Bike Makes

Abe-Froman

I’ve been reading the forum for a while but haven’t noticed a thread on this subject.

I’m new to road bikes and bought a four month old defy3 a couple of months ago, and apart from having a play on the Velodrome it is the first time I’ve properly been on a bike since I was in my teens(now 34) when I had a Cannondale mountain bike. I was looking at the Caad8, Synapse and Defy as the Giants seemed to get great reviews, and the Defy was the first one that I found in the right size second hand.

One thing I did wonder but haven’t really been able to work out from having a nosy on the forum is, what is the road bike brand hierarchy? I’m a car geek so I know the way I perceive the makes relative to each other and that lots have similar overlapping positions, plus there are a few specialist makes that don’t really fit in. So is it the same with bikes and how do they line up? Is Giant the General Motors, Ford, Hyundai of the bike world? Where do Cannondale and the rest fit, what would be there equivalent in the car world and what is the Lotus Elise of the bike world?

marcusjb

Most of the big manufacturers make such a wide range of bikes from £3-400 to £6000+ - so it's hard to give them a heirachy

There are then a few manufacturers who focus exclusively on the low-end of the market (your Kia equivlant?)

And then a few who focus exclusively on the top end of the market.

But for the vast majority of manufacturers - they're all the same, they all make a bike with groupset X at pricepoint Y aimed at market Z.

cougie

There are only three big groupset manufacturers - and everyone can get hold of them - so its basically just down to the frames. People perceive brands differently - but there's not that much difference once you ride the things.

arran77

I would say that brands such as Pinarello, Colnago and De Rosa amongst others have a certain pedigree to them but if that makes them superior to the likes of Specialized, Giant, Canyon etc is possibly more debatable.

cedargreen

Just enjoy your cycling and try not to worry about 'brand hierarchy'. A bike is basically a much more individual thing than a car- it has to fit you for a start. One of the nicest bikes I ever rode was a second hand steel Trek which I bought second hand for $50 when I was living in Tokyo. Many years later I decided on a custom built steel frame because I felt no bike had ever fitted me as well. I hope when I'm out on the custom bike that other people don't feel I'm looking down on their Treks or Giants; I don't really care what they ride.

I've managed to avoid the dismal world of car brand hierarchy by spending more on bikes than I do on cars, but my own car brand hierarchy would look something like this:

1. Nissan Almera- my sister has just got rid of hers after 10 years and 240,000 miles, during which time it has never once broken down. Mine has only done 100,000 so it's still running in.
2. Vauxhall Viva- had several of these and learnt to drive in one. The last one, which I sold a couple of years ago, I paid £175 for and drove to the south of France and back twice without problems when it was well over 30 years old. And you could fit a bike bag in the boot.
3. Citroen 2CV- Drove from Brighton to the Sahara desert in Morocco and back in a £400 one many years ago.

markhewitt1978

Abe-Froman wrote:

I’ve been reading the forum for a while but haven’t noticed a thread on this subject.

I’m new to road bikes and bought a four month old defy3 a couple of months ago, and apart from having a play on the Velodrome it is the first time I’ve properly been on a bike since I was in my teens(now 34) when I had a Cannondale mountain bike. I was looking at the Caad8, Synapse and Defy as the Giants seemed to get great reviews, and the Defy was the first one that I found in the right size second hand.

One thing I did wonder but haven’t really been able to work out from having a nosy on the forum is, what is the road bike brand hierarchy? I’m a car geek so I know the way I perceive the makes relative to each other and that lots have similar overlapping positions, plus there are a few specialist makes that don’t really fit in. So is it the same with bikes and how do they line up? Is Giant the General Motors, Ford, Hyundai of the bike world? Where do Cannondale and the rest fit, what would be there equivalent in the car world and what is the Lotus Elise of the bike world?

Most of the manufacturers make a broadly similar range. So the majority are the likes of Ford and Vauxhall, but they make top end models too.

The heirarchy comes in more in the way of the groupset level, which is the closest you'll get to your engine on a bike (with the real engine being yourself of course).

So you look at the bike and if it's Shimano is it
* Claris
* Sora
* Tiagra
* 105
* Ultegra
* Dura Ace

The higher up on that list you are the 'better' the rest of the bike is likely to be. Of course there's no reason why you can't get a bike which is equipped with Claris and put Dura Ace on it instead, but that would be like taking a Kia C'eed and putting a Ferrari engine in it.

Abe-Froman

cedargreen wrote:

Just enjoy your cycling and try not to worry about 'brand hierarchy'. A bike is basically a much more individual thing than a car- it has to fit you for a start. One of the nicest bikes I ever rode was a second hand steel Trek which I bought second hand for $50 when I was living in Tokyo. Many years later I decided on a custom built steel frame because I felt no bike had ever fitted me as well. I hope when I'm out on the custom bike that other people don't feel I'm looking down on their Treks or Giants; I don't really care what they ride.

I've managed to avoid the dismal world of car brand hierarchy by spending more on bikes than I do on cars, but my own car brand hierarchy would look something like this:

1. Nissan Almera- my sister has just got rid of hers after 10 years and 240,000 miles, during which time it has never once broken down. Mine has only done 100,000 so it's still running in.
2. Vauxhall Viva- had several of these and learnt to drive in one. The last one, which I sold a couple of years ago, I paid £175 for and drove to the south of France and back twice without problems when it was well over 30 years old. And you could fit a bike bag in the boot.
3. Citroen 2CV- Drove from Brighton to the Sahara desert in Morocco and back in a £400 one many years ago.

I'm not worrying about it, I'm just nosy as to how the makes tie in with all the road bike rules If that sort of thing was an issue I'd be driving something white, german and with huge wheels but I tend to like cars that are a bit more odd ball and fun to drive rather than worry about what other people think.

I did work out the Shimano groupset line up but the manufactured do like to make it clear where their own products stand.

t4tomo

cedargreen wrote:

2. Vauxhall Viva- had several of these and learnt to drive in one. The last one, which I sold a couple of years ago, I paid £175 for and drove to the south of France and back twice without problems when it was well over 30 years old. And you could fit a bike bag in the boot.
.

Ah the dear old vauxhall viva, inspiring such pure poetry as

"My Vauxhall Viva's covered in rust but you can't ........a bird on the 29 bus"

I learnt to drive in an old Chevette.

blackhands

"white, german and with huge wheels"

so you are into Bentley then?

MichaelW

Almost all decent bikes are made in a handful of Taiwanese factories. Giant is the largest factory and make many other brands besides Giant. Some of the other brands are considered "prestige". Giant are no slouch and make pro-grade bikes as good as the best.
Most of the rest of the decent bikes are made in a few Chinese carbon fibre moulding companies. Many pro-grade brands such as Cervelo are made this way. You can often see unbranded stock pattern frames rebadged for small shop brands such as Planet X or Ribble.
The only true "prestige" brands are custom handbuilt framebuilders who can do whatever you need or want in their workshop. Their names may be known to some but rarely carry the cache of the big factory-made, heavily branded product. In the world of racing, you need a big budget, a marketing department and the capability to outfit a whole team with several bikes.
"what is the Lotus Elise of the bike world?". Wrong way around. The Lotus Elise is the bicycle of the car world, built as light as possible with no superfluous bits. Every decent bike above £1200 is built this way.