Hey, all. I'm beginning to spec out my Crosscheck and was wondering what you think about this:

Say I spend $400 on the frame
and $300 on wheels

Could I flesh out the rest of the parts for $200, in your opinion?

My only stipulation: I want flat bars. Not sure how that will affect my budget, but let me know what you think. Thanks!

-Sam

I think if you went to town on ebay you could totally do it. You could even consider finding a used mountain bike, ripping all the drive-train and handlebars off and reselling the frame. 9-spd might be hard to find at that price, but 8-spd could be do-able.

Also, doesn't Surly offer a pre-built Crosscheck with bar ends for about $900 now? If you haven't already purchased the frame, you should def. look into this.

for handlebar check out an Origin 8 space bar,
about $25.

Anything is possible. I have a crosscheck that I budget built recently. For wheels, I did the ultegra/open pro's from performance for $200 and love them. First, they look great on the bike. Second the spin really well. Third, the higher spoke count gives me a sense of confidence when riding that I don't have with my low spoke count wheels on my other bike. I you got these wheels, you'd have an additional $100 to add to your budget for the build.

It would be tight even if you go ebay. Does the frame include a fork? If not that's probably about $50-75. If you went with Sora shifters that's around $70 right there. Then there's rd (tiagra ~ $20), fd (tigra ~$10), cassette (8speed ~ $20), crankset (say something cheap like a truvativ elita ~ $ 70), and of course handlebar, cables, housing, saddle, tires, tubes, brakes, and headset.

Cross Check Complete: $929

http://citybikes.com/itemdetails.cfm?catalogId=39&id=9959

This is probably your best bet.

Are you talking geared build? If SS, then maybe, otherwise I think it would be awfully tough to finish the build on $200 no matter how frugal of a shopper you are. I recently finished a very similar build (flat bar cross check) with a mix of parts from eBay, craigslist, LBS, etc. After the frame and wheels, you have to figure that a crankset, FD, RD, shifters, brakes, handlebars, saddle, seatpost, etc. is going to run well over $200. the total cost of mine was ~$850 or so. My big money items were the crankset (LX trekking), shifters (dura-ace barcons with Pauls Thumbies) and wheels (Mavic 719 laced to LX hubs).

If you are not planning to race the bike (probably not with a flat bar set-up), I'd recommend a little less on the wheels so that you have maybe $250 or $275 to spend on the rest of the parts. Even still, you'll have to go mostly with used parts in that price range. Good luck and enjoy.