How can you ever get a reliable view of a bike before you buy it?

Prompted by some comments in another thread about the same reviewer giving (essentially) the same bike opposing reviews and the impact of marketing budget bribery skewing their remarks, it made me think how can you ever get an accurate idea of what a new bike will be like?

I realise you could test ride it but that’s not always possible/practical, especially if there are multiple options. The timescales involved waiting for demo days or a weekend’s riding of each model could take months to conclude.

Also, most owners will only ever say good things about their bike because either they don’t want to admit they’ve bought a turkey or they haven’t the experience of many other current bikes to compare it to.

So, if mag reviews are biased and unreliable, demo days are too time consuming and owner reviews are too personal, how can you ever know what you’re buying is going to be any good or not?

I ride the bikes I buy. Easy answer. The manufacturers that make it easy reap the rewards

mikewsmith – Member
I ride the bikes I buy. Easy answer. The manufacturers that make it easy reap the rewards

I don’t follow?

Do you mean you just buy it and don’t worry whether it’s any good or not, whether another one would have been better?

But what if another would actually have been better? Surely you’d want to know that in advance?

I do a lot from geometry- I don’t work for MBR so I don’t think you can learn everything there is to know about a bike with a protractor but it’s still useful when you’ve got a point of comparison. Especially after a mistake or two, that’s where I really learned what I like and hate. So frinstance, I rode as many long travel 29ers as I could, but that was only about a quarter of all the ones I was interested in- but then I could draw some conclusions from the best of those and that told me I was pretty likely to like the one I eventually bought (because it was cheaper!)

The other option is to only ever ride the bike you bought, and just convince yourself it’s the best ever. Reviews aren’t all that useful for purchasing but they’re fab for confirming your own bias 😉

(any link to the original thread btw, I missed that!)

No I ride the bikes I can test.

I ride the bikes I can test.

+1

I bought a bike once, and only the once, after a quick spin round a car park. It was the worst bike I’ve ever owned and not cheap.

I will never again buy a bike that I can’t test off-road, ideally on a trail that I know.

Even a test ride only tells you what it’s like to ride that bike initially. If the geometry is something you’re not used to, it won’t tell you how you’ll adapt to it down the line. So the exercise focuses on short term the long term enjoyment.

My recent test rides have ranged from 1 to 4 days, decent enough time

So, if mag reviews are biased and unreliable, demo days are too time consuming and owner reviews are too personal, how can you ever know what you’re buying is going to be any good or not?

All the points in the first part of that sentence are spot on, so lets focus on the 2nd bit…

‘Good’ is also very subjective and personal, but there are very few bikes made that are actually terrible these days so it’s a reasonable starting point to assume that all bikes are going to be ‘good enough’, but might not suit you or your riding as well as they could, even if you had unbiased reviews from people who ride in the same areas and ways that you do, and like the same things as you, you could still find a bike just doesn’t suit you, which means what you’re actually trying to work out pre-purchase is not whether a bike is ‘good’ or not, but whether you will like it, and the honest answer to that is that unless you ride them you won’t know, even a demo day can’t always tell you everything, you need time on the bike, on varying terrain, and time to adjust it and tweak it to fit you and your riding, demo days were a pain in the backside for my wife because it was always a struggle to get
the bikes tuned for her weight properly in such a limited time, unless you’re lucky enough to get extended demos, but then that comes back to the earlier point above, you’re only going to get that from some places, so you could be missing out on a brilliant bike for you, but not know cos it’s so hard to get a decent test on one!

Time and experience may get you to a point where you have a fair idea if you will get on with a bike or not just by looking at the numbers, but you can still get a surprise from time to time.

The other thing you also can’t get directly form most reviews is long term info, like longevity of parts, ease of servicing etc. Again, experience will help, but only actual time with the bike in question will give you answers, shop mechanics are a great source of info in this regard, finding out which bikes they dread a pivot change on, or which models come in with premature failures or recurring faults, but the annoying thing about that is it’s always well after release that these things become known, so not necessarily useful for new models, and even a manufacturers track record can’t account for occasional turds or gems in their line up from year to year.

It’s probably not the answer you wanted but it’s an answer.

You can’t, but in practice it doesn’t really matter. Nine times out of ten all you are really looking for is validation of a decision that you’ve already made (even if you don’t know, or won’t admit, it).

