Orbit Bikes

Peter Rhodes

Been to the York bike show today, and saw what seemed to be a nice bike discounted from œ650 to œ400, an Orbit.
Got home and looked on their website to get the lowdown and it turns out they have closed down.
So firstly: are they any good?
and what other manufacturers are there like them? (but not bust)

sailor buoy

Cunobelin

Orbit are a well established firm and their bikes are good quality.

There is some confusion at the moment though whether they are closing down, or "rationalising" as part of a takeover.

They have always sold their stuff as www.gearshift.co.uk and there is a lot of stock out there with dealers.

However.....
There have been problems with Gearshift's responses to orders reported - so tread carefully




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He that buys flesh buys many bones.
He that buys eggs buys many shells,
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2old2dieyoung

Although I'm just about to sell it due to two new bikes, I had an Orbit 531 America (shimano 105) made for me in 1991 which I have used constantly and it's still in perfect condition. Enough said.

notsoracy rich

My Orbit 531 Pro which was of similar vintage was the worst made bike I have ever bought-crooked frame, forks replaced by Orbit 3 times-once because the new bike had ripples where the blades were bent,twice becase the crown race seating had been manufactured/machined undersize so it was impossible to eliminate play in the headset, and eventually headset frame fitting cups started falling out because frame oversized in this area.Orbit did straighten the frame -sort of -when it was returned ,but I seem to recall still measured quite a bit out when using the string from rear dropouts to headtube method.(Originally I think the measurements from each side differed by over half an inch.)Oh and the paint chipped everywhere.
I Gave the complete bike away a few months ago.

I have no connection with Orbit,so this is a totally unbiased opinion.
Rich

2oldnslow

Tend to agree with rich although things may have changed since I made a horrible mistake and bought an Orbit Gold Medal it really was dreadful. Poor quality paint on a frame I soon found out ( I was pretty green back then) was anything but true, and wheels, wheel lets not go there the pain of pushing my 2 week old tourer through the rain of a Dutch bank Holiday Saturday looking for a bike shop to replace 2 broken spokes well still brings a very un-nostalgic tear to my eye.

rdaviesb

I have two Orbit tandems, the first built in 1988 by the Ernie Clements crew down in Dudley, the second a 2000 vintage Routier, from Sheffield. Never had a problem with either of them.

ynyswen24cp

I used to work in freewheel in sheffield for Simon Gershon who took over Orbit in the early 90's from the original owners in Dudley. Orbit was run as a seperate company and I haven't worked in a bike shop for 10 years so i've no bias either way.
When Gershon took over Orbit, he continued to get the frames from the Dudley outfit who continued to trade as Sirius, concentating on the race market while Gershon went more into touring, audax and commuting. There were issues on frame alignement but these were sorted out when the frame building went 'in-house' at City Road in Sheffield. The last I heard was about a year ago when I noticed that Orbit had moved out to Matlock, I have no idea if Gershon was still involved or not but I just checked the link and see that the postal address is in Lancashire.

Personally, I doubt you'd have any problems with one of the Orbits from the last couple of years - they always seemed to get positive reviews in C+.

other manufacturers, though obviously not discounted:
George Longstaff, Chas Roberts, Paul Hewitt, Mercian etc and of course the venerable Dawes Galaxy.