Good luck my friend, dont worry about other people here. Any new bike is a nice bike, i have been in countries where a denali would be considered luxury.

OMG someone on my craiglist is trying to sell one for $500.
http://sacramento.craigslist.org/bik/251684550.html

The flat tire alone is probably worth $300. Overpriced Dinalis show up on Craig's List and eBay with some frequency. For a while I think flipping them was a cottage industry of sorts.

I would say that he/she has lost their mind. The Denali is worth about $199.00 if it was sold at a bike shop. But used and with a flat tire I give 25.00 for it. So I would have parts. :lol:

To night my headlight come uncliped and I had to back track to retrieve it. I didn't mind have to go back for it. But having to come back into that head wind of 16 mph was a bit*h. I know that has little to do with the Bike but man I was mad. Last night the headlight would not turn on. Got home and found out the battery had 0.00 volts in it. So I put it on the charger all night and it was still dead. So I figured that I had not cliped it all the way into the mount after looking at it last night.

I put 46.4 miles on it today just doing a store run and a few other runs, along with the commute. So now I have 1369.3 miles on the Denali. And it still riding strong as the first day I got it.

nice miles...
just wanted to add that i think a few ppl (like myself) still read this post. :)

i'm glad this thread is still going strong!
please keep us updated on how it's going with the denali.

i was at the local walmart the other dayand had a few mins to kill so i stopped by the bike section and was just looking at their roadie bikes. not bad :)

My Wal-Mart doesn't have any.

WillisB, ask them if there every had them. Some of the smaller wal-marts don't carrie them.

I ride with the Kanda tire at 85 to 90 psi. With the tires just 10 psi less you can real feel it. The speed drops by 2 to 3 mph. So always check you tire pressure.

Other then that The Denali is running fine. No miss shifts or hard shifts. I have 1386.2 on it after todays commute.

I went for a fun ride this morning, got 18.9 miles in. The rear derailer needed to be cleaned and lubed again. It was shifting a little off due to sand. And it had rained for the last few days. So I relubed the drive train and hubes. Now the Denali is running fine again.

With the fun ride this morning and the commute miles I have 1426.1 miles so far. I can't wait to get lighter components on this frame. You know that I want Shifter/break levers, but the MTB shifters are not all not bad. A quick flick of the wrist and your in the next gear.

Every drive train has it little quicks. This bike is no different. When going from 3rd to 2nd gear it takes a turn or two before it goes to 2nd gear. All the other gears are like water moving through river. But ever river has it rapides, and on the Denali it's from 3rd to 2nd gear. The only time I down shift to 2nd is just before a tight trun. So most of the time I do not notice it at all. And I only use the 48th chainring. I do not know if it is so for all the chainrings. I'll have to let you know later. I would never used the 28th chainring because it is geared way to low for me. I do think it is due to the MTB rear derailer and when I change it out for a good Road derailer it should go away.

Well had a few days of 60's temps and rain. Now it's back to 78 degs and dry commute.

Relubed the drive train and adjusted the break pads. Had to rerap the handlebar tape. I need to get double sided tape to keep the bar tape inplace. It keeps moving around on the bars. And the break hoods are made of a soft rubber that are starting to crack. So I'll have to replace them before an other 1000 miles. But when I change over to the Shimano ST-3300 7 speed Break/shafters.

Well today I had a tail wind of 14 mph. So I held a 31 mph avage down 3 miles of the commute. Then back off to 28 mph for the rest of the commpute. With the lower 48th/14th gearing on the denali that is a Cadence of 113. Not to bad for a 29 lbs bike. I did air the tires up to 90 psi before the commute. The tires are rated for 80 psi.

On a Alunimum frame with high psi in the tires you feel a lot more road bumps then on the steel frame. Even with 28mm tiers on the bike.

Cleaned the bike this morning and relubed the drive train. It's running just fine. No break downs as of yet. Only one flat tire so far due to the spock puncher. These tire are very good at not leting stuff get through the tire.

I have 1465 miles so far on the bike. The 90 day test is up on Jan 14 2007. So I have 14 days left on the test. Then it's time to replace all the stuff I have said before. I can't wait to see how light this bike will be with real road bike parts on it.

Fun Reading
 

(I am a newbie in this forum) I picked up a GMC TopKick last year so I was very interested to see another GMC covered. My TopKick came with cheap disk brakes which rub a bit. I adjusted them but I expect to swap to cantilever brakes in the spring. When I got a pinch flat by not jumping a curb too well, getting the disk back in was a bit tough. Also I drilled out the valve stem hole a little.

