bike is disassembled in key places to maintain an extremely low profile and densely packed box.
> This bicycle is powered by a belt drive, which is a rustproof, durable and maintenance-free alternative to a regular chain.
Seems like it's a similar but different system to produce the same outcome. It also says to not oil it, just wash with water. The bike also has no gear cables so it looks like it's designed to minimise maintenance as much as possible and that's a part of it.
Somehow I doubt permanently fixing one's bicycle to the wall will help.
My biggest concern though is that like all parts, the belt will fail eventually. A quick look online shows that new belts cost around $250, over half of the retail price of this bike!
Belt with two internal gears lasts much longer than a mountain bike 18 speed chain drive, but then you're comparing apples and oranges.
This is a bike designed for the Apple user, basically, except that it seems inexpensive, which is nice. If you never want to think about how a bike works, this seems fine. But my original point was to learn how to maintain a bike.
It says that the frame is powder coated. Powder coating tends to last a lot longer and survive more abuse than paint does. Also its a aluminum frame so it is not going to be rusting either.
If you leave your bike out in the elements and don't maintain it, any parts that do not survive prolonged exposure to heat cycle, water, oxidation, salt, etc will deteriorate. But that isn't even metal durability, that's just plain weather. Any bike will deteriorate outside.
Another downside is aluminum is stiffer than steel, making for a rougher ride unless you add suspension, get softer tires or significantly change geometry.