Cheap carbon frames from hong kong on eBay... Opinions pls!?
dominicdubs
Posts: 39
Been browsing eBay on the prowl for a full susser and these full carbon frames from hong kong keep popping up at very very low prices for example an 18" full carbon for £180 buy it now +postage. Now normally I'd think hold on a minute gotta be something wrong with them but they look quite nice! I can't be the only person seeing them and wondering so I thought I'd start a thread to see if anyone has any experience in buying one of these and whether any good!
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Had one of those. Looked nice (especially since they have no markings on them so you can set any paint/decals to match the rest of the bike).... but mine had a real creaky seat post that drove me nuts (tried all the usual remedies without much success). There all right for what they are. Like building a bike around a cheap Aluminum frame, you get what you pay for. But don't expect them to compete with the more expensive carbon frames from the top end sellers.
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Merida is a big bike player though. They supply cheap stuff (e.g. some Halfords stuff I think), but have the serious kit too.
That's assuming it's genuine and not a copy.
For full sus though, even aluminium I'd think more than twice over a £180 full sus frame.
Good value for carbon though has to be the Carbon 456 from On One / Planet X. Not quite as cheap, and isn't full sus, but that is a seriously tough frame and can be had for £300 at certain times in the year.0 -
Merida make Specialized frames, and many others too.0
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Lol. Not a Merida in the pic. Just decals i stuck on. The Chinese frames that the OP is talking about are unbranded.
Yeah, Merida do make frames for other people. I have one branded for Saracen. But these cheap Chinese frames, who knows who makes them?
Like i said, these Chinese frames are alright, just entry level. The one in my pic is just two molded carbon fiber casts glued down the center with no effort made to disguise the join....
Not the best way to build a carbon frame as they can de-laminate down the center. A lot of these cheap frames often claim to be monocoque frames. But that's not true (not even with Merida frames until recently). Most are made like aluminium frames, a collection of shaped carbon tubes that are glued together rather than soldered. Then an outer beauty wrap is applied to make it all look like one lump of unbroken carbon. Technically, the outer beauty wrap is monocoque, but it's the inner glued tubes that are where the main support comes from and, as with a lot of glued carbon parts, tend to de-laminate at the joints from all the impact stresses.
You can often tell which type you've got just by looking at the weights. A true one piece monocoque 18" Carbon fiber mountain bike frame should weigh in at under 1kg (most Scott frames and more recent Merida frames), whereas a beauty wrapped frame of the same size will often be closer to 1.2/1.3kg due to the extra material underneath the beauty wrap at the joints.0 -
In practice though a bonded frame is just as good as any other. In fact I know of no frames that are a full one piece unit, and many bars are still seamed and bonded.
As for weight, depends on use. An XC race bike from the top guys may be under 1kg. Some are overbuilt slightly for more durability, like my Zaskar for example - 1.4kg, but can take a 140mm fork. This has no cosmetic layer.0 -
Don't get me wrong. There is nothing wrong in buying cheap unbranded Chinese frames. But simply be aware that there will be a few caveats and not all Carbon frames are equal. The same way not all Aluminium frames are equal. Bit like that guy in another thread who couldn't see the difference between an entry level sub £100 frame and something a bit more expensive, like a £400 Kinesis Maxlight XCPro2, for instance. For a novice unaware of the differences between 6000 and 7000 grade aluminium, double/triple butting and things like gusseting and the different ways of welding it all together a cheap sub £100 Alu frame can be mighty tempting. The same goes for these sub £200 carbon frames (had three).
This is true of all things bought from China. A bit like the debate about cheap Chinese lights over in the lights threads. There pretty awesome and cheap BUT........... expect there to be a few design or manufacturing glitches.
For instance, i bought two Cree XR-E R2 torches from China last year. Awesomely bright BUT..........
............. one light is noticeably dimmer than the other and both suffered from the obligatory changing modes every time you hit a bump. Fixable, but not perfect without a bit of tinkering.
Bought this Chinese Inon 2000 lumen light two weeks ago on the recomendation of torchy the battery boy..
nice light with oodles of flood BUT...............................................
.............................. there were bare wires sticking out of the mount that would of shorted the torch if i'd used it in rain. The new sturdy clamp doesn't fit any of my oversize bars (screws not long enough). Trying to fit it further down the bar where it starts to narrow also doesn't work as you have a cylinder (the inside of the clamp) trying to clamp onto a cone shape (the narrowing bar) so only one side of the clamping band touches the bar. Since the inside of the clamping band is perfectly smooth, with no rubber feet or gromits to give grip and because the light head is enormously heavy (heavy enough to club baby seals to death) the light does nothing but slide round and point at the floor or sky going over every bump....... Fixed the bare wires and made a better clamp from a stock Halfords aftermarket replacement otherwise i would of had £114 of light i couldn't mount to anything. Nice light BUT......
