Help! Finding a quality 2nd hand bike on my budget?

[Danny]

At this time of year some local bike shops will start discounting their 2008 stock to make room for the 2009 models. So you could ask your LBS whether they are likely to have an end of year sale or whether they have any display models they are prepared to sell off cheap.

Also they may get in second hand bikes in part exchange for new ones, or have board for small ads.

Failing that there are some real bargains to be had on eBay, though often sellers expect you to collect your bike.

You could also see if your local police force has auctions of stolen bikes whose owners they haven't been able to track down.

Finally Edinburgh Bicycle Co-op do the Streetfinder for £249.

 

[louise]

Also see if your LBS will give you a student discount, mine offered me 10 percent when I asked

 

[maxcherry]

There's just so much wrong with that last post, I don't know where to begin....

There's a heck of a lot of dodgey folks flogging dodgey bikes with even more dodgier frames i know i still have the pins in my arms and shoulder to prove it

 

[DJ]

There's a heck of a lot of dodgey folks flogging dodgey bikes with even more dodgier frames i know i still have the pins in my arms and shoulder to prove it

It's still making me laugh!

 

[Danny]

Carrera Subways now on sale at Halfords for £185 - plus you get £20 free accessories.

Like others I am not a great fan of Halfords, but if you are on a tight budget this could be a good option.

 

[standard-issue]

Keep checking ebay, it changes almost daily, I used it to get back on a bike, paid £350 for a £1300 road bike, not a scratch on it!

If your in the market for a new bike and think you'll get the use out of it.

(depending on uni, can be a good idea to have a bike, you can get much better quality accomodation much cheaper if you're not on the doorstep, I paid £15 less per week than my gf and the house was better than my parents place)

Anyway...yeah...if your lucky enough to have a decathlon within reachable distance anywhere chech out the entry level bTwin range, their bikes are real good quality and in the event anything breaks, comes loose etc, you'll get free servicing for at least a year, and they'll replace parts no questions asked, plus the people working in there are usually competing cyclists at an amature or junior national level, so they'll have pretty trustworth advice about the right bike, set up etc, as any good LBS should have really.

Well I have a day off so I'm off for a ride

 

[standard-issue]

Hay you live in nottingham HALLOOO you have raligih, your in the bike making capital of england, go to the raligh website you can get a new bike for what you want, pluss it will come with a gaurentee (second hand wont) youll be safe in the knowledge your wheels wont come off when your travelling at speed (second hand wont) saw this bike http://www.raleigh.co.uk/b_details.aspx?id=447 go new from the off (you don't want to sit on somthing someones bits have been sweeting on)

Stay away from halfords then! (ok for the odd bits and bobs, or if your lucky enough to get the halfords with a real bike tech. I'm told they do exist) but in the case of my housemate, who after lots of hassle from myself and another housemate, still went ahead and bought a Carrera Kracken, as it had a decent SRAM setup and "good review", He first had a hub drop to bits??? beats me how that happened considering he only commuted on it, then roughly 7 miles from nowhere, exhausted from sky diving the cassete fell off???, halfords replaced everything, "set it up" gave it back to him with different, heavyly used knobbly maxxis tyres (flat)??? he went back to get the correct tyres, they gave them him but wouldn't change them, so he got a free set of worn out knoblers (woooo!) A couple of days later te cassette fell off again!

They are pretty good at replacing things but I would hold your breath at it staying together for long. Just get your own tools and get it put toghether right before the warranty runs out!

I'm sure I'll get linched by the Halfords Fan Base (both of them) and I'm sure pleanty of people have had good experiences with them (Someone earlier has had a Halfords Subway for 4 years) I don't think the bikes themselves are the problem, I tink it's more to do with the expertise of the people they hire. If you take advantage of cheap bikes make sure you have the expertise yourself to maintain the bike.

 

[Scoosh]

Calling Mayfayre !
You came on here on 5 October, posted a question, which the CC forummers in their benevolent wisdom have answered with a variety of suggestions (all of them good and valid ) and ...........








............. SILENCE




What's happening in uni-land ?
Even students can be courteous to those who seek to help them

 

[mickle]

If you're anywhere near Leicester we do refurbished bikes for students from £50.

They're decent quality bikes and we probaly sell 50 or 60 to mainly foreign students every year

Or near York, we can hook you up with one of our ex-fleet bikes.

www.companyofcyclists.com

 

[standard-issue]

Typical woman...given up already!

 

[Danny]

What's happening in uni-land ?
Even students can be courteous to those who seek to help them

She's probably still recovering from Freshers Night, or more improbably doing some studying

 

[Hilldodger]

pluss it will come with a gaurentee (second hand wont)

Ours do and they are all fully serviced before they leave and are better set up than the new bikes from some bike shops

 

[ColinJ]

I see people have already mentioned bike thefts!

I went to Sheffield with my stepdaughter when she had her interview at the university and spent some time wandering about the campus while I was waiting for her. I saw chained-up bikes with wheels missing, chained-up wheels with bikes missing, and chained-up bikes-with-wheels which had been completely trashed by being jumped on A year later, my mate's son went off to university there and his mum bought him a new mountain bike to take with him. It lasted two weeks.

I wouldn't normally recommend getting a cheap and nasty bike, but I think there's a good chance that whatever you buy will get nicked or vandalised so in this case I'd say just get something off eBay and replace it with another cheap one when that happens.

 

[swee'pea99]

I see people have already mentioned bike thefts!

I went to Sheffield with my stepdaughter when she had her interview at the university and spent some time wandering about the campus while I was waiting for her. I saw chained-up bikes with wheels missing, chained-up wheels with bikes missing, and chained-up bikes-with-wheels which had been completely trashed by being jumped on A year later, my mate's son went off to university there and his mum bought him a new mountain bike to take with him. It lasted two weeks.

I wouldn't normally recommend getting a cheap and nasty bike, but I think there's a good chance that whatever you buy will get nicked or vandalised so in this case I'd say just get something off eBay and replace it with another cheap one when that happens.

The only thing I'd query is 'nasty'. If you use a bit o' brain it's not that hard to find something genuinely good that just *looks* like crap and won't attract thieves, for not a lot. It does help if you know one end of a spanner from another mind.....

 

[simoncc]

If you want to go off road then you need to be looking at second hand MTB bikes for your price range. However, if you are prepared to stay on-road then a cheap bike new bike from Halfords or Argos will probably do you fine for commuting if you are prepared to maintain it properly with a can of oil to the chain and cables every now and then. And you'd get one for a lot less that £250. For that money for a new bike I think you can get quite a nice machine these days if you shop around a bit. At the £250 level there are plenty of nice bikes such as this one.

http://www.evanscycles.com/products/trek/t10-2008-hybrid-bike-ec001535?style=85262

As mentioned above in this topic, you can sometimes get the most amazing bargains second hand from your LBS or through ebay or local ads. But if you need a decent bike quickly then only having £250 is certainly no barrier to getting one.