£1200 First road bike. carbon or Alloy?

81stuperman

Help! I am burried wheel high in a mass of road bikes for £1000. My cyclescheme voucher is on its way and I still haven't decided which bike I am to buy. So far I have tried Cannondale Synapse and CAAD10, BMC Streetracer and Roadracer, Bianchi Impulso, Cinelli Experience, Willier Montegrappa and Boardman Team comp. I am willing to top up if need be. I am an experienced Mountain biker (Orange 5 AM) and have decided to stay on the road so as to optimise ride time. I like the relaxed audax/sportive style bikes but would still like something a little sporty too. ISo far the BMC streetracer was the best ride and I liked the rigidity. If possible, I would like to reach into the carbon frame territory. is there anythinge else I should consider? (before the winter closes in and I really do need a sportive ride complete with mudguards)

Stuart

81stuperman

Been looking at Felt F6, Sensa Toscana and also Ribble pro evo carbon. Just to throw a few more models in the mix!

simon_masterson

To be honest if you're committed to spending that money (and you're not exactly a 'beginner' in quite the same sense that many are!) I would opt for a carbon fibre frame. That or get a cheap alloy bike.

...It's what I would, and likely will, do with those funds. You can get a fair amount of alloy bike for your thousand quid, but you still have something that you may well want to upgrade; that and I have concerns about the durability and longevity of alloy. Rightly or wrongly I think of carbon fibre as a better long term investment. You could get a basic spec and upgrade practically everything on it over time and you'll still likely have a really great bike by the time you finish. There might be frames that are a few grams lighter, but nothing drastic. If you buy something with a view to upgrading, even if you sell it within months you may well make quite a loss on it.

dinkdankdo10

Would defo get full carbon and you get a full carbon bike with SRAM groupset from Planet x for £1000

Gizmodo

Personaly I'd be wary about cheap carbon bikes. A friend bought an on-line shop's own brand carbon bike last year for £800, I had bought a Trek carbon bike just a month before. Having ridden both bikes through the winter (mine probably did more miles).

So far he has had to replace the wheels (£200) and is now in the process of replacing the BB and crank set (£75). That still means his bike has cost a lot less than mine, but be aware, they may need more work.

simon_masterson

Gizmodo wrote:

Personaly I'd be wary about cheap carbon bikes. A friend bought an on-line shop's own brand carbon bike last year for £800, I had bought a Trek carbon bike just a month before. Having ridden both bikes through the winter (mine probably did more miles).

So far he has had to replace the wheels (£200) and is now in the process of replacing the BB and crank set (£75). That still means his bike has cost a lot less than mine, but be aware, they may need more work.

I've always thought the same, including Planet X and the like. They get good reviews, but the pennies must be pinched somewhere. For not much more you can get a Dolan or other reputable brand (I'd rather spec out my own bike); I think it's a better choice myself. But I don't anticipate running into those funds for a little while, let alone clearing the purchase with the wife...!

rolf_f

Gizmodo wrote:

Personaly I'd be wary about cheap carbon bikes. A friend bought an on-line shop's own brand carbon bike last year for £800, I had bought a Trek carbon bike just a month before. Having ridden both bikes through the winter (mine probably did more miles).

So far he has had to replace the wheels (£200) and is now in the process of replacing the BB and crank set (£75). That still means his bike has cost a lot less than mine, but be aware, they may need more work.

Errr, so were the wheels the shops own brand? Was the BB and crankset own brand? You can't blame the frame manufacturer for the quality of components the purchaser chooses to select. My own Ribble is kitted out with Campagnolo wheels, BB and crankset. I hope this is a reputable brand! FWIW, the bike has covered over 5000 miles and no components have yet needed to be changed.

In terms of value for money it's vastly superior to my Look which cost three times as much. I love both bikes though.

velogee

I had a slightly smaller budget of £1k and I decided to go for an Allez Elite which has a good spec and at the time was discounted to £700. I used the rest of the voucher for decent bib shorts, shoe, pedals and jersey. If I had been able to I would have got a CAAD10. Just my personal choices/experience.

stoneb09

I have just bought a Carrera Virago Carbon bike with 105 groupset and it truly is a stunning bit of kit. A lot of bike snobs will complain about it coming from Halfords but I got a service that was very reputable indeed.

The bike itself is very well build, the frame it light and the 105 gearing runs smooth as a nut. The only thing that lets it down are the wheels and although they are Mavic branded, are quite heavy.

This will be the only thing I change in the near future and with a british cycling membership you save 10% off the list price of £1000 meaning it costs just £900.

Some will obviously disagree but that's what you get with a forum.

Gizmodo

Rolf F wrote:

Gizmodo wrote:

Personaly I'd be wary about cheap carbon bikes. A friend bought an on-line shop's own brand carbon bike last year for £800, I had bought a Trek carbon bike just a month before. Having ridden both bikes through the winter (mine probably did more miles).

So far he has had to replace the wheels (£200) and is now in the process of replacing the BB and crank set (£75). That still means his bike has cost a lot less than mine, but be aware, they may need more work.

Errr, so were the wheels the shops own brand? Was the BB and crankset own brand? You can't blame the frame manufacturer for the quality of components the purchaser chooses to select. My own Ribble is kitted out with Campagnolo wheels, BB and crankset. I hope this is a reputable brand! FWIW, the bike has covered over 5000 miles and no components have yet needed to be changed.

In terms of value for money it's vastly superior to my Look which cost three times as much. I love both bikes though.