The Inon was a bit overkill for my regular commuting, so bought two of these smaller Chinese units off ebay (one from a UK seller, one directly from China) one of which as turned up the other day....
Again, brilliant light and more of what i wanted in the first place BUT.......................................
............................................. the Chinese monkey who assembled it did so in such a fashion that the red light that indicates that the battery as reached it's 30% drain state is constantly locked on, weather the battery is charged or not so there is no way of knowing when i've drained the battery when riding the bike. The bar clamp is a bit useless and the three modes haven't been well thought out. Just insanely bright, slightly less insanely bright that still has every car honking it's horn at you and stupidly fast flash mode on full power that would have most motorists screeching to a halt and physically assaulting you. There's no lo power mode at all. So i have to connect the battery up to the Inon in order to check it's drain state and carry a smaller torch on the handlebar for when i'm in among traffic, which gets round the problems but sorta defeats the purpose of trying to reduce the number of lights and weight on my handle bar.
I'm sure when the other one turns up it'll have some small annoying niggle. Either design flaw or manufacturing flaw of some kind.
What's all this to do with carbon frames. Well i've had the pleasure of owning two Chinese carbon frames and building a bike up for someone with another one.....
First unbranded Chinese frame. As seen in the pic above. Nice frame BUT.......
......... the seatpost creaked like a bitch. No amount of carbon paste or distributing the weight with a Exotic double clamp would fix it. Annoyed me so much i sold it.
Second unbranded Chinese frame. Slimmer with internal cable routing BUT........
......... couldn't get the rear wheel on. The distance between the two drop outs was out by almost a centimeter. In order to get any of my wheels on you had to yank apart the two stays until you heard the frame creaking and making cracking noises. Standing up on the pedals and putting down any power had your convinced the rear triangle was going to shatter, judging by all the creaking and groaning noises it made. It went..
Third unbranded Chinese frame. Made this up for a friend BUT..............
.........................hit a problem with the integrated headset on the frame. The diameter was just fractionally too narrow for the bearings and cups that were supposed to fit in it.. There was no way of getting the upper cup into the frame short of hitting it with a sledgehammer (which probably would of worked... but shattered the frame). Tried three different headsets with the correct dimensions just to check it wasn't the headsets at fault. In the end, rather than trying to sand down and widen the headset cup in the frame i simply ground down the outer diameter of the drop in headset cup. Worked eventually but it's such a tight fit he'll never be able to get it out if he needs to.
Are we spotting a pattern here....?
Of seven items i've had from China i've had a 100% "piss me off" rate. Which isn't good. Some of the problems are fixable, some are not, some have acceptable workarounds. I'm not saying don't buy anything from China, weather it be lights or frames. I'm simply saying be prepared to meet a few design/manufacturing problems and be prepared to do a bit of tinkering. If your not, then look somewhere else.0 -
Get what you pay for really. If you're happy to take some defects and work around them or even just buy several (in the case of stuff like lights) and replace when bust, can work out okay value.
Some stuff is okay though, and big names have their manufacturing plants in China. The knock off stuff often comes from the same places, just knocked out on the cheap in the same sweat shops.
Much like in the electronics industry, *cough* Sony. But their stuff has been going downhill for years and much is from Chinese factories now, so maybe there's something in this China produces crap stuff
China is the future though. They have all the money.
Anyway, people say much the same negative things about Hope and they're British 0 -
There is nothing wrong in buying cheap unbranded Chinese frames. But simply be aware that there will be a few caveats and not all Carbon frames are equal.
I agree, but I see these problems with frames, torches and parts no matter where they are built, and from the big brands too.an entry level sub £100 frame and something a bit more expensive, like a £400 Kinesis Maxlight XCPro2, for instance. For a novice unaware of the differences between 6000 and 7000 grade aluminium, double/triple butting and things like gusseting and the different ways of welding it all together a cheap sub £100 Alu frame can be mighty tempting. The same goes for these sub £200 carbon frames (had three).
So what was the difference? Kinesis have a huge plant in CHINA!!! (as do Giant, Merida, and many others). 6000 vs 7000 is neither here or there, the butting and gusseting depends on the design. Kinesis are a big player, and actually make many of these budget frames anyway. And this goes for these carbon frames, a lot of the cheap ones are made in the same factories to the same standards as the brands we see. Maybe you have been unlucky and the retailer did not QC.This is true of all things bought from China
It can be true of any part bought anywhere. To say that british built, or US built and branded names are any better is wrong, they aren't in my exprience and can have exactly the same problems. In the UK I guess the importer and distributor though may do more QC.0
