There’s a whole world of interesting parts available from AliExpress but has anyone had any success buying from there?

There seems to be lots of people copying lots of people, how do you find (or is it even worth finding) the original seller? Are people on there usually helpful? Adverts seem to include the absolute minimum of info so I might need to ask a few questions and lastly did anyone get ripped off with import or customs?

Not bought any bike bits, but bought a camping stove and a pot to go on it, no problems at all.

Yes, bought a fair few bits, no probs.
Never anything more than about £15 tho.
‘DT Swiss’ star drive tool, roadie bar tape, gloves, Sram Etap rubber hoods, 0.1mm and 0.2mm washers for fine tuning rotor spacing, syringes, valves, led lights
They tend to quote long lead times but most things turn up quicker.2-3 weeks
They now charge Tax on UK orders at source.
One order never arrived and refunded promptly

I bought some Wellgo pedals for my daughter that were unavailable here, they turned up in the time claimed and had zero issues.

Basically treat it like eBay, check the feedback and go from there.

I don’t buy anything branded, really, since I don’t trust it. But I’ve bought a lot of other stuff.

(there’s some psychology here I think, I just inherently don’t trust anything that seems to be a knockoff- anyone that sticks a fake label on something is obviously untrustworthy. But it doesn’t actually mean the product is any less good than the unbranded or own-brand stuff that I don’t worry about so much)

I bought a mech hanger adapter for a slidey dropout.
Took a month or so to arrive but otherwise faultless and less than a fiver. Had it a year and a bit now and still fine.

I’ve bought some carbon wheel rims. You can see seller feedback and many of the sellers are the same as on eBay etc. Aliexpress is better for discounts and coupons, so it is possible to get an extra 20% particularly for Chinese holidays etc.

Set of 4 pot disc brakes turned up fine.
Dropper post did not, however, as above, was promptly refunded

I’ve been eyeing a couple of relatively expensive cassettes but not pushed the bottom yet. I bought a cheaper one which has been fine. I’ve had Loads of NW chainrings dirt cheap if your prepared to wait and short chainring bolts ridiculously cheap.

Clothes are usually crap though

Ztto dropper lever (best vfm lever on the market?), a goat link clone and tubeless valves.

Smart Trainer (Wahoo kickr copy)
ZTTO cassette
29er Carbon wheels
Titanium handlebars
YBN chains
A few other odds and sods.

All fine so far, never had a dodgy product or anything going missing, no issues with customs.

I was scared initially, the smart trainer (Thinkrider X7) was a real punt in 2020 as the UK was all out of stock of Wahoo/Tacx/Elite. It arrived within a couple of weeks and I’ve used it at least twice a week since then on Suf/Zwift/RGT.

Look for deals, some are very generous indeed. You can get money-off tokens easily.

Then again, China is naughty so you might experience some moral dissonance. I then bought Hope brakes to make up for it 😉

Bought loads of bits over the years, always great service including things like shimano deore brakes etc , Had a stem come this week and waiting on a narrow/wide chainring for a fiver to complete my 1x on my fat bike .. happy Aliexpress customer here

Regrettably, they’ve started to charge VAT at source – still really cheap so long as UK C&E don’t get nosy. Look for listings with free shipping.

And if China is happy to supply Russia with weapons, you’ll still carry on buying coz it’s cheap, yeah great stuff 🙄

And if China is happy to supply Russia with weapons, you’ll still carry on buying coz it’s cheap, yeah great stuff 🙄

Where’s the ‘like’ button?

Or I could buy exactly the same thing from a uk supplier who imports it and adds a massive mark up.

I not sure that a NW chainring is going to prop up the Chinese government.

Are you going to your heating off as it has uses some Russian gas.

Stainypants, so long as you are happy crack on, personally I try to avoid buying stuff made in China that helps fund a fairly abhorant regime when I can, probably doesn’t amount to much but if everyone did the same 🤔

You’re going to shit a brick when you hear buying stuff in the UK supports a government who send arms to Saudi…

Thanks everyone else.

@dickyboy

I hope you don’t have a car – and so use oil from the house of saud?

Brill things I have not been punished over buying from AliExpress:
Titanium Bolts
Togs
Road Togs
Bells
BB Press
Shock bushing press
Computer moutns
Cables/adapters

Shit that hasn’t been so dope
Mini tools (cheap metal breaks easily)
Cassettes (they aren’t as refined, chains skip more)
Carbon bars (broke them flexing between my hands and got a refund)

I bought some oilslick bolts which were cheap but poor quality. I probably deserved that for stupid vanity.

I also bought a direct-mount narrow-wide chainring thinking “What’s the worst that could happen?” Well, that folded in half leaving a big gouge in my frame and leaving me stranded.

There’s no accountability if the product fails, so there’s no impetus to perform any real QC. Even if a name gets a bad rep, the same product will appear with a different name slapped on. I’m sure some of the stuff is passable, but is it really worth the risk? Up to you. I probably won’t bother again.

And if China is happy to supply Russia with weapons, you’ll still carry on buying coz it’s cheap, yeah great stuff 🙄

Except a fair proportion of that “Chinese” stuff is actually made in and shipped from Taiwan which, if you’ve been paying attention, isn’t China.

