Bikes Direct Review

Triathlon Forum
1

A co-work, who is an avid mountain biker with several high end bikes, decided he wanted to test the road bike waters without jumping in too deep. After some discussion and research he bought a bike from Bikes Direct, my first experience with them. I figured if 2 mechanical engineers with 60 year of design and manufacturing experience between us couldn’t make it work we were a lost cause anyway.

The bike was listed as Motobacane Vent Noir with a 105 5900 drive train. $1350 on sale for $829. It was bought 5/5/15 and showed up on 6/3/15.

It showed up in a box with the front wheel removed, the handlebars and seat removed, and the front brake removed. The bike was blocked, taped, and tie wrapped everywhere. It was not cosmetically damaged in shipping. Not a scratch on it.

We assembled the bike and put it in the adjustment stand. The wheels are Weinmann, the cockpit is Ritchey, and the saddle is a no name (literally, no name on it anywhere). The frame has 6061 AL stamped on it. Welds looked sound and clean. 105 5900 shifters, FD, and RD. Tektro brakes, FSA crank (that I have never seen before) and SPD compatible pedals made by Wellgo (RC-713), another “never heard of them” brand. There is a generic assembly sheet in the box that told you pretty much nothing. It was so generic they should have just not included it to start with.

Adjustment

The brakes were taped in a manner that was not readily noticeable, and it stopped them from working. Once the black tape was removed, the pads were adjusted for position, and the cable tension set correctly (front was too tight, back was too loose) they seemed to function fine. Out of the box, even with the tape removed, they were borderline dangerous. One pad was rubbing the tire, the other was rubbing the fairing on the wheel.

The FD was also taped in a manner that made no sense (it didn’t secure anything) and it stopped the FD from working. Once removed it still didn’t work. I ended up releasing the cable and stating over, including adjusting the pitch angle and height, both of which were way off. Once a full set up was done it worked perfectly.

The RD was working but making a lot of noise, and it would not shift to the 27. I adjusted the high and low limits and it got better, but eventually I just release the cable and started over. After doing a full alignment and adjustment the RD was quite and shifting correctly.

Conclusion. You get what you pay for, and Bikes Direct seems to be upfront about things. I would guess that the average garage mechanic would have had a tough time adjusting this bike so that it worked properly. It hasn’t been on the road yet, but it looks to me like it was well worth the 4 week shipping wait, 2 hours of assembly and adjustment time, and $829. Just be aware that it requires some skill to assemble and setup, so if you don’t have the skills and tools you need to add that cost (about $120 at the LBS I would guess). It isn’t an IKEA table and chairs, that is for sure.

2

So nothing was wrong… you just had to do adjustments and finish putting it together? Sounds like every bike I’ve ever built.
It does say on their website when you order, “90% assembled, we suggest taking it to your LBS to finish.”

3

Conclusion. You get what you pay for, and Bikes Direct seems to be upfront about things. I would guess that the average garage mechanic would have had a tough time adjusting this bike so that it worked properly. It hasn’t been on the road yet, but it looks to me like it was well worth the 4 week shipping wait, 2 hours of assembly and adjustment time, and $829. Just be aware that it requires some skill to assemble and setup, so if you don’t have the skills and tools you need to add that cost (about $120 at the LBS I would guess). It isn’t an IKEA table and chairs, that is for sure.

This is not a negative comment to you, just clarifying since text doesn’t always convey properly.

The adjustments and the time sound 100% spot on for any bike taken out of a box and for someone who doesn’t build them daily.

Having built over 1000 bikes from a box over the years (years ago) from couple hundred to couple thousand retail, cost has nothing to do with what you needed to adjust. I could get a cheap bottom of the line beater out on the floor in 20 minutes running great and sometimes a full XTR bike would have taken me 3 hours to get to a point it was running right.

Build 10 of those you’d be knocking them out in 30 minutes and price of the bike wouldn’t have changed.

4

Sounds to me like an outstanding deal and a reasonable expectation for a biked up box. I have never purchased a bike via mail order, but did help a friend put together a tt rig from a well known triathlon/multi-sport web retailer about 5 years ago which took about the same amount of prep to get ready for the maiden ride. I worked at an LBS in college and have been building my own bikes since the 80’s. I came very close to buying a roadie from them recently, but ended up finding exactly what I wanted locally on a last ditch craigslist ad. Let us know how your friend likes the new ride!

