I think you guys are being a little hard on SDRider. He just has a bike that he likes and got a little off-topic. At least that's my take.

Somehow...I don't think that's going to happen.

And he didn't know what a tallbike was, then insulted it!

OK, so maybe bringing an R600DuraAce reference into this was a little harsh on SDRider. Or maybe not.

:beer: Don't know why a bunch of people I've never met decided to jump all over my ass but whatever makes you feel good.

It looks unsafe. Personally, I think you'd have to be nuts to ride it on public roads. My .02

Hey Dan Burkhart,

See, I see it like this. If you have a store (no matter what kind) you should carry what the people will buy. You get 10 people stop in to look at bikes and say you sale 4 bikes, at $1000.00 each. You make what $250.00 or more. Know what if you carry a cheaper bike like the Denali. and you sale 6 to the other 10 people that stop in, at 150.00 each. Now you would have made $4900.00 in sales (thats 4 at $1000.00 and 6 at $150.00) and took home $306.00 or more.

See I have been in bike stores and seen many people come in look around and then leave. Saying that that bikes cost way to much. I am sure you have seen, and heard this a lot. So why don't the bike stores carry a bike or two that Wal-Mart or Toys-R-Us carry. This way you make more money and the person knows that they can bring it to you for repairs as well. Most people that buy Wal-Mart bikes just get a new one when the old one breaks. Because they don't think that a bike shop will fix a bike that was from Wal-Mart. All the bike shops are hurting them self by not carring these cheaper bikes. And the public is missing out on cycling.

OK that all I have to say about that.... NOT

Damn... I guess I'll just have to wait for La-Z-Boy to get into the bike biz.

Look at it this way: You ass makes people feel good.

You're like Shakira.

Yep. I did this a couple of years ago when I was looking to get a bike. I figured ther had to be something in the 300-400 dollar range that I could pick up and start riding on. Boy was I surprised when the cheapest road bikes (which were well outnumbered by the mountain bikes) were 750$ or so. Fortunately I was able to get a great deal on my Univega on ebay and was able to start riding that way.

Which really makes me wonder why there are so few bikes in that price range. It seems like it would be full of potential buyers.

This thread is interesting....I've not read every post....have to do some work...but it suggests some questions...that may be a little off topic .....

1) Is there a market (I think there is a need) for a simple, inexpensive (not cheap) bike?

2) what would it be spec out as and still keep it inexpensive.....my partial spec would be steel frame, rear derailler (get 8 speeds easy) no front derailler, flat bar (easy to put various shifters/brakes on). I would except more weight in frame for better components. No fake springs, suspensions etc.

3) my take on LBS not handling cheap bikes....I think that by buying at a LBS people expect a level of quality is higher than at a boxstore...even if they are paying the same price. This makes keeping customer expectations fulfilled hard. Perhaps if a simpler, better quality bike can fullfill both needs.

What do you think??

I don't know what sort of profit margin you think LBS's have, Cig, but it's a lot higher than that, 40% or so if what I've heard is correct. Obviously they have to account for time to assemble, pay employees, provide free lifetime tuneups, etc... but I think your numbers are way low.

You point, of course, is still valid. There IS a point of diminishing returns though - the $30 (smaller margin, I'd guess) that you make on a $150 bike is not worth the cost that you'll put out trying to maintain a level of service worth your reputation. So in the sense you get what you pay for - Walmart sells cheap bikes and makes less on a bike than the LBS, but they don't have the same reputation for quality and service to maintain (which of course digs into your profits). This is true in other areas - I read an article about Snapper (IIRC) lawnmowers turning down a deal to sell with Walmart, because they felt that between the price concessions Walmart wanted and the lack of dealer support, that it would end up costing them more than the additional gross profit would bring (at least in the long run).

