Thinking of buying a Cycleops Mag + turbo trainer

DCI Gene Hunt

So as I don't miss out valuable miles because of wretched winter weather Ive decided to buy a turbo trainer for use in my garage where I can listen to Radio5 whilst I complete 45 min turbo sessions. I looked at the Cycleops fluid 2 but Im not prepared to hand out £200+ on a turbo. Anybody who has tried a Cycleops Mag with or without the variable resistance control, how did you find it ?

gav77

I bought the Elite Crono Fluid ElastoGel Trainer from wiggle for £130 and I'm more than happy with it. It's my first turbo trainer but looking at the reviews mag trainers are a little loud.

pippi_langsamer-2

I don't quite get the "I'm not spending £x on a turbo trainer", when (if used correctly), it will result in tangable improvements in fitness n performance- unlike that x5 amount outlay that many will spend without second thought on a pair of " pro", wheels that will make absolutely knob-all difference....

I'd say buy the best trainer you can afford.

DCI Gene Hunt

I have been reading a lot of reviews and the elite cronos fluid for £130 gets absolutely outstanding comments everywhere, quiet as a mouse , fluid based instead of air or magnets and a realistic riding experience. Ordered one tonight along with elite riser block and vittoria zaffiro pro home trainer tyre. Soon the roads will be icy and the weather temperatures pretty cycling unfriendly. A daily 45 -60 min workout each day will compensate for any missed miles out on the road and help me to keeps the legs spinning over. I keep a spare road bike in my garage which will be my turbo bike, ill just leave it hooked up to the turbo and jump aboard on those bitter mornings.

macleod113

gav77 wrote:

I bought the Elite Crono Fluid ElastoGel Trainer from wiggle for £130 and I'm more than happy with it. It's my first turbo trainer but looking at the reviews mag trainers are a little loud.

Had mine for 2 weeks now as i cant play with rollers with a broken thumb. i use it in the garage which is under the 8year olds bedroom and i've had no complaints so far about noise when she is in bed (and she winges about the telly being on too loud in the lounge often). i can manage 90 or so minutes but this is watching movies/shows/gcn on youtube to ease the boredom.

i am finding i am going through several bandanas worth of sweat and a cap also. may need to layer up and use the fan :-)

DCI Gene Hunt

MacLeod113 wrote:

gav77 wrote:

I bought the Elite Crono Fluid ElastoGel Trainer from wiggle for £130 and I'm more than happy with it. It's my first turbo trainer but looking at the reviews mag trainers are a little loud.

Had mine for 2 weeks now as i cant play with rollers with a broken thumb. i use it in the garage which is under the 8year olds bedroom and i've had no complaints so far about noise when she is in bed (and she winges about the telly being on too loud in the lounge often). i can manage 90 or so minutes but this is watching movies/shows/gcn on youtube to ease the boredom.

i am finding i am going through several bandanas worth of sweat and a cap also. may need to layer up and use the fan :-)

I have a little portable telly out in the garage and a digital radio which I usually listen to Radio 5 live or Planet Rock on. Im sure 60 mins will pass by quickly enough out there when I know the roads are like skating rinks, the ice cold winds are blowing or its pi$$ing down outside Ill be thinking of the poor souls in the club out there and the misery LOL

supermurph09

Do you intend to use any type of plan?

bigmat

I'm looking at buying a turbo at the moment. The Elite Crono Fluid ElastoGel looks good but is it limited in terms of resistance? I wouldn't be too bothered about not being able to do all out sprints on it, but would realistically be looking at doing sustained intervals at up to 500W and would like to be able to put in the occasional kick up to say 1000W. Would I need something else for that sort of thing? The CycleOps Fluid 2 is the other one I have been looking at.

Any comments would be gratefully received.

scazzer

DCI Gene Hunt wrote:

So as I don't miss out valuable miles because of wretched winter weather Ive decided to buy a turbo trainer for use in my garage where I can listen to Radio5 whilst I complete 45 min turbo sessions. I looked at the Cycleops fluid 2 but Im not prepared to hand out £200+ on a turbo. Anybody who has tried a Cycleops Mag with or without the variable resistance control, how did you find it ?

Ive just bought Cyclops fluid from a mate and its best trainer ive been on,if you go into the classifieds theres one for sale for £150 ..

DCI Gene Hunt

This morning howling wind,bloody freezing and pi$$ing rain :x the turbo literally cant come soon enough :!:

Anonymous

I really like rollers and cannot ever see myself getting a turbo (never say never though) but the Kinetic Rock And Roll II looks like it might give enough feel to tempt me.

Had a go on a Tacx virtual reality trainer recently but really did not like fact it was bolt upright.
Shame you cannot use the Kinetic Rock And Roll II with that.