I wasn't blaming the frame manufacturer, in fact I didn't even mention that. I was responding to the advice about buying a cheap carbon bike from an on-line store rather than an ally frame bike for the same money that hopefully will have better quality components. Sorry if I wasn't clear.

Pigtail

I'd say you're on the cusp there where you could justify either. You'll get a good alloy bike, or a modest Carbon one at that price. For £1500 I'd say carbon, for £1000 I'd say alloy.

rolf_f

Gizmodo wrote:

I wasn't blaming the frame manufacturer, in fact I didn't even mention that. I was responding to the advice about buying a cheap carbon bike from an on-line store rather than an ally frame bike for the same money that hopefully will have better quality components. Sorry if I wasn't clear.

I take your point but I don't think you can make the assumption that the cheap carbon bike/online store is likely to have worse components. When you go to Ribble in particular, the groupsets are always complete - buy a cheaper Bianchi C2C for example, and you find that many of the components are at a lower level than the highlighted groupset. Basically, Ribble, PX etc aren't charging anymore for their carbon frames that the mainstream brands charge for their alloy frames (which is reasonable given that there is no reason why a carbon frame should cost any more to make than an alloy one - really it should be cheaper). Carbon is regarded as a high end product due to its performance but in cost terms it isn't - so all the cheap frames do is remove that premium. It's like Video-CD-DVD. The quality of the product increases but, if anything, the price reduces over time.

81stuperman

thanks for all the posts!

I have spotted a Giant TCR Composite reduced from 1500 to 1200 so will have a look next week.

also found the Sensa tuscano summer special at merlin cycles. full carbon with ultegra, although I don't really know much about Sensa???

Mike54321

For me, the best value bikes in this sort of price range are aluminium. Even if you were to go a fair bit more expensive I would say a CAAD 10 would be a good contender.

Also, maybe this isn't what people are trying to say, but 'alloy' isn't an abbreviation of aluminium.

rolf_f

Mike54321 wrote:

Also, maybe this isn't what people are trying to say, but 'alloy' isn't an abbreviation of aluminium.

Indeed - alloy is not an abbreviation of aluminium but I'm not sure anyone suggested it might be.

For example (from Wikipedia):

7005 is an aluminium alloy used primarily for bicycle frames, due to its relative ease of welding. It has similar physical properties to 6061 aluminium alloy, except it has a higher density of 2.78 g/cm³, and depending on the temper, may be slightly stronger. There is significant debate as to which is superior for bicycle frames, as both have their merits. [1]

It does not need to be precipitation hardened, unlike 6061, but can be cooled in air. [2]

[edit] Chemical composition

The alloy composition of 7005 is:
Aluminium 91.0% - 94.7%
Chromium 0.06% - 0.20%
Copper <=0.10 %
Iron <=0.40 %
Magnesium 1.0% - 1.80%
Manganese 0.20% - 0.70%
Silicon <=0.35%
Titanium 0.010% - 0.060%
Zinc 4.0% - 5.0 %
Zirconium 0.080% - 0.20 %
Other, total <= 0.15 %

simon_masterson

Mike54321 wrote:

Also, maybe this isn't what people are trying to say, but 'alloy' isn't an abbreviation of aluminium.

Indeed. I don't like to use the term, but it's better than 'that stuff that's usually incorrectly referred to as 'alloy''. Is 'aluminium' really that much better? I'm assuming that pure aluminium isn't used to make frames with, but nevertheless even if it's 94% aluminium, it's still technically 'aluminium alloy' and not 'aluminium'.

okeydokey79

stoneb09 wrote:

I have just bought a Carrera Virago Carbon bike with 105 groupset and it truly is a stunning bit of kit. A lot of bike snobs will complain about it coming from Halfords but I got a service that was very reputable indeed.

The bike itself is very well build, the frame it light and the 105 gearing runs smooth as a nut. The only thing that lets it down are the wheels and although they are Mavic branded, are quite heavy.

This will be the only thing I change in the near future and with a british cycling membership you save 10% off the list price of £1000 meaning it costs just £900.

Some will obviously disagree but that's what you get with a forum.

can i ask did you look at the boardman team before you brought the Virago???

Barteos

Frame material is irrelevant. What matters is how the bike rides and what spec you're getting for money.

81stuperman

thanks for the science lesson. haha only kidding. I am clued up on materials and will from now on use the proper term of aluminium alloy to prevent any arguments.

In the end I managed to bargain my LBS to let me have a Synapse Carbon Apex for £1400, including £200 now and £200 next month deal (obviously the cyclescheme voucher took care of the rest)

I took it out for a 15mile break in that afternoon and was hugely impressed. out of all the bikes I had tried it was easily the smoothest, most comfortable and pleasurable to ride. Having not tried SRAM groupsets on any of the test bikes I was also impressed with the entry level APEX gearing. first upgrade though, but no rush, would be the Shimano rs10 wheels.

Agood looking bike which will stay with me for a long time!

Cheers for your help guys!

shane r

I've been through this all twice now myself.

Last year I bought a full carbon Ribble Racing Sportive with Tiagra for £800 on Cyclescheme. Since then I've upgraded most but the frame, which is superb. I upgraded the groupo to 105 for pennies by buying bits in sales and flogging the Tiagra gear on fleabay.

This year I have just purchased a full carbon Dolan Mythos with SRAM Rival for the magic £1000 on cyclescheme (yes, you can do it every year!), although have not yet taken delivery.

For me there was never any question that I wanted carbon, and my experience with a 'cheap' frame has been excellent.

t4tomo

Aluminium Alloy frame with Carbon forks and seat stays?

Nice compromise.

stronginthesun

1200 would get a superb specced alloy canyon ?