Test rides can be great fun, but even there you are probably kidding yourself into thinking they are more useful than they really are. Simple things like how the bike is set up, tyres etc can make a huge difference to whether you get on with a bike on a test ride or not. As can factors such as how you are feeling on the day. Then there is the fact that it might take time to work out how to get the best from a bike. If it really is significantly better than your current bike then it has to be significantly different. If it’s significantly different then you may well not feel comfortable on it at first.

But the biggest flaw in your logic is possibly the notion that another bike would be better. There are hardly any duff bikes being built these days and as long as you are comparing bikes built with roughly the same riding in mind they all work well enough. So, another bike may be different and that difference may make it feel better in some circumstances. You may even be able to conclude that you prefer it overall, but usually it is just better here, but worse there.

It’s all just a bit of fun though 🙂

I have only ever been able to go off reviews.

When I last purchased a bike it was IMPOSSIBLE to get a trial on the 2 bikes I was looking at because I needed a small frame size.

That was from Santa Cruz and Giant !

The ONLY way is to test them yourself – it’s a long hard process but worth it 🙂 especially if spending a big chunk of cash.

cant understand why people would just buy something on the back of a magazine review.

@mikesmith – how did you manage a 4 day test ride 🙂 impressive. The most I’ve had is a day.

That one was a mate in the bike shop, but he will do a full day if people are serious. Take it ride it and get the hang of it. Throw in a proper set up first and it’s a good start.

It was a 160km test rise too 😉

The timescales involved waiting for demo days or a weekend’s riding of each model could take months to conclude.

so take your time then

demoing bikes is quite good fun

I have used a demo to justify a decision I’ve probably already made, but I’ve also changed my mind of the back of a demo too

You can’t – you can only really know once you’ve owned it a while.

Test rides – do not give you a big picture. However you can then start to refine what you purchase in the future.

cant understand why people would just buy something on the back of a magazine review.

Sometimes it’s all you can go off. Canyon, YT etc are a case in point.

I guess I’m naively wishing mag reviews were just honest and impartial. It’s really quite sad to think they are all just corrupt BS.

The original thread was something about the Giant Reign (it’s on the forum page now), can’t get the linky thing to work.

guess I’m naively wishing mag reviews were just honest and impartial.

Even if they were, they are still someone else’s opinion and taste. I’ve tested bikes that magazines and friend rave about and found them, after I’ve tested them, to be a bit MEH! IMHO obviously.

I’ve never been offered a test of less than a full day and I’ve never paid for it either. I’m spending a lot of my hard earned and I want to be as sure as I can be that it’s worth it.

I don’t think it’s a matter of believing the mags or anyone else really. That helps and might help narrow it down, but if you really wanted a bike as it looked great, ticked all the boxes and everyone was saying good things about it for me it still needs to be tested.

Geometry plays a massive part in things and for me I would rather have a bike that felt right than one that was supposed to be the best or whatever.

I spent 3 months sourcing/testing a few road bikes last year and was 99% sure I would buy a certain make/model until I jumped on the one I eventually decided on and within the first 5 miles I knew what I wanted. I really really wanted to not like it as it was more expensive but it just felt so much better.

also as above, it’s good fun if not a bit time consuming 🙂

Its a bit like the moto industry. The bike company’s need to wake up and provide shops with demo bikes for people to try first. Especially with the kind of money that get’s spent on them. Then SOME of the bike shops also need to wake up and understand the same.

Never ending… I know I wouldn’t fancy handing out 5k plus on something I have only read about.

poisonspider – Member

I guess I’m naively wishing mag reviews were just honest and impartial. It’s really quite sad to think they are all just corrupt BS.

Honestly I reckon most are honest and impartial. But that doesn’t necessarily make them useful or “true”. You see some amazing comments in reviews, MBUK had one a while back where the dude had got TF to replace every part inside a fork to get it to a point where he could “live with it” and still later on said the bike was a great package with “minor tweaks”. Or other ones where in an attempt to find something to write about they obsess about nothing- Guy Kesteven’s review of the Carbon 456 where he declared the frame was too stiff to ride, even though all the symptoms he described were clearly about the fork damping. He wasn’t biased, he was just talking total pish. Some of them just don’t seem qualified- I remember one reviewer banging about all the enduro races they’d done and how great the bike was for that, but you could look them up and see they’d dnf’d about half and been pretty much the slowest in the race.

