I know absolutely nothing about indoor cycling but find myself looking at smart trainers mainly for my Daughter.
Budget is limited to max £250.
So far have looked at:
Elite Novo Smart wheel on trainer £199
Tacx Flow Smart wheel on trainer £229
Dare2Ride Fuego 1.0 Direct drive Smart Trainer £249
We don't have a dedicated 'pain cave' so will need to be easy to store & setup.
Bike will be my old 26" XC bike converted to 1x10.
Will also need to have a decent native App as don't want to for out for Zwift.
Any alternatives to the above trainers I should look at?
Thanks
We bought 2 off Xplova Nova S direct on trainers from CRC a year back to replace wheel on Tacx Flow Smart and a Wahoo Kickr Snap.l still have the 2 wheel on units sitting around.
Perhaps buy used - better value and tryout?
The direct drive trainer - for me - gives a more consistent ride, less rollercoaster than with the wheel on unit.
Interestingly, my wheel on trainer had a lower 'flat road' power output reading and higher hill climbing wattage, where conversely my direct drive tells me i have a higher 'flat road' wattage and lesser hill climb wattage output.
I've had two Taco Flow smart trainers die on me with very little use - first repaired under warranty though Halfords second time with same fault I was out of luck.
Replaced it with a direct drive trainer (Jet Black Volt) and the volt is much quieter, smoother and life like. It's so quiet I could probably use it in the spare room at 5am without waking the family up quiet.
I would definitely recommend going direct drive if you can.
General consensus seems to be that direct drive is better, but like you I don’t have anywhere I can leave mine set up and it’s easier/quicker to set up a wheel on one, I think.
I’ve a Kickr Snap which is good. There might be some deals with Wahoo stuff and a free year of Zwift
pretty sure direct drive is the only answer
the pinnacle is pretty well loved on here for cheaps, sporstdirect / evans i think
bought mine a few weeks back for well under £200
Freewheel are doing the Elite Tuo for £200 which is a damn good deal.
https://www.freewheel.co.uk/elite-tuo-trainer-tt92003
Oooh £160 with British Cycling discount.
Anyone used the Tuo and comment how good it is?
Will also need to have a decent native App as don’t want to for out for Zwift.
Go 2nd hand and spend the money of 2 years subscriptions to Zwift?
FWIW I can't give my wheel on smart turbo away. There is no market for them anymore. So if you don't want to race on zwift, and don't care that however hard you pedal it caps out at about 850W, and the slope will only do a virtual 8% or whatever rather than the vertical wall some trainers seem to enforce. Then I'd just go bargain hunting on ebay / facebook.
YMMV but IMO having a turbo and saying you don't want zwift is like buying a gaming PC then spending your evenings using a free version of excel. It's entirely possible to do, but google sheets is infuriating, it's dull, and you could be playing a game instead so you'll probably get bored.
Dont bother with wheel on, seriously.
Direct Drive is a massively better setup.
As for time to setup - the time difference is however long it takes to undo your wheel axle/QR and pull the wheel out. 30 seconds?
We don’t have a dedicated ‘pain cave’ so will need to be easy to store & setup.
Also consider having at least a dedicated corner somewhere for the winter months. It only takes 5-10minutes to set-up, but turning the TV and booting up Netflix on takes 30s. Make getting on and starting pedaling as easy as watching netflix. If I'm still not in the mood after a few minutes riding then I'll quit, but if I'm searching round the house for HR straps, ANT+ dongles, the laptop charger, and whatever else I'll lose motivation before I've even started.
Definitely buy used and try it out first!
It's not for everyone.
Even a non-smart one can be used if you have speed/cadence sensors so the program can work out your power.
Direct drive for sure.
Don't forget you need a fan (as big as possible) and probably a mat to protect the floor and keep noise down (a £3 wiggle yoga mat would probably do!)
As well as Turbo factor in App/Device, Fan, Mat, stand/table.
Definitely direct drive if you can find one 2nd hand.
Although if you're anywhere near Madrid I've got a BKool gathering dust in the garage, you could have that very cheap 🙂
Thanks all, a few bits to consider.
What's the verdict on the Pinnacle trainer?
Looks the same as the Dare2Ride one from Merlin.
Subscriptions to the more user friendly training software are mostly somewhere in the £10-15 ball park. You can however get literally months of time from free trails if you are prepared to move between apps a lot to begin with. Also there are a few free ones - AFAIK MyWhoosh which is like Zwift but not as good and not as popular is completely free as it's part of some UAE sportswashing agenda (think they pay for some sort of UCI/TdF official trainer partnership). I think maybe Golden Cheetah and Xert might be or might have previously been free too, but may be a bit less user friendly.
I have a wheel off smart trainer (Elite Zumo which although no longer made, was their cheapest wheel off smart trainer at time of buying). It lives under the bed and I do think it takes at least ten minutes each to set up in the kitchen and put away at the end. Have to bring the trainer downstairs, get bike in from shed, mount the bike on the trainer, get the fan and set that up, boot up the laptop. Don't think a wheel on would save much/any of that time though.