What a difference a bike makes???

Dazza2280

I'm looking at upgrading my bike with around £2500 - £3000 to spend, I've been on a £525 Giant Defy 3.5 for the past year. I get that the most important part of moving any bike fast is rider ability, but will i notice a difference straight away moving up from my 'starter' bike.

Also i was looking at the Pinarello FP Quattro until i read on here that its got really heavy wheels, are these heavy in comparison to a set of top end Mavic wheels, or heavy in general. I'm assuming they'd still be much much lighter than the standard rims on my giant right???

mrwibble

just the lightness and stiffness of the carbon frame will help. I have mavics, they are very fast rollers. you will get better quality components too, it all adds up. For 3k you should have a good look around, come sale time, I bet you could get something extra special. Bat the summer out on the defy, wait until September

chrishd883

I would say that after the £1k - £1.5k mark you get dimishing returns for your money.
Spend twice as much and you won't notice much in terms of extra speed, etc.
That's not to say that you won't love it.

i'm not one to say that you shouldn't spend that much money.
if you have it and you can afford it - as Nike would say - just do it !!
But people say that wheels are the number one upgrade,
so I'd consider looking for a bike slightly under your budget
and go for a wheel upgrade from new.
Plus you should get a descount for the "old" wheels!

And +1 for waiting a few months - wait for the discounts to start!

crumbschief

Esther Phillips

ollyridesfirst

As stated.....there's little difference in the bikes from £1.5k upwards aside from better components.

You might as well look for a bike/frame that you like and then go to your LBS or another bike builder to discuss what you can build around it. For £3k though.....you will be looking at something nice i'd say! You could even go down the road of a custom made carbon frame.....when i got my current bike, my mate had a carbon frame made for him by Paul Hewitt and it's stunning. Think he has SRAM force on it, carbon bars, seat post etc and upgraded to some Mavic 50mm carbon wheels (not sure on the model)......all in all i think he paid about £2.2k for it (we got a bit of a discount as we were both buying)....but he loves it!

Mr752

The wheels, although branded as MOst Wildcat are actually Campagnolo Vento, even the manual for the wheels that comes with the bike is a Campagnolo manual.
They weigh around 1895g (MOst website) so you dont even have to go all the way up to top end Mavics to make a weight saving.
I think Ksyrium Elites are about 1550g and you could pick a set of them up for about £450.
I put my Cosmic Carbones straight on and still saved weight and for when the road starts to go up I bought a set of C-4 CA-2.2, 1350g, £350 ($550) direct from the US. They've been good and stayed true up to now, but theres always the chance you might need to send them back to the US should you have a warranty claim.

http://www.c-4bicyclecomponents.com/sit ... t=menuJump

Monty Dog

For £3k you can buy a custom-made carbon frame and then you'll need a further £3k for the bits to hang on it! For the money you'll certainly be able to build yourself something around the 15lb mark, but might want to be careful in terms of component selection rather than taking a stock offering from one of the big brands.

rolf_f

Monty Dog wrote:

For £3k you can buy a custom-made carbon frame and then you'll need a further £3k for the bits to hang on it! For the money you'll certainly be able to build yourself something around the 15lb mark, but might want to be careful in terms of component selection rather than taking a stock offering from one of the big brands.

You can get a custom made carbon frame for half that. Mind you, there isn't much point going custom unless your body shape needs it!

Didn't realise FP2s were that expensive :shock:

Actually, the wheels aren't 'really heavy' - they just aren't really light. They do make a great commuting wheel as they are pretty much bomb proof. For serious money I'd buy a bike that I could spec myself (which I did!) - and put Campagnolo Neutrons on which are relatively cheap, tough and light and look good (lower profile than most wheels at the moment).

If you want a non mainstream brand though, probably don't hang around for discounts - you'll just waste the summer waiting for something that probably won't happen!

MikeWW

I had a Secialized Allez that I had upgraded a bit over a couple of years to include decent wheels/tyres (Kysrium Elites/Pro 3's) and 105 shifters/10 speed.
Then bough a Moda Stretto about a month back for around £2k

I love the look of the new bike and the components are great-carbon cranks, bars, seatpost, American Classic Aero 420's, SRAM Force.

The bike accelerate faster and its a better ride BUT it hasn't transformed me into a different rider.

Now I'm really happy with the purchase and would do the same again (and buy the same bike again) but I never expected much gain.

