[Closed] Why are forks so expensive now??

Brexit

Trump

We're in for a Brumpy ride....

There is no justifiable reason for it. You can buy a spring in two tubes for a push cycle for over £1000 now. There is no reason for that.

Blame that ill-thought out vote last summer with mountains of misinformation on both sides!

Your best bet might be to look at a complete bike, then decide whether to keep new bike and sell the old, or just grab bits you want and sell rest of new bike.

For example, Boardman 29er for £650 with Recon Silver, or Bizango Raidon for £625 (before 10% British Cycling, or 15% Toyota Club discount).

I'm in a similar quandary , not upgrading just needing to replace Rebas on my 29er . I've ordered a pair of X Fusion Slides , people on here seem to like them and the straight steerer version is £320 , tapered £340 . I'm sticking with straight steerer as it's what I've got now .

Something to do with liberation from the evil EU overlords I think?

It's time to buy British, does this mean we all have to ride shitty pace forks ?

Before I tell you, can you let us know whether you voted Leave or Remain; then we'll know whether to laugh or not 😉

Because you've picked the most expensive option. CRC have a Reba 29 RL for £274.99.

I paid about £250 (after BC discount) for a set of X Fusion Traces a few weeks ago.

I originally wanted Rebas but they were out of my price range. The X Fusions seems great though.

I'm sure it's all Brexit and nothing to do with bike bits companies charging the maximum that they think IT middle managers will pay.

middle managers in IT earn shitloads

edit mark has it

It's time to buy [s]British[/s] Swiss, does this mean we all have to ride [s]shitty[/s] perfectly fine [s]pace[/s] DT Swiss forks ?

FTFY

£274.99 is QR not 15mm

I've still got some 4 ride old Rebas for sale 🙂

As Mark90 said 🙂

Fork prices went crazy a long time before Brexit.

Because business is business and people still pay.

[i]I'm sure it's all Brexit and nothing to do with bike bits companies charging the maximum that they think IT middle managers will pay.[/i]

It's bound to be the latter, they weren't legally allowed to charge what they thought they could get away with before June last year's vote.

Fork prices went crazy a long time before Brexit.

That, once looked at the cost to replace the 100mm Factory 32's on my 29er and let out a slight squeal when i saw the £750 price tag 😯

What is it exactly that makes them so expensive from an engineering perspective?

[rose tinted] I paid £300 for my Mag21s plus extra for a 1.25" ahead steerer.[/all this was fields]

Paid £230 for a set of 29er 120mm 15mm Reba's in a CRC sale 6 months ago.

Why are forks so expensive

Because we keep paying.

Some prices are a joke. £500 for a BMX frame???

Plunging pound innit. If you're an importer then you'll be stiffed for the fall in the pound and will need to raise prices to compensate.

Also, it's the start of a new model year. Everything is expensive once the old stock has been cleared...

Finally, this sport is seen as "aspirational" by lots of middle manager marketing people working at the major manufacturers (hello SRAM and Fox!). Aspirational pricing is seen as a fillip rather than a hindrance.

I plan on keeping my existing stuff for longer until such time as the pound recovers. Of course, having a colossal maniac in the White House means that the value of the dollar is about as predictable as a sugared up toddler's temper over the next three and a bit years.

Likewise, if we do completely balls up Brexit then the prospect of tariffs may mean stuff becomes more expensive again.

Worth keeping a watch on Ebay, i was lucky last year to get a set of SID RLT 15mm 27.5 off a brand new bike for £280 the owner was upgrading straight away I did the same with XT brakes just had to be a bit patient.

I'd really like to know the price of forks through the product lifecycle; the factory door price per unit, the manufacturer price to distributor, distributor to retail, etc. The fact that many retailers sell them at massive discount suggests there is a lot of breathing room between each stage, production costs must be tiny, it's just some metal tubes, o rings, shims and a few ml oil, and development costs can't be that high, it's not exactly F1 technology and nothing has changed that much over the last decade or so.

We do get humped by $ exchange rate and tax in the UK too I guess.

prices where high before the EU vote

Not bought a new fork in a long, long time now. 🙁

prices where high before the EU vote

Yep. But compare the value of the pound in May 2016 with now and try to work out the additional cost of importing say 5,000 sets of forks.

You're also going to have to hedge against the possibility of an economic downturn meaning that you have fewer customers for your premium priced forks. If the potential market for 5,000 forks is reduced by 10%, then you're going to have to shift more unsold stock at the end of the year, possibly at or below break even.

where would I be best off looking for a nice 120-130 mm travel 29er fork with 15mm axle.

Also what models would you suggest

I bought some Fox Vanilla 130 about 10 years ago cost 630€ new. They've always been expensive.

I suspect imported volume (lack of) must also matter, as outside of STW who really replaces their forks?

Fox prices were stupid before Brexit, the fall in the pound just makes them even more stupidly expensive. About time that someone in the UK to set up a rival fork company.

Since 2007 we've gone from 2 dollars to the pound to 1.2 dollars to the pound. Since almost everything in the bike industry is made in Taiwan or China, both selling in USD, that pushes UK prices up a lot.

Going to give the forks time to bed in but so far they seem spot on.

You wrote this a week ago. Suppose for you a week is a long time to keep something 😆

I did say Im just browsing at work !!

Renton , take a look at X Fusion Slides that's what I'm going for

its all you high earning middle aged rich kids...the industry knows you've got disposable incomes and they take advantage of that by telling you that you need to have all the latest kit at their extortionate prices and you fall for it....that and the brexit/trump effect 😉

Renton I am waiting to get a warranty replacement Reba fork which I don't need . It will be arriving sometime in April , brand new , uncut steerer , 120 travel , boost , suitable for 29 or 650+ . If you are interested we might be able to work something out .

tbh I'd be buying a set of 29 Pikes instead, they're probably less than 200g heavier (my 29's a 1800g). You can change the airshaft to move the travel between 120mm and 160mm so will go on pretty much any 29er (useful for those folk who regularly change frames/bikes).

Certainly stiffer than Reba's and probably better for a larger 'lad'.

As said before they have been over the top for years paid £320 with a good discount from LBS 5 years ago for some Rockshox recons 120mm.

I clearly remember the early Manitous being £350 in 1992. That's about £700 of modern money based on RPI.

For about 50mm of elastomer travel.

As has been said, fork prices have been nuts for a while now. A long time ago there was a threshold of £500 for top end forks until Fox bought out the first 36's which were way over this and once people started buying them costs seemed to rise.

@Renton

Cotic have some 29er X Fusion Trace RL 120mm Ex Demo for £249, non Boost.(demo Fleet has gone boost)

http://www.cotic.co.uk/news/warehouse-specials

£500++ for forks is bonkers. Sitting here in the shop we have 2 Gazelle bikes. For those not familiar with them they're a BIG Dutch brand, made in the Netherlands and are easily the best quality, best equipped, and best designed bikes I've ever clapped eyes on. £5-600 gets hub gears, Dynamo lighting, integral lock, rack and mudguards. Every little detail is thought out and works perfectly. They're not just a frame with parts specced by accountants. The Dutch buy hundreds of thousands of them and I can see why. Selling a fork for more than one of these bikes is clearly ridiculous.
But 'cyclists' are led my marketing and fashion
'People that ride bikes' aren't. They just want something that works.

My next bike will be a Gazelle. 🙂