5

I wasn’t intending to criticize Bikes Direct. On the contrary, think they are a decent and honest company. I just thought that since they come up in threads once in a while here that a detailed “this is what you’re in for” thread might be worthwhile.

We do mechanical things for a living, things that are very high end and complicated, but neither of us have ever unboxed a bike before, so the experience was new. I assumed it would be for many on this board as well, and it never hurts to know what you are walking into.

Truthfully, I didn’t look at the website close enough to notice the “take it to the LBS” warning, but that is sound advice as well from my experience.

6

I wasn’t intending to criticize Bikes Direct. On the contrary, think they are a decent and honest company. I just thought that since they come up in threads once in a while here that a detailed “this is what you’re in for” thread might be worthwhile.

We do mechanical things for a living, things that are very high end and complicated, but neither of us have ever unboxed a bike before, so the experience was new. I assumed it would be for many on this board as well, and it never hurts to know what you are walking into.

Truthfully, I didn’t look at the website close enough to notice the “take it to the LBS” warning, but that is sound advice as well from my experience.

Actually, I took your review as a “thumbs up” kind of review even though you didn’t actually come out and say it too clearly. From the sound of it, there was nothing really wrong with the bike, you just had to assemble and adjust it. I’m glad to hear that, actually, as I’ve considered them in the past. I have, though, assembled a bike from a raw frame up so I’m not concerned about having to adjust a few things here and there.

7

I wasn’t intending to criticize Bikes Direct. On the contrary, think they are a decent and honest company. I just thought that since they come up in threads once in a while here that a detailed “this is what you’re in for” thread might be worthwhile.

We do mechanical things for a living, things that are very high end and complicated, but neither of us have ever unboxed a bike before, so the experience was new. I assumed it would be for many on this board as well, and it never hurts to know what you are walking into.

Truthfully, I didn’t look at the website close enough to notice the “take it to the LBS” warning, but that is sound advice as well from my experience.

Oh I didnt’ think you were being critical either. I was merely adding in the experience of my pals high end/list price rig from a big name retailer to the equation. Either way you go there is some cursory wrenching that will most likely have to take place…which is why I see BD as such a huge win b/c they crush on price. Let us know how your pal likes the rig once he gets some miles in! For those who can live w/o a big name decal on the side BD is awesome. I have posted here b/f on a few occasions about a friend of mine who has a low end SRAM equipped steel roadie from them that has to be going on season 5 or 6 by now…problem free. He uses it most of the time and saves his 8k rig for race prep rides and race day.

8

I wasn’t intending to criticize Bikes Direct. On the contrary, think they are a decent and honest company.

Really? The company’s whole business model is based on deceiving the public. It buys the rights to brand names of bankrupt bike companies, slaps those names on frames made in China, sets up websites with bogus MSRPs to make it look like the brands are real companies, and sells the bikes through Bikes Direct as though the customer is getting a great deal or the bike is on sale. It could have just advertised the real price on the brand websites.

9

Just as an aside - how long have you been swimming? 3 x 4k per week for a 41 minute HIM swim is not a great result for most triathletes, so I suspect you need to take a look at the structure of your swim training, unless you’re still a pretty new swimmer or really have never trained for real in swimming until more recently.

10

Just as an aside - how long have you been swimming? 3 x 4k per week for a 41 minute HIM swim is not a great result for most triathletes, so I suspect you need to take a look at the structure of your swim training, unless you’re still a pretty new swimmer or really have never trained for real in swimming until more recently.

Talk about a non sequitur. Where did that come from? Did you mean to reply to me and in this post?

11

Just as an aside - how long have you been swimming? 3 x 4k per week for a 41 minute HIM swim is not a great result for most triathletes, so I suspect you need to take a look at the structure of your swim training, unless you’re still a pretty new swimmer or really have never trained for real in swimming until more recently.

Talk about a non sequitur. Where did that come from? Did you mean to reply to me and in this post?

Woops sorry - wrong post! I had 2 tabs open - ignore my post!

12

Let us know how your pal likes the rig once he gets some miles in!

The bike now has about 250 miles on it. He brought it in so I could adjust the cables and check everything and there was nothing wrong that I could find. It seems to be a very good bike for the money. Wayne loves the bike, but hates the pedals, so now we are discussing the pros and cons of SPD-L/Look and Speed Play. He is a mountain bike guy and likes double sided entry, so I’m pretty sure a set of Zeros are in his future, but the jury is still out.