EDIT: That article: http://www.fastcompany.com/magazine/...n_snapper.html

Thing is, I do not have the floor space to be all things to all people. I have defined my niche, and competing with the big box stores at their end of the market simply does not fit.
Most people who buy low end bikes are not as capable or knowledgeable as yourself on their maintenance, and if I sold high volumes of them, my service department would be kept busy doing nothing but free tweaks and adjustments.
I do not consider myself an elitist snob or anything like that. If someone feels the cheapest bike on my floor is too expensive, I will politely direct them to where they can buy bikes that are within their budget.
Most people who venture in to a bike shop are hoping to find something better than Wal Mart's offerings. I can't hope to compete with them on price no matter how many I sell, so I have to offer something different.
Dan Burkhart
www.boomerbicycle.ca

I don't either.

However, I've owned plenty of crappy bikes and know that they are a horrible suggestion for anyone starting out in cycling. Primarily because they will not work well consistently under regular use and it becomes very frustrating to constantly return a bike to a bunch of idiots who don't know what to do with it or worse a real bike shop who's employees will scoff at the crappy components and berate the owner for buying it in the first place.

Can a cheap department store bike be a suitable commuter bike? Yes, apparently it can...if you know your way around a bike and aren't afraid to work through the problems it will present you with.

Personally, I think it's better to spend a little more and get a quality bike.

Flame away knaves. :D

I see your point Dan and SdRider. But you could offer a cheaper bike with a tuneup add on package. That way you'll cover your repaire cost. That way everone will win. I feel that as far as the Denali goes. That if it was put together right in the first place it would be a very good bike for people wanting to see if they wanted to ride or not.

So far the Denali has meet my needs and is a very solid bike for $158.77. All that I have done to it is very minor adjustments. Which if it was sold by a bike shop, would have all ready have been done. Yes it has MTB drivetrain and shifters. But to the non-road bike person, who would know. No one that's who.

To answer the qustion about fixing the front derailer. I moved it down and alined it to the chain.
I all so replaced the front derailer cable, because when I was pulling the cable tight it broke. Damd cheap cable. I all ready had a good cable. So no cost there.

I did 33.64 miles on the Denali today with a average speed of 18.9 mph. This gives a total of 444.29 miles so far.

So lets recap:
Got it home, Adjust breaks, adjusted rear derailer, adjusted seat and handlebars. Cleaned all bearings and relubed with White Lithium grease. Greased all cables.

Readjusted the derailers 4 times in 350 miles. Now there seem to start settling down.

So now I am just going to ride the bike for a while and see what comes up next.

I've found this to be an interesting thread. It's far more useful to see how and why a product fails than simply saying it sucks. I'm interested in how the experiment turns out. My first road bike was a {gasp} western auto murray. I suppose it sucked but I rode it a lot and didn't have any actual component failures. Of course this was over 35 years ago, friction shifters where not as picky as index shifters. I managed to make the few little adjustments to keep it in tune.

My next road bike, my first real one, was a peugot and it was a night and day difference from the murray.

Probably because you popped in to post a pic of your expensive (comparatively) bicycle and said "MINE'S BETTER!"

However I may disagree with your tact, or lack thereof, I do in fact agree with your supposition. I believe it's better (financially as well as for sanity sake) just to spend more to start with. Not everyone could afford your LeMond, but surely most folks can come up with a little more than the Denali's buy-in, which usually buys a much better bike.

But that's the beauty of Cig's test. We get to see if our bias towards low-end bikes is founded, or not. For now, I'd say that the amount of adjustments Cig has had to do would practically render the bicycle "broken" for a great majority of the public... But I'm very intrigued to see how much value he can get out of it when cared for well.

See this is the beauty of the internet. Any one can join in on any topic. I Love it.

I said that I know I was going to catch hell for doing this review on the Denali. But as you can see I have not had to much of that at all. This surprises me more so then the test has.