Other than that, and the way some snobs look at me, I'm happy with the bike. Full susp is a bit heavy, sometimes it's touchy to shift properly, but for recreational light trail/mostly bike path riding, it's fine. I have added fenders and a back rack, lights too. I wouldn't expect it to compare to a steel hardtail in any way. but i got it new, for cheap.

I'll be following this thread to see if the bearings go in the denali. That would be the end of the bike I'd guess.

Some people like used. Some don't. Buying something that might be defective is a risky proposition that, personally, I don't do unless I'm forced to. Cig Tech, keep on posting if you can. These long term reports are very useful. A lot more than "mine is better than yours".
...thehick

Thanks TheHick, I did not like the reviews that I seen on the net for the Denali. So I thought I just do a review that covered the whole bike and how to improve it.

Got a wet commute in today. It rained all day here, and is going to rain for the next 3 days. I really like these Kenda Kwest tires that came with the bike. Have not had a flat due to anything geting into the tire. An d I have road through glass and stuff left over from a rack or two. There have a K-Shield built into the tire made of Aramid and Ceramic particles within a green elastomer. I have had nothing get the the tube so far.

Any ways I have 1513.7 miles on the Denail so far.

Hi Cig, this is a great review. I had a cheap Huffy mountain bike from Caldor, another version of Walmart that went out of bussiness a few years ago. Anyway, that bike actually last me for a good 7 years with over 2000 miles on it. I got it in 7th grade (I'm only 21 now) would ride for fun for like 30 miles a weeks. The brake on the bike were great in the sense that they always manage to stop the bike even though I notice that both the brakes were rubbing on the rim just a little bit which doesn't help you go any faster. The shifting was a mess, and for the longest time, I can't get it to shift down to smallest cog. I learn how to adjust a few years later from the internet and manage to fix the problem. The shifting was never smooth and tend to skip the third cog, sometimes it would even jump gear with my permission. Sometimes I'm not sure what gear I was in. Did I mention the bike weight 35lbs?, and this was before suspension became a big hit among walmart bikes. In summary, I thought this huffy was fairly reliable in the sense that it could get from A to point B safely for at least 2000 miles, one of the reason might have been because I only weight around 135lbs. I never had a flat or any mechanical problems with it until I took it apart the other day =). It just not that fun of a bike to ride due to the weight, the bad shifting, the mess-up brake but I still love to ride it cause I like riding no matter what. I wish I have the mechanical skill that you have bikes, that would solve alot of my problems with the Huffy.

The Huffy went into retirement at the end of the summer in 2006 after I put 600 miles on it. My neighbor was having a tag sale so I manage to pick up a Panasonic Sport 500 road bike for $3. I like this bike even better even though it felt a little weird. The shifting on the bike is much smoother, it'll hit every single gear, feel a little more responsive and sportier handling, it's 3 lbs lighter which should help a little. I put a couple miles on it since I got it and it's working great. So yeah that's my experience with cheap bikes.

Yep, a hevay bikes take a lot more leg to get them up to speed. But once your up to speed the extar weight helps you stay there. My PB-14 is a 20 lbs bike, but by the time I added the front and back bags and rack, battery, headlight, and taillight and 1 liter drink it weight was more like 40 lbs. And I road it from 22 to 26 mph on my 34 mile commute every day. So I figured a 29 lbs bike would be about right a commuter bike.

Seems like you have just out ridden all the critics from the early pages of this review. They don't even bother posting anymore in this thread. My hat is off to you.

I started reading this because I'm going to buy the Denali boys version of this bike (24 inch wheels). I been doing a long search for a decent boys bike for my 8 year old son and the only other options were in the $600+ range. That said I don't want stick him with a 28lb bike. Weight is one of the reasons I wanted to get him a better bike in the first place. So I am going to go in a similar route to yours and replace some of the heavier parts with lighter stuff I have lying around. Keep up the good work and let us know what parts you upgrade to too.

I'm still reading and waiting for something to break. pippo is right though not many skeptics posting any more.

My bet is still on the pedals.

Okay, now someone on my craigslist is selling one for $50.
http://sacramento.craigslist.org/bik/257801448.html
I don't know, it's mighty tempting.
I think I might just buy it, I have the extra cash and if I don't like it, or would rather get another bike, I can just resell it, and maybe even make something.

