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The "next shocker" will be when this things falls apart as you ride it down the street. IF you don't get lead poisoning from the cheap paint applied by a 6 year old Chinese child laborer first.

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Actually, many of us would prefer if #1 ingested as much lead paint as possible.

Actually you don't need to ingest lead paint to get lead poisoning. Simply coming into contact with it on your skin for an extended period could cause problems. Come'on guys, my point was, just how good can a 43 lb., $80 bike be? I'm not even sure I would trust riding it on the street. How much could it have cost to produce those brakes that you are hoping would stop you before you enter oncoming traffic. A buck a piece? Is a bike that could kill you (literally) a "deal"?

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It's when you combine the two #5 that the problems start!

Actually, #1 is doubly wrong. Coming into brief contact with lead paint will not cause problems. Lead paint is actually desirable on many items, just not things that your child might chew on. It's ingestion of lead paint chips or dust that is a problem, but if junior is chewing on your bicycle frame the odds are s/he was missing a few genes already and it wouldn't make much difference.

However, there is no indication any of these ever had lead paint so it was just a wasted troll.

How good can a $80 bike be? It can be fine for riding on the paved roads except it's a bit heavy and you'll have a loss of power from the mushy front, and especially rear suspension. A hardtail is a better choice until spending over roughly $380-500 or more on a bike build well enough for rough off-road use. Most of the people you see riding bikes are not riding multi-hundred dollar bikes, unless they're doing stunts or always riding off road. Miracle of miracles, they use their bikes without getting a seatpost up the ass or breaking anything as the so called experts seem to imply will happen.

The other issue is that it was built by a walmart employee and should be adjusted prior to riding it, and then as with all new bikes, readjusted again after the cables stretch and other parts wear in a bit. The majority of problems with these cheap bikes are misadjustments, and this includes the braking performance.

No #4, this bike won't literally kill you, stupidity would kill you. A person who rides any maladjusted bike into oncoming traffic is an rodeo cowboy. That includes a $3000 bike shop bike that you don't have readjusted after a couple months of regular use. Having written that much, this bike is suited only for on-road or very light trail use, for the weekend warrior looking for exercise and who can adjust a bike, not someone racing, putting a lot of miles on a bike, etc.

BTW, did you ever notice how the most snobbish of bike owners who are quick to tell you cheap bikes break, end up continually replacing parts on their higher-end bikes? They upgrade this, that, and the other, then buy another bike because they're still not happy and decide to rebuilt it all again.

In summary, if you have only a limited bike budget, buy an aluminum framed, aluminum rimed hardtail and a set of (usually metric) allen wrenches. Adjust it immediately, readjust it again after a few dozen hours of riding, and again after a few hundred more hours (at the very least). If you can't adjust a bike, exempt yourself from making judgement calls about quality and just take it to a local bike shop to have that done.

dave_c, could you repeat that? I fell asleep after "Actually".

This is NOT a weekend warrior bike or off road bike by any means. Cheap bikes DO break because their components are cheap and construction is shoddy. So basically the wheels can easily be out of true by dropping or going up a curb. If you're wheels make it then the next thing to go will be the shocks because they are cheap and the elastomer in the front or the air spring in the rear easily fail. Next, the cassettes will bend easily and the derailleurs will do the same. I agree you should have your bike checked over in the beginning. However, you just spent $80 on a bike, a tune up will cost you at a minimum $25.

The reason people spend $3000 is to ride it and those who ride it break things. Therefore they have to replace parts. Snobbish or not, this is a cheap bike by any standards. A basic entry bike that will do weekend warrior/light trail use would be $400-500 and will be adjust right from beginning.

Basically, this bike burp sucks and so does anyone who tries to stand up for it.

<table width="90%" cellspacing="1" cellpadding="3" border="0" align="center"><tr> <td><span class="genmed"><b>illegalsmile wrote:</td> </tr> <tr> <td class="quote">Basically, this bike burp sucks and so does anyone who tries to stand up for it.</td> </tr></table><span class="postbody">


Let's look at the facts.

1) It won't be adjusted properly. That's the buyer's burden.

2) If you ride up a curb with any high bike, you have equal chance of warping the rim. Actually, those ancient steel rims are far less likely to be damaged than today's high "performance" narrow aluminum rims, unless you're spending $300 on rims alone. Is that really what someone contemplating this bike is likely to do? No.

3) You really lose only 3 things with this bike.

__A) It's heavy, no racing nor steep hills will be fun.

__B) Initial adjustment is necessary. However, with any bike no matter the cost, you still have to either make or pay someone the same fee to readjust it eventually, unless paying the premium at a LBS to have them pretune it.

__C) It is not suited for rough trail or downhill use, and the rear suspension is an unnecessary extra cost since the whole bike is not suited to any terrain where a rear suspension would be suitable, so it just ends up adding cost, adding loss of power pedaling, adding another point of failure, and adding weight.

Will it last as long as a $500 bike? Of course not, but for it's intended purpose riding on-road or light trails, if kept adjusted it will hold up at least 80/500 as long.

For someone that only rides 80/500 as much, that is a good value, though as mentioned multiple times, in this class of bike the equivalent build but a hardtail is a better option.

This is a starter bike. Claiming you get more by paying 5X as much is a poin... [Truncated]

You can have the last word because you type so much, now go get your rocks off on buying this bike.

C'mon people, dave_c doesn't know the first thing about cycling, as illustrated so eloquently by his novella of a response.

Agreed #9.

There are so many reasons why you SHOULDN'T buy a bike like the one advertised. If you're already going to have it adjusted after purchasing, why not just get a bike-riding friend to help you buy a similarly priced used machine from craigslist?

Plus, you don't want the same bike that dave_c has, even if he's a self-proclaimed "weekend warrior" (aka fat thumbplum who doesn't know the first thing about bikes.)

#13 likes to shop Craigslist for bacon sex