I’m after a cheap thrash about bike and I’ve narrowed it down to these two. The London road is £699 with apex, the hack is £799 with Sora. Anyone ridden both by any chance?

Don’t know how much googling you’ve done but there are heavily reduced old-stock Hacks in a few shops, my Tiagra equipped Hack 2 was £650 and I think there are some even cheaper at the moment.

I have a Hack, it’s my main bike mileage wise as I commute on it (32 miles a day), it’s my winter road bike (did Festive 500) and also used it for Paris-Roubaix sportive. Other than heavy OE wheels it’s spot on.

I bought a London Road frame for the other half. The seat tube was laugh out loud out of spec. They sent a replacement which wasn’t much better so I got my money back.

Have a look at the Mango Point AR too

If you think you would fit a medium frame, there is a clearance XLS (carbon frame) for £729 after discount at PX.

Another decent similar spec adventure bike I’ve spotted is a Giant Revolt 1 2015 for £599 at Rutland, which has relatively massive tyre clearance for 700x50c.

Or you could get a full hydraulic disc adventure bike (as opposed to mechanical cable disc on all the others, which need regular adjustments to work properly) for £600 on the singlespeed or £722 for the 10-speed Pinnacle Arkose 2015 clearance bikes.

Has anyone else noticed that the flat bar spec London Road has vanished off the PX site?

I like my London Road, but couldn’t recommend it to someone else, hence two of my friends were persuaded to buy Arkoseses instead of PX.

The saracen looks good and I would personally always choose cheap shimano over cheaper SRAM…

I have the LR also and although I quite like it I could not hand on heart recommend it.

Got a Hack myself, the wheels may be heavy but they are also pretty tough. Mine has taken some punishment on rough towpath and heavily potholed lanes and are still absolutely true. If you are short like me beware of toe overlap if you plan on using guards.

Anywhere doing deals on lighter disc road/cross wheels?

@ smokey jo: Alexrims ATD550 11Speed Aero Disc Wheelset reduced to £128 with “Easter20” at Superstar?

Cheers all… Very helpful. I’ve had a go on a London road and it seemed pretty nice plus I’d get better wheels on that than the Saracen but I am put off by sram. I’ve also seen the discounted 2015 hacks but I’m no so keen on the colour scheme. Any more comments on either?

Funnily enough I’ve just bought a pair of the lighter shallower ADT470 wheels with the code.

I’ve got Sram on my nice CX bike and don’t like it as much as Shimano. Fragile, jockey wheels that seize (not just me, see a current thread), clunky shift action. Different enough that you should try it as you may love or hate it.

I’d get a 2015 Hack and suck up the paint scheme- it’s your cheap thrash bike not your pride and joy!

Ha ha, that’s a good point CTM re: colour scheme. I’ve had Sram on my hardtail before and I wasn’t keen so maybe that tells me something.

I bought a London Road rival 22 on the CTW scheme. Really pleased with it. I was scheptical at first re SRAM double tap as I’d only had shimano up to then. Got to say I’m a convert … really easy to use and feels crisper to me … on the downside … louder too!! … I’m not a proper roadie though so my experience is fairly limited … great bike though for the money and works out about £470 overall … also the service from Planet X was superb!

Cheers goat, can I run 10 speed cassettes on those?

Yes. But you’ll need to use a spacer, possibly included with the wheels.

For those that indicated they would “not recommend” the L.R. can you please explain why? I am in the states and considering one of the blue frames currently on sale for a gravel and cx bike.

There were a batch of frames sent out where just about every single one (it seemed) had a seat tube that was out of spec and the response was less than helpful from PX.

Have a London Road. Like the SRAM rival although as per sleigh not a proper roady so nothing to compare it to Shimano wise. Opposite way round on the MTB, prefer Shimano to SRAM. London Road isn’t a bad ride. As per previous comments a load were built with out of spec seat tubes. Fist and top hat springs to mind!

So overall like the bike but the company can be a bit hit or miss.

Edit: Two guys at work recently got new bikes. One went for a London Road the other went for a pinacle arkose. Both are happy with them.

My LR frame had a hole in a weald on the seat stay the brake post mounts all needed to be taped and the fork post monts are out of line the early silver frames seam to be the worst and PX did not step up to bat …I like the frame but the qc is poor had i inspected the pruduct first i would not have bought it but it was mail order to france.

For those that indicated they would “not recommend” the L.R. can you please explain why? I am in the states and considering one of the blue frames currently on sale for a gravel and cx bike.

I think it is the company more than the product TBH, they’re a stack’em high sell ’em cheap outfit, I was willing to put up with a shonky seat tube and risk their customer service for a £150 LR frame (see this thread from last year), for me it worked out, but I wouldn’t pay out for a whole bike from them, and I couldn’t recommend them to someone else in good conscience…

Think cookeaa sums it up well. Ultimately they do sell things very cheaply and something has to give to cover that, it would appear to be customer service and QC.

I guess if you look on complete bikes as being a collection of parts that someone has thrown at a frame you couldn’t go to wrong. Bought an inbred a few years back and the non drive side crank arm fell off after a month of use. I did offer to buy them a torque wrench when I phoned up to complain. To be fair my London Road seems to be put together better, apart from some of the cables being a bit short between bars and frame.

edit: should point out that I only live 30 minutes down the road from their Sheffield showroom so it’s always easy to go there in person and make some noise if necessary. I’d not but a bike mail order from them if any distance away.