Trek Valencia for my gf's Dad - decent buy?

daniel_b

Hello all,

just bought this bike:


http://bit.ly/Trek-Valencia for £180 - Retailed for £500 new.

A 2010 model, clearly has a fairly rogered chain, so first task is going to be to establish whether it can be recovered (I suspect not) and if not, then get a new cassette and chain.

This is not for me, but for my gf's Dad, and he's only going to potter about on it to be honest, but I thought it looks like a good honest bike, if somewhat neglected, and has the bonus of having guards fitted.
Will fit a rack once we get it for him, and give it a good service together with the new chain and cassette if required.

For the cost of a chain and cassette it will be no more pricey than a new relatively anonymous bike from a random website, and I thought it seemed like a decent price.

My only concern was the mechanical disc brakes, no idea whether they are reliable, unreliable and or a b1tch to adjust/work on?

Anyone have any thoughts on it?

Cheers

Dan

BelgianBeerGeek

Can't be 100% sure but brakes look like Avids, so should be ok. Nice bike, when she's scrubbed up I'd say looks like a bargain.

daniel_b

Thanks for your reply BBG, much appreciated :-)

I had kind of budgeted up to £220, as that was what I thought it would be 'worth' so was rather pleased to get it for sub £200.

The Evans write up suggests it has Shimano M416 brakes........

I plan to put a new 8spd cassette and chain on from CRC, they have some bargains on there at the mo, and a disc specific rack too, Cycle Surgery have some lush looking (Lush as in Lezyne make some nicely designed and well thought out kit) Lezyne ones for £20 instead of £40.

I was rather tempted by this bike myself, but it's a 21" frame so too big alas, would have made a nice pub bike!
It has a little bit of a Cannondale bad boy look about it I think.

The only thing I did notice in reviews was that a fair few people did not get on with the apparently swept back handlebars - but then I see you can buy standard bars for £9, so it's not a huge cost to swap out is it

Picking it up on Wednesday, and looking forward to fettling it as a birthday present

Dan