I hope those who have been considering buying a bike online would find this useful. I was always a person to support my locals, but every now and again I find myself up against a block wall. I welcome your questions or feedback.

A few weeks ago I took the plunge and placed my first order ever from Bikesdirect.com. I bought a Windsor Tourist. This bike will eventually replace my Jamis Allegro as my primary commuter. Maybe not right away, but eventually. I also have an interest in taking some short over-night touring trips but with the gardening season right around the corner plus raising our chickens, I’ll just have to see how realistic that ambition will become.

I chose the Tourist based on posts I’ve read here on BF and the fact that none of my LBS’s seem to have a lot in the steel-framed line of bikes. Fact is, no one even had an aluminum frame/fork bike in stock!! I have nothing against carbon… just prefer real metal between my legs!! And for $600 and free shipping I figured it was worth a shot.
I had placed the order on a Saturday morning. My bike arrived the following Thursday. Just so you know Bikesdirect requires a signature upon delivery.

Before we begin, for those who have not done a lot of their own maintenance on their bikes (beyond changing flats) I would highly recommend purchasing a copy of Park Tool’s Blue Book of bike repair and maintenance. Amazon.com sells them and it is well worth the money. Even if you have no plans of ever doing a complete rebuild or over-haul, get the book. I bought the book when I had placed an order for some other books/DVDs from Amazon and was able to get free shipping out of the deal.

Anyways, first order of business is unpacking the bike. I would recommend you allow yourself plenty of time for this. Do not rush this simple process! I resisted the urge to pull the bike from the box until the next day after work. I will admit I opened the top flap to see how what the color of the frame looked like. But I waited until the weekend had officially began at my house before ripping into it. Once I finally pull the bike out my youngest children found this to be huge fascination and of course wanted to “help.” By “help” I mean they wanted the bubble wrap to amuse themselves with (they eventually got it).

The bike comes well packaged. I was impressed with the time and care that was invested into packaging the bike and parts. The wheels and handlebars are zip-tied to the frame, with packing foam and bubble wrap everywhere. It was so thick at places I used a pocket knife to cut the foam and/or bubble wrap off, not too mention the zip-ties. Please keep a wire cutters or such like tool handy for this process. We were able to lift the entire contents straight up and out of the box. I spent a good half-hour slowly separating the pieces. It takes time. Don’t rush this or you’ll run the risk of damaging something or loosing parts. Trust me!!

Make sure all the parts are removed from the shipping box. There was a small baggy of parts and a smaller box of parts, too. Somewhere in the mess is an instruction manual for assembly. I followed this somewhat, but I was a little disappointed as to how vague the manual really was. For starters, it appears they printed one manual for both MTB and road bikes. For instance, for the assembly of the brakes, there were directions for caliper and disc brakes. Most of us here know the difference but if you were a total newbie, you’d be left wondering about some things. They also completely skip some items, items that I think were exclusive to the Tourist. After I had the stem and bars installed, and I moved on to getting the brakes working, I discovered that there was a ring that held the front brake cable that should have been in the stem assembly. So I had to remove the stem and slide that ring in. No big deal, but there was nothing in the manual about it.

I took my time and had the bike together in about an hour. It took me another half-hour to adjust stem and seat post. I took it for a spin and it was obvious the brakes needed tweaked some and the front derailer hardly worked at all. The rear was great, but the front was a mess.

This is where the Park Blue Book came in handy. I’ll spare the gory details but I ended up completely taking the front derailer off, re-installing it and starting from scratch with cable tension, limit screws plus moving the derailer height a bit. In the end I was shifting smooth from the small to middle chainring and the large chainring was doable but noisy.

Let it be understood this is my first bike with a triple so maybe that’s the way they are, plus I never had a bike with the integrated brake/shift levers before. So maybe I am in for a learning curve myself here. At any rate, I will wait until my cables stretch after a few miles and then make some more adjustments. I’m sure I can fine-tune the front derailer more than it is.

Another recommendation I can make when it comes to working on bikes: get yourself a bicycle work stand… or make one! This makes stuff like this so much more enjoyable. If you own more than one bike try to find some bucks in you commuting budget to make this happen. I got mine from Nashbar (ever notice that within 20 minutes of buying your first ride a Nashbar catalog shows up in the mail?!). I paid about $80 for mine. We have about a dozen working bicycles here at home (from 16-inchers all the way to adult bikes) and it really helps. Try getting a three-year-old to hold the bike while you work on it…. you’ll learn quick!

Now that I am satisfied with the bike as assembled and tuned I hope this weekend to put some miles on and see how it handles before adding the needed commuting accessories. I have all my gear bought for this rig: Fenders, rear rack (the Tourist actually came with one but I am partial to another brand), computer, lights, the whole nine-yards. I will eventually move the handlebar bag and panniers from the Jamis to this one. But due to going from a flat-bar road bike to a drop-bar road bike, I need to do a good shake-out ride before I am able to trust myself to the new shifting pattern, especially at 4am in the dark on the way to work. I may also change the tires out for something a bit more aggressive, too. I have Ritchey ‘cross tires on the Jamis and they have performed well over the last 18-months. I may purchase another pair since I am really impressed with this tire for commuting.

So folks, hope you find this helpful. If I were to rate my experience with Bikesdirect.com I would give them a 8.5 out of ten, based on delivery speed, packaging and the quality I have seen thus far. They do lack a bit in the printed directions, and I suppose the worst that could happen is you need to have a LBS assemble your ride.

I welcome your questions and feedback. Again, I hope this was helpful to someone.