Winter Cycling - Possible winter bike?
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coffeecake
10-14-09, 02:26 PM
So I'm going to look at a Norco Cherokee later today. I looked it up on bikepedia and it comes with pretty low-end components.
http://img1.classistatic.com/cps/kj/091012/722r5/2269l64_20.jpeg
She wants $50 (Canadian). Nice price, or crack pipe?
plodderslusk
10-14-09, 04:30 PM
I suspect the brakes to be quite bad, I would not go for that bike at any price.
Geeze . . . out here in the Atlantic people would be looking for $80-$100 for that. I don't $50 to to bad, but then again . . . I'm new at this.
Arrowana
10-14-09, 09:43 PM
Looks fairly similar to the Huffy I rode last winter. If I kept up on maintaining it, it would have been perfectly fine. Definitely check out the brakes, I got the pair on the Huffy to work great despite being even cheaper looking than the ones on that bike, but it often is a challenge to get cheap brakes to work well in my experience.
Should work OK for a winter bike, but like you said. Low end components. Around my neck of the woods I can get a better used bike for 25-35 USD at the thrift store. But 50 bucks is OK. The frame looks good for a winter bike. It looks like it has steel wheels which are heavy and don't stop very well as the metal is too slick. The brakes might work OK with better brake shoes. Inexpensive aluminum wheels are around 30-35 bucks each.
If the frame is the right size and it is difficult to find used bikes around your neck of the woods, then I would go for it. Unless you can buy an inexpensive Walmart bike with an aluminum frame and aluminum wheels for under 100 dollars.
coffeecake
10-14-09, 10:55 PM
Went and checked it out; it's in decent shape but still kind of banged up. Irrelevant anyways as it's too small for me. I am thinking I'll just stick studded tires on the alu hybrid I've got.
You're better off commuting on the cat. Natural fibre (cat hair) breathes, plus four-wheel (or paw) traction.