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Need a commuter


isitafox

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Right lads, the ride to work scheme should be opening for us next month so I'm looking at getting a new bike to ride to work on. Currently doing it in my Heckler and I love the comfort but the tyres and weight make it a bit of a drag but I don't know what to go for?

Not a big fan of drop bars so if I go for something roadieish is there an alternative? Potentially looking at spending upto £700 though I may push that if the right bike comes along.

(gonna try hard not to sack a road bike off and just get a fatty, they'd do the job right?!)

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What's your budget? I advise against a fatty they are only really anygood in certain conditions, which is bad conditions essentially.

I'd advise looking into the Planet X range, look into the kaffenback and london road. The kaffenback is basically a steel road bike with disc brakes and the London road is a fat tyred, disc braked road bike with mudguard and pannier mounts. It's also got new Sram rival 11 speed on. I believe both can be specced up with flat bars rather than drop bars.

Other than that I'd suggest looking into cyclocross bikes as they tend to be a slighty more relaxed road geometry while typically running disc brakes with enough clearance for mudguards and/or chunky bobbly tyres.

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I know some people will probably say I can get something a bit cheaper that's still suitable but I do like the look of that Orange. Just found out that the scheme is open now as well so will call down to have a go of it at least!

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Change of plan, Roadrats won't be available until March at the earliest so I've gone for one of these http://www.urbancyclery.co.uk/products/copy-of-genesis-croix-de-fer-10-2015-rosso-red with a slightly modded spec. Gonna be setup with flat bars instead of drops though I'll keep the drop shifters in case I change my mind. Decided steel was definitely the way to go!

post-24247-0-82514600-1412950319_thumb.p

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  • 3 weeks later...

Already posted a pic of this but I thought I'd comment in here. Picked the bike up on Friday and I love it, not a bad weight really for a steel setup in my eyes (around 26lb) and the bars feel awesome. The bike shop had originally specced some cheap silver Shimano flat bars straight out the Madison catalogue but they weren't available so ended up with a set of black Salsa bars, brakes are dual piston cable discs (as in both pads move when you pull the lever unlike normal cable jobbies) though they'd run out of compressionless outer so I need to call back to get that swapped and the saddle is awful so I'm gonna order a Spoon in the next few weeks. I also swapped the pedals for my spare Echo TR flats though I reckon something like some MG-1's are in order, already want to start upgrading stuff like sticking a set of Hope hubs on there!

Rode it to work this morning and unsurprisingly it's so much faster than my Heckler and easy to maintain that speed, really looking forward to getting some miles in on it.

post-24247-0-71286900-1414307893_thumb.j

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