Price? MTB vs Road

welshkev

I was scanning through the user feedback section in the classifieds and saw someone had paid £175 for a pair of second hand shifters for their road bike. is it just me or does that seem ludicrous?

this isn't an mtb is better than road rant, I just don't get why road bikes and components are so expensive.

can anyone enlighten me? :?

supersonic

I don't know either, as road bikes are more popular.

Same with CX bikes. Many that cost a grand beggar belief. You can get lighter hardtails in many cases!

bennett_346

The MAMIL effect...

bails87

Yeah, shifters are strangely expensive. But then road shifters are a combined brake and shift lever so not quite comparable to an MTB shifter.

Still, i was amazed how much mine sold for when I took them off my commuter.

You seem to get relatively little for your money with road bikes. If you spend a few hundred extra quid at the lower end of the MTB market you get brakes, suspension and gears that work, vs the undamped/spongy//clunky rubbish at the cheaper end. You can see the technology and extra mechanics that you're spending your money on. But on a road bike you spend the extra and it can just feel like everything gets ever so slightly lighter...

pesky_jones

bennett_346 wrote:

The MAMIL effect...

Please, elaborate.

IMO everything in biking is overpriced. I think the fact that so many cyclists are content paying these prices and are able to justify the ridiculous pricing that enables the prices to stay high, and even keep rising. You may argue that no one is "happy" to pay £500 for a pair of forks, but at the end of the day, you do buy them.

The Rookie

Road parts do tend to be lighter, a mid range Sora rear mech is lighter than an XT for example.....but yes it's less obvious than on an MTB

I have ST shifter/brakes on my Kraken as well.....M765 not the unfeasably ugly M775!

The profits declared by listed companies contradict the assertion that everything is overpriced, there is certainly no shortage of competation for many parts, especially forks!

bennett_346

a) a lot of people who ride road bikes compared to mtb are middle aged men with lots of money to spare, who don't seem to recognise/care what good value is and i've seen this a lot. i think the average age of a mtb'er is a bit younger too so the disposable cash isn't there.

b) i never have paid RRP for anything over £200, and the last two bikes i've bought have been reduced from around 2k to 1.4k because i'm sensible with money. and because i'm tight and certainly wouldn't pay £500 for some forks

njee20

Road STIs are a hell of a lot more than MTB shifters - a Dura Ace mechanical pair is £470.

The saving grace is that my 9 year old DA ones are in vastly better condition than an equivalent MTB pair would be. To that end stuff holds value better.

lawman

Problem with most young folks is they find other things to spend money on. My guys at uni splash their loan on booze, hookers and blow and are skint. I got mostly bored of all that a while ago, so I have my loan to blow on shiny things. Still I worked my ass for a year and bought the Mojo. If you want something and are sensible anythings achievable IMO. If things go reasonably over summer and next year a trip to the alps and even a new bike could be on the cards. Make the most of it while you can I say!!

bennett_346

lawman wrote:

I got mostly bored of all that a while ago, so I have my loan to blow on shiny things.

+1, although i'm trying to save some for the few years after uni where money will be at its most tight.

cooldad

Pesky Jones wrote:

bennett_346 wrote:

The MAMIL effect...

Please, elaborate.

Middle aged man in lycra I think.
I'm offended. Although I do cover mine with baggy shorts, even on the road bike (for my once a year or so road ride).
My whole bike cost me a fiver though, but it did need new tubes.

Stu Coops

bails87 wrote:

Yeah, shifters are strangely expensive. But then road shifters are a combined brake and shift lever so not quite comparable to an MTB shifter.

Not strictly true as the new XT units are brake/shifter in one.

Still, i was amazed how much mine sold for when I took them off my commuter.

You seem to get relatively little for your money with road bikes. If you spend a few hundred extra quid at the lower end of the MTB market you get brakes, suspension and gears that work, vs the undamped/spongy//clunky rubbish at the cheaper end. You can see the technology and extra mechanics that you're spending your money on. But on a road bike you spend the extra and it can just feel like everything gets ever so slightly lighter...

njee20

That's all the difference ever is really, at any price point.

However... You'd be at risk of serious injury if you took a £500 MTB to a World Cup DH course. But you'd be just fine in the World Champs on a £500 road bike, just weighs a bit more!

Top end road stuff has always cost more. Until the last couple of years you couldn't spend more than about £1500 on some MTB wheels without really trying. There's a choice of £5000 wheelsets on the road!

pesky_jones

njee20 wrote:

That's all the difference ever is really, at any price point.

However... You'd be at risk of serious injury if you took a £500 MTB to a World Cup DH course. But you'd be just fine in the World Champs on a £500 road bike, just weighs a bit more!

Top end road stuff has always cost more. Until the last couple of years you couldn't spend more than about £1500 on some MTB wheels without really trying. There's a choice of £5000 wheelsets on the road!

Never really thought of that, to me that says that MTB should be the more expensive.

EH_Rob

Depends how you look at it. If you look at it as from the other way, you can ride a road bike up and down hills as opposed to just down hills, maybe that's why they charge double.

I may be wrong, but I'd have thought the most expensive endeavour of all is not overengineering something to be bombproof, its shedding weight whilst remaining within limits imposed by the UCI. I guess that's what it comes down to in the end, allied to the fact that a big chunk of the roadie market may have more money to spend on their hobby than MTBers. And also that the Pinarellos of this world can basically charge what they like. But then the big MTB players do the same.

njee20

R&D budgets for road bikes are far higher than for MTB, not many MTBs are designed in wind tunnels.