As for the Moda Stretto- IMO it has a really good balance of components and the wheels are better I think than the Kysriums . Apart from the saddle which I changed the rest is spot on out of the box and I can't envisage changing any of it

Kona21

£3k you say...

http://www.canyon.com/_uk/roadbikes/bike.html?b=2122

I think I have recommended canyon everytime on here, I just think the value for money is superb!

MattC59

Dazza2280 wrote:

I'm looking at upgrading my bike with around £2500 - £3000 to spend, I've been on a £525 Giant Defy 3.5 for the past year. I get that the most important part of moving any bike fast is rider ability, but will i notice a difference straight away moving up from my 'starter' bike.

Also i was looking at the Pinarello FP Quattro until i read on here that its got really heavy wheels, are these heavy in comparison to a set of top end Mavic wheels, or heavy in general. I'm assuming they'd still be much much lighter than the standard rims on my giant right???

It seems most people are recommending carbon, but no one has asked what type of riding you do. Do you need Carbon ? Admittedly, carbon looks lovely, but my material of choice for my next bike is titanium. You can get a lot of ti bike for that money.

stronginthesun

MattC59 wrote:

Dazza2280 wrote:

I'm looking at upgrading my bike with around £2500 - £3000 to spend, I've been on a £525 Giant Defy 3.5 for the past year. I get that the most important part of moving any bike fast is rider ability, but will i notice a difference straight away moving up from my 'starter' bike.

Also i was looking at the Pinarello FP Quattro until i read on here that its got really heavy wheels, are these heavy in comparison to a set of top end Mavic wheels, or heavy in general. I'm assuming they'd still be much much lighter than the standard rims on my giant right???

It seems most people are recommending carbon, but no one has asked what type of riding you do. Do you need Carbon ? Admittedly, carbon looks lovely, but my material of choice for my next bike is titanium. You can get a lot of ti bike for that money.

i would still go for carbon ? its the material of choice in the tours

cougie

Its definitely a diminishing returns thing. The difference in feel and performance between say a 2k and a 3k bike wont be it being 50% better or faster - more likely it'll be indistinguishable.

Take your time in choosing and try to ride as many bikes as possible.

What are you planning to do with it Dazza ?

ollyridesfirst

Titanium is something that i will be investing in one day! The frame will outlast you!

As for your bike now....have a look here:

http://www.artscyclery.com/descpage-CV1 ... b=RDMBIKES

works out at about £2700

cougie

Titanium could be a good choice if the OP wants to fly with the bike. I'm not sure about a bike for life though - most of us like to chop and change every few years (even if theres no real reason for swapping bikes !)

Unclemonty121

Back to your original question, will you notice much difference.

I reckon there is a good 5 minute difference between my winter (alu/carbon) and summer carbon bike, and that's just at the 1k range. This is same route, same rider etc.

Redhog14

I would agree with most of the chat here, I have ridden a good frame (£1.2K) with upgrades worth around the same and certainly the wheels and groupset made a big difference. I am considering the purchase of this machine an Argon 18 but am swayed by the Ti option and I feel that buying a new bike every 5 years seems very wasteful. Rational or otherwise I also have a nagging fear of breaking this Carbon beast inadvertently i.e. not in riding/racing incident but loading/unloading/travelling.

gkerr4

i agree with the diminishing returns theory - same with most things really.

however, one thing to note, that i have noticed, is that even on bikes costing the high side of £2k - they still come with crappy 'entry level' wheels - often vento's / aksiums / F7 / the usual-suspect-£150ish-wheels!

I think self-build (or self specify)is the way to go - certainly if you are looking at £3k - alternatively, see what you can get with the best frame / component / fit blend for around £2500 and then budget to get a set of £600ish wheels (assuming you can sell the un-used ones which come with the £2500 bike for around £100). this might produce a pretty good end-result.

meanredspider

I'd have been in the diminishing returns camp and I'm sure it's true to some extent. That said, a colleague has just gone from a Madone 5.x to their top-of-the-range bike and knocked over a minute off his 20K TT PB time first time out, taking second place ahead of those that used to beat him.

vorsprung

OllyRidesFirst wrote:

Titanium is something that i will be investing in one day! The frame will outlast you!

Myth. Ti breaks the same as any other material

lemoncurd

What are you going to be using the bike for?

If you have the money and just want a nicer looking bike then go for it, just don't expect massive performance gains.

Optimistically you may be 5 minutes faster for every hour that you cycle but unless you're racing does this really matter to you?

rdt

lemoncurd wrote:

Optimistically you may be 5 minutes faster for every hour that you cycle but unless you're racing does this really matter to you?

Maybe if it's an electric bike... :shock: