2nd Hand Road Bike Advice

[SpiderPig]

A couple of months ago I got on a bike for the first time since I was a kid to start training for a 600+ mile charity ride to be completed over a week next summer.

Knowing little more about cycling than when I last rode at the age of 10 (I'm now 25) I headed to my local Halfords, avoided all the scary looking road bikes and picked up a hybrid Carerra Subway for £180 to start building up my fitness (which was then non-existent).

I've enjoyed riding the bike and it's built up my cycling confidence but as I'm starting to move up to 40-50 mile rides I'm wondering if the bike's hybrid nature is making it harder work than necessary?

I'm thinking of moving up to a proper road bike and with about £200-250 to spend I was planning to go the second-hand route through ebay. My problem is that with zero knowledge of bikes I'm finding it very hard to pick through the numerous options so if anyone could recommend some trusted makes, models and features that I should be looking for then it would be much appreciated?

Thanks

 

[marinyork]

Nice username.

I do not know much about the carrera other than quite a few people use it to commute on here. Obviously use a road bike (I'm still stuck on a hybrid after 3 years). One thing I would say is if you don't use clipless then do that.

 

[peanut]

bit of an open question really. Like saying recommend me a second hand car

Suggest you search for men's racing bikes on ebay then use the 'item nearest you' data sort and when you have got a list of bikes within say 25 miles of where you are post the link and we'll give some advice as to what might be suitable

 

[swee'pea99]

+1

Also, make sure you know what size frame you need, then google anything that comes up, then anything you fancy, exchange an email or two with the seller to find out what kind of a person you might be dealing with.

 

[SpiderPig]

Hi,

A quick search turned up these options in my price bracket and either in my local area or with a delivery option:

Giant SCR3: http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&ssPageName=STRK:MEWAX:IT&item=250327478860

Ventura: http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&ssPageName=STRK:MEWAX:IT&item=140282499751

Trek: http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&ssPageName=STRK:MEWAX:IT&item=280287734469

Can anyone give me some more info on these? I'm not necessarily planning to rush out and buy one of them straight away but it'll at least help me know what to look out for in the future.

Also, for my price range what are some good bike makes to look out for when searching through ebay/classifieds as I really am quite clueless?

Thanks

 

[peanut]

forget the third bike. Its probably over 10 years old and looks like it has been coddled together with very old componants .

The Giant and Ventura are both constructed with very poor components . Basically all the componants are the cheapest no-name parts the bike shops can source in sufficient bulk to offer a complete bike at a sub£300 price.

of the two I would go with the Giant myself .The frame is reasonable quality and can be upgraded a bit by carbon forks and some better components later.You should be able to get your money back if you sell it later

My advice is don't rush into this. You are unlikely to be happy with either bike after about 6 months when you start comparing with what you could have.
Have a bit of patience and keep looking.

Its Christmas and lots of people will be getting new bikes and want to sell their existing bikes cheap.

 

[PpPete]

Giant is probably quite good, although I'm not a fan of Sora gears....
Avoid the Ventura
Not really enough info on the Trek, but it's a well known brand.

 

[peanut]

heres a quality bike with a good frameset and quality components. If it sold for £250 or less it should be a bargain.
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Cannondale-R1...ryZ33503QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

 

[4F]

Well out of those 3 I would say the Giant SCR is the best one. A collegue of mine bought a ventura and to be honest it is not up to much so I would avoid that and the Trek looks a lot of money for the age. The other thing to be familiar with is the groupsets as depending on what the bike is fitted with will determine the price. I should say that second hand you should be able to get something with shimano tiagra or if you are lucky shimano 105 within your price range.

You can fine tune the search in e bay to your frame size and then nearest first and then go from there. I picked up both my road bikes of e bay and if you are patient you will be should be able to pick up a bargain.