Yeah but… I’m happy to try to do my bit, if every good man stayed silent & all that

@Dickyboy

Isn’t boycotting a country and so punishing the citizens of that country a bit Jingoistic? What did whatever poor bloke working in a factory forging your cassette do to support the treatment of the Uighurs? Import/export tariffs from China are almost negligible, and modernisation driven by international demand work to encourage westernisation rather than isolationism (and so totalitarianism).

Whereas buying petrol is literally paying the house of saud money to cut peoples heads off.

It’s a bit like people going vegan because “the cost of vegetables in co2 is less than meat” ignoring that this is a cost per gram of content, not per bioavailable nutrient (if you switch it around meat has a lower co2 cost than mass produced veg, ignoring the massive ecosystem destruction caused by large scale cash crop production).

In short; you might be surprised to find that things are more complex than “China bad, not buy stuff, me have moral high ground and look down on evil people”.

Got one of the more expensive Ztto cassettes (12 Speed SRAM ULT) it wasn’t exactly cheap – although miles cheaper than a SRAM GX and actually available.

Really impressed with it, longevity remains to be seen on it but its certainly performing well just now.

Loads of stuff. I find it generally pretty good, but you need to do you due diligence on the seller by reading the reviews.

From AliExpress I’ve just kitted out a bike with:

Ztto hubs (same as DT Swiss 350) for £90

Sroad 12s cassette – £100 (same weight as x01 cassette)

Slx brakes

Slx groupset

Slx cranks

Away from AliExpress, bought a carbon catalogue frame and carbon rims.

Bike is ace, no issues with a quality of kit, price or delivery times.

I’ve bought some knock off lego sets. Been great. 2 road bike frames also great. A cheap mobile phone (for a laugh and to see what it was like) absolute shite. As long as you do the research and use a decent seller it’s fine. Just be prepared to wait for stuff to arrive.

mech hanger and garmin mount for a canyon.
about 80 quid from canyon, maybe more with import faff.
30 quid from AliExpress with 2-3 week delivery.

@squirrelking – China would disagree with you about who owns Taiwan. Lol.

I indirectly bought a ztto xd 9-50t oil slick cassette 2nd hand but brand new from a U.K. seller on eBay who had struggled to set it up with his xx1 drivetrain, I had fancied trying one from aliexpress but didn’t fancy a £100+ gamble. Got this one for £40 from eBay, set it up no dramas with my gx shifter, deore mech and kmc chain (proper mongrel set up!), worked great for a total of 3 rides until a heavy shift up the cassette literally peeled about 1/4 of the 3rd cog off!!!! Luckily a relatively inexpensive lesson, now back on a sram gx cassette!

fatbrad
Free Member

I’ve bought some knock off lego sets. Been great

So I don’t buy copy lego sets but I do buy shitloads of inexpensive fake sets that Lego don’t do. I love my steampunk robot pirate.

The only copy lego set I bought was the Porsche 911 because I didn’t want an orange one. The others are MOC kits which is easier than getting the instructions and buying the parts separately.

@zerocool yeah they would, as I’m sure Russia would regarding Ukraine. But the rest of the (majority of) the world thinks otherwise so **** em.

@sqirrelking I accept that any boycott is tricky and in effect you would probably not buy anything if you looked into it, just thought I’d better echo an alternative view to those gleefully making their cheap knock off purchases 👌

Ali is OK to buy from….but cycling clothes, shoes, all have sizing issues, the padded shorts can leave you tender on your nethers….anthing named is fake and the quality can be shocking.
Now big money savers are …lego…obvs its not real lego….but £80 for the bugatti..I brought one for my kid and every part was there and all bits worked , I even got a led kit for it….In fact today I just received my Ali lego adidas superstar trainer…£20…..oh and I didn’t have to pay tax

@dickyboy which is fair but as someone else said its not always as straight forward as that. Sometimes it is though.

anthing named is fake

Again, I’m sure that depends on whether you’re buying a top brand for buttons or a known Far East brand through the grey/domestic market. I have no doubt someone would knock out fake Wellgo’s but I have no idea why when the real thing is cheap enough.

I’ve bought real Shimano and rockshox stuff off of Ali, it’s oem stuff but it is real

Now big money savers are …lego…obvs its not real lego….but £80 for the bugatti..I brought one for my kid and every part was there and all bits worked , I even got a led kit for it….In fact today I just received my Ali lego adidas superstar trainer…£20…..oh and I didn’t have to pay tax

I don’t mind the MOCs or the Chinese kits and the lighting stuff is great but brazen intellectual property theft is a step too far for me

I’ve had a couple of kitchen knives – I did a bit of research and understand what I’m looking at regarding metal specs.
I’m happy with them – I paid about £30 each – the same items are available on Amazon for 2.5x the price.
I’ve also had a few other bits – embroidered patches, badges, etc.
Personally I’d not buy ‘safety critical’ stuff like brakes or carbon handlebars from there, just due to the lack of accountability/traceability.

For bike stuff, although it’s all road stuff, Trace Velo on Youtube builds his bikes exclusively with Aliexpress/Wish bargains. Plus he’s funny to boot 🙂

The ZTTO hubs I bought are interesting, complete copies of DT Swiss 350s, the DT Swiss spare parts fit perfectly… However they were released by ZTTO on the day the star ratchet patent expired. Which I thought was good form.