cheap commuter
 

anyone up for a huffy mountain bike challenge. torch and bicycle tools help :lol:

I hate to be a first posting negative poster, but what are you looking for? Someone to out-trailer-park you?

i.e.

roashru: My bike is sooooo cheap.

Audience: "how cheap is it?"....

What's wrong with using a Huffy mountain bike for a commuter? I use a Huffy Stalker as my main winter and poor weather commuter and it is great at it. If you treat a Huffy with even half as much TLC as you do a LBS brand bike you will have an exceptionally hearty commuter for far cheaper. Don't knock the huffy. :notamused:

Nothing. But what is the OP actually asking?

:bike:

What do you mean by challenge? Is it a challenge to go out and buy a Huffy?

Crap I lose, I just bought a Devinci.

Apropos of Huffy, the local Safeway - Safeway! - had cruisers for Christmas, $150. There was a leftover for sale last weekend in the seasonal clearance stuff, $75.

You can buy a used vintage mountain bike for less and it will be a higher quality bike. I just bought for my daughter a vintage specialized rockhopper (nice bike) for $50. She likes it a lot.

Floriduh? Wally World One speed .

See Huffy Toss : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AFn3ndv71qc

Searching out a decent used bike for cheap is not necessarily everyone's idea of a good time. I understand that. But you don't need to buy the first one you see, or any of them. And no matter what you find, you are going to have to decide whether you're going to do all the work on it yourself or have a bike shop do it. And you have to face the fact that many bike shops will be less than thrilled at working on an older bike.

Buying a cheap new bike is a little different. You can find one right away; no time is wasted trying to find the right one. Then you have to decide whether you're going to do all the work on it yourself or have a bike shop do it. And you have to face the fact that no bike shop will be thrilled at working on a really cheap bike.

As for reliability, it's a gamble either way, and if you don't know about bikes you're going to have to learn a lot either way. A good old bike may have worn out parts that are hard to replace; and cheap new one is built entirely of junk parts that require constant attention and probably have to be replaced pretty soon. In general, I think you're better off going with a used bike.

What's the "challenge", specifically?

Some Huffys ride OK if the tires are decent. Be sure the brakes work. Some cheap bikes have brakes that are so bad that they can't work with any amount of work put into them.

But they don't have those at Safeway.

Hiya all, may as well make this my first proper reply as a newbie to the forums (looks good so far).

Huffy challenge huh, my experience with them......well, let's say i got to bring out the tools lol
We got our lad a Huffy Bmx from Wally world as someone " heads hang in shame :innocent: " split the steerer tube on his bike the week before & couldn't get a replacement fork in time for following weekend. Anyway, mom brought said bike home with lad, lad was chuffed and off he went out with a smile. Me, being the doting dad, told him that we would strip it down at end of fall as it was needing a bit of tlc. Could tell straight away that the BB was a tad rough lets say. Opened it up and to my amazement (well, not really too amazed) to notice that no grease what so ever had been applied to the BB, stripped the Headset and yup....you guessed it...no grease! I was quite flabbergasted to find the wheel bearings had been greased lol
Anyway, rebuilt bike and now good to go. and yes, of course i went to the shop. Only to be told to bring it back as was under warranty but could take up to a month. Well of course i told them where they could go and just said quietly that they were lucky my kid come to no harm through an unsafe bike.
I personally wouldn't blame the build quality of Huffy and similar store bikes, but more how they are assembled (my 6yr old could do a better job).

And no idea, what the OP was after but hey, that's my Huffy experience :eek:

As for a cheap commuter, i not long purchased (as winter bike) a '91 Spec Hardrock $50 (bottom end components as in GS200). But bike is all original, excluding the seat and really quite good condition overall.
I could of got a season or two out of original pads & cables but replaced them straight away as i do with most 2nd hand bikes. I did give it a complete strip down & rebuild but only because i like to tinker.

Phew, first post/reply and what a long one eh guys & dolls....apologies :hug:

Check out the Velo Cheapo 2016 Contest.

http://www.bikeforums.net/classic-vi...po-2016-a.html
http://www.bikeforums.net/classic-vi...-makeover.html

It is pretty open ended. Just the idea is to build up a bike and ride it. A Huffy might even be allowed.

Or we could start a huffy (or other big box store brand) specific one here in the commuting forum... just figured I would point that out. It could be called "The box bike build challenge" or something...

Just replaced my old peddles with a new pair from Wally world (Bell Kicks 300), cheapest pair they had. My old right peddle was clicky, not sure how old they were so I replaced both to be safe.