The Pro road scene is vastly more lucrative than MTB too. There's plenty of reasons road stuff costs more, justified or not.

It does last a long time though.

EH_Rob

That's a good point, I forgot about aero development, that stuff costs a fortune.

njee20

More advanced materials a lot of the time too. They've certainly been playing with carbon a lot longer.

johnnygooneruk

I think it was Keith Bontranger who said "cheap, light, strong. Choose any two"

supersonic

Which materials are more advanced?

EH_Rob

johnnygooneruk wrote:

I think it was Keith Bontranger who said "cheap, light, strong. Choose any two"

If there was a contest for 'most profound first post ever' this would get my vote.

njee20

Which materials are more advanced?

Trek did OCLV Boron, and have also played around with OCLV 55 on the road for frames and rims. Likewise Paul Lew has been doing rims with a Boron/Carbon mix for years.

There are Lightweight and Reynolds wheels with carbon spokes, and Mad Fiber wheels that are just mental. There's things like Look Keo Blade pedals using carbon leaf springs, all the aero profiling on tubes, Virtual Kammtail Foils and that, Cervelo with a sub-700g frame.

I think boundaries are pushed a little more on the road - you tend to see more mental road stuff than MTB, which tends to be more stayed.

supersonic

I think it does depend on what angle you look at it from - with sub 850g hardtail frames, a 700g road frame doesn't seem that impressive, and think this is one area where tech is on a par, especially with DH stuff pushing boundaries. Carbon lay up techniques have moved on leaps and bounds in both camps.

Fork tech on MTBs is pretty amazing nowadays, but is a totally seperate area.

I'd have thought trickle down tech would have helped bikes around the 500-1000 mark for road and CX, but they do seem poorly specced and heavy for what looks like mostly basic kit.

njee20

Who does an 850g carbon frame? (not denying it, just curious). Scott do the Scale 899, using the HMX methods tested on the Addict (and the older Scale/Spark) a few years ago.

Agree on forks/suspension (and obviously discs, although they're gradually coming to the road now), but I still think most brands are pushing material advances on the road, then applying to MTB generally, more than the other way around.

Totally agree that there have been huge advances in things like carbon layup in the MTB world, and you can't just use weight as the yardstick as it's not always the primary aim, but I still think more companies use the road as a proving ground for material advances.

supersonic

A guy on Weight Weenies reckons he tested a Trek Superfly carbon, 849g for a 17": and don't Merida and Spesh have frames around the same? Certainly Merida had a sub 900g frame, but a lot does depend on the size!

mcnultycop

supersonic wrote:

I'd have thought trickle down tech would have helped bikes around the 500-1000 mark for road and CX, but they do seem poorly specced and heavy for what looks like mostly basic kit.

I'd been looking at a road bike so could commute occasionally (42km each way, I've done it on the hardtail on knobblies once. Never again). I thought I'd get something decent for £500 but the ones I looked at were relatively heavy things. I'll just try and get a job closer to home.

The Rookie

Trek claim 849g for a 17" superfly, no coincedence I'm sure that that came after Spesh claimed 850g for their competitor bike frame (size unspecificed). I had heard a confirmation of the Trek weight, but not seen it.

stubs

mcnultycop wrote:

I'd been looking at a road bike so could commute occasionally (42km each way, I've done it on the hardtail on knobblies once. Never again). I thought I'd get something decent for £500 but the ones I looked at were relatively heavy things. I'll just try and get a job closer to home.

Why not get some flat bars with bar ends and some 1.5" road slicks on a cheap set of wheels. I used to commute 12 miles each way on my HT set up for the road and could do the 12 miles in 45 mins without sweating. A proper road bike might have got me there a couple of mins earlier but with an aching back from the drop bars.

njee20

Of course! Forgot the Superfly SL, how stupid, top of my 'next bike' list!

They've used the same tech to make the Madone 7-series under 700g, so getting back OT it's a road/MTB draw!

I'd been looking at a road bike so could commute occasionally (42km each way, I've done it on the hardtail on knobblies once. Never again). I thought I'd get something decent for £500 but the ones I looked at were relatively heavy things. I'll just try and get a job closer to home.

It's not all about the weight. My winter road bike is a £700 Allez, weighs 2lbs more than my FS MTB, but I'd never consider riding the MTB for a road ride. It's horrible. The winter bike isn't really that much slower than the shiny lightweight carbon summer road bike.

£500 will get you a really good second hand road bike. I don't know why you'd ever use a mountain bike for a road commute! I find either of my road bikes vastly more comfy than a mountain bike.

mcnultycop

njee20 wrote:

It's not all about the weight. My winter road bike is a £700 Allez, weighs 2lbs more than my FS MTB, but I'd never consider riding the MTB for a road ride. It's horrible. The winter bike isn't really that much slower than the shiny lightweight carbon summer road bike.

I appreciate it isn't all about the weight, but the components felt pretty crappy too, for the cash.

njee20 wrote:

£500 will get you a really good second hand road bike. I don't know why you'd ever use a mountain bike for a road commute! I find either of my road bikes vastly more comfy than a mountain bike.

I rode the mountain bike for the commute because I had the mountain bike, if I had something more suitable I'd have ridden it. I wanted to make sure I was OK with the distance, as I was about 135kg at the time, to see if it was worth trying to do it once a week.

njee20

Was more in response to the suggestion you build a bike with slicks, bar ends etc for the commute. You'll get a decent road bike which will be faster and more comfortable.