I think the problem with cigtechs comment on offering an inexpensive road bike is offering 2006 technology at 1975 prices. If they offered 1975 technology they could have a decent bike. Bicycle mechanics have to make a living too and after awhile you have to wonder when the labor of maintaining something costs more than the product, most consumers are not going to think it is worth it so you are still back to the origional quandry of trying to satisfy the low end customer. By the time you take the eco-road bike in for 4 or 5 tuneups you could have gotten a entry level road bike of decent quality. If you include the tune-ups as part of the package the bike mechanics will be spending all their time doing free work, the eco-road bikes will be a bike shop parasite.

The picture changes when you equip that eco-road bike with low maintainance friction shifters and stuff but that's so yesteryear.

I am fixin' to pick up my one road bike from the shop because I had a shifting problem I was unable to diagnose and fix. In the olden days I could maintain every aspect of my nice road bikes with a couple of spanner wrenches, a few cone wrenches, and a spoke wrench or two, and a freewheel tool (they called them freewheels back then and you could replace the individual cogs). I had not yet recieved my zinn maintainence book and the bicycle magazine maintainence book is only good to line bird cages with. I will find out soon what the problem was, I'm sure it was simple, but for the week I was tweaking it I cursed the existance of index shifters, and campanolo for that matter.

A lot of consumers do not need or want anything but an eco-bike, a lot of bicyclists would be satisfied with downtube friction shifters too.


What's my point? Wally mart (or bike shops) COULD sell inexpensive bikes, but to make them reliable they would have to be simple and for some reason nobody wants to do that.

BINGO. You hit the nail on the head.If cheap bikes stuck with simple materials and technology, they would work fine and last a long time. If they stuck with steel frames, horizontal dropouts, nutted axles, friction shifters, and ridgid forks and frames, they could be sold very cheaply, and be very low maintenance, reliable machines. However, people want their cheap bikes to look and work like the expensive ones, so they get poorly aligned frames which cannot be compensated for with vertical dropouts as they can with horizontal and nutted axles. They get cheap suspension with non replaceable bushings, etc. etc.
Simple is good at the low end of the scale.
Dan Burkhart
www.boomerbicycle.ca

Dan, I agree. The Commuter does not need to be over built. But that is what people want. All my bikes have had vertical dropouts. The 2 huffys I have had feel into the group of poorly alined frames. As a matter of fact I did check the Denali's frame. And find it to be dead on alinged. Maybe I just lucked out and got a good one. I even check the rear end to see if the axle (drop outs) where alined and there where just 2mm off. So I fix that. only one drop out (rightside) was bent in at the bottom. Now there are dead on. Did this the first day. Sorry I forgot to post that fix. But most people would not know how the check this, let a lone fix it.

Yesterday I got the 6 year old a new bike so today I took him out for a ride. Got him a 18" BMX style bike. Started teaching him the rules of the road. He did 3 miles with me at about 10 mph. Not to bad for a 6 year old.

Good for you. Some of the best times I had with my kids,(they are grown up now with kids of their own) were on bikes. If he sees you on your bike, he will always want to go with you now.
Dan Burkhart
www.boomerbicycle.ca

Yep, we just did another 2.19 miles. I just thought he was done. :lol:

Well, that wasn't really my intent. Sorry if my post came off that way.

It is an interesting test though. :beer:

well I just got my non-walmart bike back from the LBS Thank god just in time for 40 miles. It is sitting at 50cents a mile.

Update
1580 miles only one broke spoke one tune up. Yes that is 10 cents a mile if your not counting MTC.
I adjusted the seat and it is more enjoyible.
I wonder why they would weld the handle bars? (sorry if I did not see why).
I like this bike because it was the first brand new road bike for under 200 bucks I could find.

If you don't have the floor space why not just put it in storage and have a picture on the wall or something. You could even put a tarp on it and store it outside as I am sure no one will steal it. I have placed this sucker in all sorts of ghettos and not even a scratch.

P.S I have seen the Roadmaster or whatever selling for 80 bucks at a LBS. They also have 400 dollar road bicycles new.