DCI Gene Hunt

Carbonator wrote:

I really like rollers and cannot ever see myself getting a turbo (never say never though) but the Kinetic Rock And Roll II looks like it might give enough feel to tempt me.

.

I can fully appreciate your thinking, ive always resisted buying a turbo until now. All the MTFU / HTFU from fellow riders does not remove the sheer and utter misery I feel when cycling in the piSSing rain with a howling wind and sodden feet. Ive deliberately bought a fluid trainer so as to get closer to the feel of proper riding and a tv in the garage or listening to pounding hard rock on planet rock radio will certainly be better than the tedium of staring at a garage wall for 60 mins.
The elite trainer is due to arrive early this week and the weather forecast is an absolute pig. My options are do no riding because of the $hitty weather, go out riding and get absolutely soaked in the bitter wind or do 60 min sessions on the new turbo in my garage. Im confident things will work out well and roll on the spring.

pippi_langsamer-2

Carbonator wrote:

I really like rollers and cannot ever see myself getting a turbo (never say never though) but the Kinetic Rock And Roll II looks like it might give enough feel to tempt me.

Had a go on a Tacx virtual reality trainer recently but really did not like fact it was bolt upright.
Shame you cannot use the Kinetic Rock And Roll II with that.

Just done 60mins on my RnRII. I'm not really following a plan yet- just munching along with a few our of the saddle 1 or 2 min "climbs". Even now, 60 mins seems to pass much quicker than I remember from old sessions in years past. I haven't got the turntable riser yet, so prob not getting the full advantage of the wobbliness.

I'm seriously contemplating buying the KK Inride power module to get full advantage from a proper plan in the new year...

Roberto di Velo

After a couple of miserable rides in the last few weeks, I definitely need to get a turbo trainer!

The Cycleops Mag + looks a possibility, but I had been thinking of a Tacx, as a mate has one that seems pretty good. I'd been mulling over a Booster or Blue Motion. Anyone got any experience of those, and how much better the more expensive ones are (I know they have a heavier flywheel)?

Cheers in advance.

DCI Gene Hunt

Got my cronos fluid trainer and man that thing is quiet !! Would definitely recommend in favour of a mag or wind trainer.

cc78

I bought a Cycleops Fluid2 a few weeks ago and in total I've used it for 16 hours so far... then I noticed last night that there is a small leak out of the fluid drum.

So I'm now waiting for the well-known internet retailer to get back to me about a replacement; I'm a bit annoyed at the hassle more than anything else, having started a base endurance plan now I'll have to stop for at least a couple of weeks while the replacement is turned around.

Until this happened I was delighted with it, the fluid resistance feels good on the bike, it's not too noisy and felt solid enough (!). I have also been using Trainer Road with it, which is excellent.

iron-clover

BigMat wrote:

I'm looking at buying a turbo at the moment. The Elite Crono Fluid ElastoGel looks good but is it limited in terms of resistance? I wouldn't be too bothered about not being able to do all out sprints on it, but would realistically be looking at doing sustained intervals at up to 500W and would like to be able to put in the occasional kick up to say 1000W. Would I need something else for that sort of thing? The CycleOps Fluid 2 is the other one I have been looking at.

Any comments would be gratefully received.

I've had one since summer now and have been using it to simulate TTs and sprint intervals back then, and have also used it a couple of times with a couple of sufferfest videos during my clubs turbo night now winter's here, and I'd have said it can handle 500W for definite, but I'm not so sure about 1000W unless you have really tall gearing. I normally use it with a biggest gear of 50x12, and I find my TT effort (between 250-300W) is on the third smallest sprocket, and the other two are a fair amount harder but sprinting in the biggest gear it tends to try and spin out when I really go for it, although admittedly I can only keep it going for around 5-10s before the cadence starts creeping back down, at which point it becomes quite hard.

There is a really useful site I found displaying the power curves of different turbo trainers, and their curve for the Elite fluid standard seems about right from what I remember of the curve on the box, and their max was 800W at 50kph.

I'm not the most powerful rider though, and for the vast majority of what I use a turbo for it's absolutely fine, and its quietness and simplicity to set up and get going are a big bonus for me, especially after having people peeking out of their windows when I cranked up a cheapy magnetic turbo in the garden- it sounded like a plane taking off!
Now the chain and spokes are the loudest parts of the system which is fine by me!

bigmat

Cheers - sounds like it probably would have been OK but I might have had to tailor my routines a bit. Went for the CycleOps in the end which I'm hoping will put me somewhere in the middle of its power range (bearing in mind as well I have a compact on one of my bikes).