Another thing, can I replace the handlebars without replacing the stem too?

Man I took a look at that $50.00 Denali. Did you see that the seat is about 45 deg nose down and the handlebars are truned way down as well. I was thinking that if it where set up right, that they would not be saling it at all. But if I had road any bike set up like that.... well lets just say "It would down right hurt". It also looks like the left break lever is turned way in and the break pads are way off as well.

Pippo, This would make a good starter bike for a kid. Even if you don't lighter. The hubs on the 700c Denali are XT MTB hubs. There are easy rolling hub. Mine you there are not high speed hubs, but there will roll for every. And you know how kids are, they will just ride up and drop a bike on it side. Even if it has a kickstand. I don't have a scale, but the bike is 29 lbs going by the web. I do know the chaingring is 3.5 lbs and the wheels are about 2 lbs. So if you change them out it will lighten up the bike about 4 to 6 lbs. If you put the Sora ST-3303 shifter on it then there is a 1 lb. you could drop. The forks are 3 lbs, so if you put carbon froks on it you'll save 1 to 1.5 lbs. The head is 1 lb. So switch it out to save a .5 lb. With all that you could get the 26 lb Denali down to about 19 lbs. Hope this helps you out.

Well so far I have 1688.5 miles on the denali. I did a 174.8 miles on the Denali in the pass 5 days. I'm tring to get the 2000 miles in before the 90 return policy runs out. I have till the 14 of January. So I'm ridding my butt off tring to get the 2000 miles in. I have sunday off so me and a few friends are doing a all day ride od 125 miles. My friends still can't belive that I can out ride they high dollar bike on the Denali. I even switch bikes with one of them because he though it was the bike that made it easy to out ride them. He found out that the Denali is 29 lbs and that he just got droped even faster :lol:

Well they already sold the bike.

Well got in 31.7 miles today, wait it's after midnight so that was yesterday.

I was a little late on the 1500 miles bike checkup but did it today after the ride. Anyways, I cleaned and check the drivetrain. The chain is within limits but I am looking at getting a new one now before it goes out of limits. Then took the hubs apart and cleaned and inspeced the bearings. All is well with them. So lubed and reassambled the hubs. Relube the drivetrain. Took the headsaet out and checked it for wear or cracks, found none. Reassambled the headset/handlebars. Cleaned and lubed the shifters. All looked good with them. Check the alinement of the break calipers. Did a quick adjustment to the calipers all is well with them. I did finely get the back break to aline right with the rear tire so there is only 2mm space on both sides of the tire. So that is a plus. Checked the frame for wear found none, no cracks or bent tubes. Checked the rear dropouts for alinement, it was dead on. And checked the wheels and they are still true and round. Removied BB, cleaned and lubed the bearings. All is find with the BB. Took the Pedals off and removed the bearings to clean and relube them as well. I was very suprised to fine nothing wrong after 1700 miles on the bike.

All the maintenance made the bike commute a joy to ride. It road a lot easy to work then the morning ride.

So far I have 1726.7 miles on the Denali.

I got 128.3 miles into day. It took 6.5 hours. That gave me a 19.7 mph average speed. The bike handle well. And after the checkup I gave it yesterday it road a lot better then it had been.

So now I have 1855 miles on the Denali. With 7 days left on the 90 day return policy.

Today on my ride a guy I passed drafted off me for a while. Then we stop for a red light. He was on a Cannondale SystemSix bike. A very Nice looking bike indeed. He asked me what my bike cost and kept looking it over. Once I told him that it was a Wal-mart bike he said "No way". Then I told him that I only paid $158.11 for it. He said it lood like a 1500.00 bike to him. Then said he want to ride along with me after I told him I was doing an other 78 miles or so. So he and my two friends took off for the rest of the fun ride. One of my friends drop out after 85 miles. Then the other had to go get ready for work at 96 miles. That left me and this roadie to finsh off the ride. He was fast but he drafted off me 70% of the time. After the ride we stop at a place to get some thing to eat. Then we parted ways and he still could not beleive that the Denali was a Wal-Mart bike. At almost every stop light we keep get looks from the people in cars. And a few times people would tell us that we had nice bikes. This is also why I never leave the bike out side when I go to the store.

you'll break the 2k mile marker this week
great! ****ing awesome!!
As someone mentioned above, it's funny how all the nay-sayers have dropped from this thread, but rest assured, there are plenty of us cheering for you
I propose we change the title of this thread to "CigTechs Denali Blog" heh