Recommend a pair of hybrid bikes

m_stan

Looking to get a pair of hybrid bikes - ladies and gents - in the 600 price region. Can someone recommend something to suit general leisure cycling on roads and pathways that would comfortably take a kids seat ? Price range is flexible from 6 to 800 ish.

What should I be looking for - gears, suspension etc ?

Thanks,

m_stan

This for example looks good to me - good brand gears, lots of em, front and saddle suspension etc. And well within budget. Thouhts ?

daymobrew

Raleigh has lost its good reputation in recently, producing lower end bikes made in China.

I recommend that you visit a bike shop and tell them what your needs are. They'll match them to a bike.
You don't need suspension - it only adds weight to the bike and is something that can fail.
You could look at the City Bike range at Cycle Superstore. Be sure to leave room in the budget for the child seat (115 euro).
The Giant FCR3 looks good - it'll be easy to ride.

Dirk Gently

daymobrew wrote:

The Giant FCR3 looks good - it'll be easy to ride.

I have this one myself. One of the first things I done was spend 80 euro on a new saddle, you feel every bump on the road. Not sure this might be something the op would be looking for.
It's basically a road bike, strictly good road surface cycling only. It might limit the OP if he wants to add a baby seat and perhaps limit the places in which he might be able to cycle.

It is a great bike to use for training or commuting but maybe a hybrid with ticker tyres would be more comfortable and more sturdy for family cycles.

davej

His and hers Trek T30 Navigators should do the trick?

By the time you have gotten good locks, seats and other bits and pieces you would probably be in the €600 mark or just under..

davej

Wez

Had a go of my mates new Claud Butler today, VERY nice ride! Really like it, and I've got my racer and fixie for around town and this is somethign I'm considering making this my 7th bike!

Can't find a price online but he just bought it for about 450 in a shop, I'll find out where if interested!

Nice and strong too, he's hopping up and town curbs etc on it and it's going strong! Actually his second, first one his mate 'lost'..

antoinolachtnai

I got a Giant Expression LX a month or so ago, and I really enjoy it. It's around EUR 425. There is a cheaper version of this at EUR 300 (the DX). Either of these includes stuff you will need like mudguards and rear carrier. If you buy a bike without these, you'll have to pay more to get them, obviously.

Talking to the guy in the shop, the difference between one bike and the next is the frame (steel is bad, aluminium alloy is better because it is less weight for the same strength) and the components, including the tyres, derailleurs and the gear shifters. All shifters and derailleurs come from Shimano from what I can tell. They do different ranges. Acera range is better than Tourer range. (i don't know why it is better, i am just reliably informed of this). lever shifters are better than twist-shifters. Some Hybrids have puncture-resistant tires, some don't. Obviously this is a good feature to have.

How far up the range you go really depends on how much spare money you have and what mileage you will do. If you do a lot, spend more, if you don't, it might not be worth it, I guess.

Is one bike brand better or worse than the other? The guy in the shop didn't think there was much to choose between Raleigh and Giant bikes. All Giant bikes are made in China (Taiwan) as I understand it. You can't judge a bike by the continent it's made on.

My own impression is that Raleigh, the uber-brand of my youth had a bad period during the 90's but is a serious contender in the mid-range bike business again. I'm sure this could be disputed.

Kids seats are outside my area of expertise, but I can't see why these bikes wouldn't be suitable for this.

Best idea is to get down to the bike shop and try a few bikes out.

m_stan

antoinolachtnai - great info and sound arguments - thank you ! Thanks to everyone else for their input too.

m_stan

I'm debating the suspension topic with a friend who as a bike with suspension. He has it 10 years with no problems.

Can anyone comment on suspension in particular ? How useful is it, is it worth paying for and how often does suspension generally fail ?

Thanks

davej

With a €600 budget it's not really feasible afaik. Also if you are mainly going to be on the road it will only hinder you.

davej

antoinolachtnai

I don't have it, though there's some sort of spring under the saddle. Don't know if it would help. It would certainly add more weight. I hear that reliability is an issue for cheap ones. But I'd ask the guy in the shop. They will probably tell you the truth about reliability if you ask them. From their point of view, the fewer repairs that come back to be done, the better.

blorg

I would avoid suspension personally, especially at that price range. Suspension seatpost generally not much of a problem though.

Thomas_B

This thread may be of use: http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2055108452

I'd second the Trek and the Giant recommendations. I would strongly recommend against buying a bike that has knobbly tyres or no mudguards and rack.

I ride the base model Giant Expression -- around 300 euros (think the DX is a bit more expensive). I've done up to 50 miles in a day on it, and it works fine for me.

I spent a week on a Trek T30 this summer, and found them to be great bikes. Gears and brakes felt a little bit more well-engineered, but personally I think many people go overboard with the component-fetishism -- the bog standard mech on my Expression works fine.

I wouldn't go for suspension on a hybrid bike because of (a) energy loss (b) extra complexity and chances of things going wrong.

Of course, the best advice is to go to a bike shop and try out different bikes.

Best of luck in your search, and I hope the three of you have many enjoyable cycles ahead of you.

Ghost Rider

That's a very good point. Where the bike is manufactured might once have been significant, but nowadays it's not - or not necessarily. Not only are most Giant bikes manufactured in Taiwan, but it turns out the company itself is actually Taiwanese! (For years, I had thought it was an American company with manufacturing facilities in the Far East.) Similarly, Raleigh bikes haven't been manufactured in England for a long time.

The same thing applies to brands as to countries of origin i.e. the old wisdom doesn't apply. For the most part, you can no longer identify a brand name with quality. Nowadays, a company will not specialise in either high-end or low-end products; instead it will cover the whole range. The thinking is that the branding on the higher-end bikes (e.g. the ones you see in the Tour de France) will increase the sense of value of the lower-end ones.

I am sure there are manufacturers to whom this does not apply but the "big names" e.g. Shimano, Giant, Trek, Cannondale, Specialized all follow this pattern. That's not to say their lower end products are of poor quality - just that the brand offers a level of reassurance to the consumer that is somewhat imaginary, having "trickled down" from the brand's higher-end, more expensive products.

antoinolachtnai wrote:

Is one bike brand better or worse than the other? The guy in the shop didn't think there was much to choose between Raleigh and Giant bikes. All Giant bikes are made in China (Taiwan) as I understand it. You can't judge a bike by the continent it's made on.
.

blorg

To an extent, but generally these big "Tour de France" brands _do_ produce quality stuff at the low end.

There are other "non-TdF" brands that produce stuff that is not of great quality, I'm afraid I would dump Claud Butler and Raleigh in there although reports do suggest that the latter may have improved of late. And of course there are several lesser-known brands that produce very good bikes too, although these probably generally concentrate on the higher-end (I'm thinking the likes of Focus or Planet X.)

So it's not necessarily bad advice to go with Trek/Giant/Specialized/Cannondale etc. for an entry-level hybrid.

Giant is indeed Taiwanese but Trek, Specialized and Cannondale (most recently) all have bikes made there, only the very high-end stuff is made in the USA. I would not let "made in Taiwan" scare you at all.

oobydooby

I commute (and tour occasionally) on a Trek T30 and highly recommend it. The ladies' version is great fun too - it feels like being on a Harley Davidson! They are sturdy and reliable, perfect for carrying stuff and would hold a child's seat very well.

You might get a pair second hand from Irish Cycling Safaris and with the money you save, you could buy yourself a fun bike too