Originally Posted by
phatkhat74
$600 budget a Haro mountain bike which I bought and did have success with.
The owner mentioned he didn't feel overly comfortable recommending me a road bike because of my size which I was fine with at that time. A few squeaks here and there but it held up to a runtastic 1482 miles worth of abuse (and by abuse I mean my weight, I only ever rode it on the road).
is there a road bike out there that would be reliable for a guy my size?
Yes I am constrained to a budget, $1600 at the time of this writing.
Size wise I'm 355# and 6'2".
When I started riding bikes I was around 375. I rode hybrids for a while because I was scared of road bikes. One day I got passed on a bike trail by a road bike guy like I was standing still and it fueled the drive to get one for me too. I was around 325 lbs when I got my first aluminum road bike. I was scared it was going to blow up or crumple, but it didn't.
Now I'm in the 275 lb range and riding carbon and it is fine as well.
After riding both aluminum and carbon, I'm a big carbon proponent. Many bikes say carbon is only good if you are under 275 or 240 or something, but I feel like it can handle more weight than that. That said, I don't know where that magically number is that takes carbon from being safe to unsafe. It's probably way higher than any of us know, but few want to test it and find out.
The bike I started on at 325 lbs was a Specialized Secteur. This is a great first road bike. It has a very comfortable geometry for bigger folks. Plus the more recent models have the Smartweld technology plus Zertz in the frame and fork to smooth out the ride. So it can be made comfortable.
I see folks recommending steel, but my LBS tells me steel is too flexible for big folks. That it will be noodly under the strength/weight. I haven't ridden enough steel bikes to know. The one thing I do know about steel is they are heavier. And heavier means slower. If you want to go faster, the lighter the bike, the better. That's why aluminum and carbon are so popular. They are light and stiff at the same time.
The main thing to be concerned about at 300+ is the wheel strength. That's where you'll see failures first. You need to have at a minimum 32 spoke wheels. This isn't a big issue because some of the entry level road bikes come with 32 spoke wheels. But you have to make sure that the wheels have been trued and taken up to their max spoke tensions to give you the most strength. Sometimes its hard to find a bicycle shop that can or knows how to do this.
I ended up learning how to do it on my own after having multiple spoke issues with my first few bikes. Cyclocross and Gravel bikes are another option. They are built to be ridden on rougher surfaces than true road bikes and therefore are typically build with stronger materials. Often time they have disc brakes and I've found my disc brake wheels to be stronger than my rim brake wheels.
What brands does your local bicycle shop carry?