I don’t think I have ever had a proper test ride.

Aside from my last bike the previous 5 have been custom self builds/trigger’s broom type scenarios.

I know what I like/need in terms of sizing and what I like in terms of Geo.
You can then adjust for projected stem length, wheel length, fork length, etc.

How can you ever get a reliable view of a bike before you buy it?

You can’t.
I’ve demoed bikes and I’ve bought blind.
I only ever bought one (blind) which didn’t suit me, and that was the bike I wanted to like the most (a stunning raw DW 5 spot).

Try to borrow a bike, mates, others on STW could help.

I recently bought a new bike after demoing some. My LBS let me demo for a whole weekend, and a three day weekend. Took the bike to Afan, Chilterns and local trails. I did this with two bikes from them. So some shops do let you demo for more than a spin round the car park.

You really need to ride on local trails.

I also demoed a bike at Bristol Bikefest when we were racing there. So I did a lap on mine, my mates and the new bike. Brilliant way to see what was good/bad/ugly.

However, the biggest difference between my 26 inch Enduro, a light HT and a 29 inch XC FS were the tyres they had. So it just shows most modern bikes are pretty good and small things you can simply change make a massive difference.

I also rode my wife’s bike for several local rides, races and weekends. Only after such an extended test did I feel comfy buying one just like it.

Its quite different to my bike and it took me a while to figure out I liked it.

So unless you can demo as much as I did you need to figure out what sort of bike you want. XC, Enduro etc. Most top brands in the same category will be very similar. Especially if you spend time changing tyres, pressures, shock settings, grips and stems.

As others have said the only way to be sure is to ride a bike. Test ride, hire, borrow etc

If you can’t get to test ride then it may be possible to ride similar bikes / bikes from the same manufacturer etc.

Failing that you are taking a punt, although you can reduce the risk of getting a bike you don’t like by doing lots and lots of research. Read reviews, posts by people (I don’t think most people always say good things about their bikes – but these days there are very few bad bikes around if you’re spending a fair amount of money)

Personally I wouldn’t buy a mountain bike over £2k without a test ride. I probably would buy a road bike though – probably because after all the research I’ve done and riding other makes, the one I want rates well in a lot of tests in comparison.

The original thread was something about the Giant Reign (it’s on the forum page now), can’t get the linky thing to work.

here is the link…
linky

Guy Kesteven’s review of the Carbon 456 where he declared the frame was too stiff to ride, even though all the symptoms he described were clearly about the fork damping. He wasn’t biased, he was just talking total pish.

i started the “other thread” the OP is referring to and Guy Kesteven wrote the 2 reviews. in one review he gave it 4.5/5 but in the later one he gave it 3.
both bikes are essentially the same bar a switch from XT to SRAM gearing and brakes…i just dont get how essentially the same bike can get 2 massively different scores from the same person.
i think he is talking pish….but would be interested to know what everyone else thinks

here is the link for the first review
review 1[/url]

and here is the second review

well we all know sram is pants so there are your 1.5 stars.

In all seriousness though that is odd. Can he be brought to account and made to explain himself?

Edit:
The first review is from 2014, bike geo has moved weights have changed so the bike could be a dinosaur compared to its contemporaries. If the new review is more recent that is.

I sent them an Outraged of Edinburgh email when they reviewed the exact same stem twice with different logos on and concluded that the Superstar logo made it stiff and light while the Answer (eh, I think) made it unpleasantly flexy… I got pure flannel back. But TBH even that didn’t feel like dishonesty, it felt like “We imagined these 2 identical things felt different because man, there’s only so many things you can say about a stem.”

Eh, I’m totally crossposting, off to the other thread… But 2 words, “price difference”.

and here is the second review

Haha. What a knob. 😆

There’s a pretty big difference in the wheels and they are actually two different models; the one in the mag costing over £2k more. I’d say that might be grounds to start marking it down when something costs substantially more with arguably less suitable parts.

there’s £2K price difference between the two bikes tested. I would expect a review to include value for money in the score, or score vs the competition at that price point…

I’d say that might be grounds to start marking it down when something costs substantially more with arguably less suitable parts.

Not when it compares (favorably in some cases) with the equivalent competition bikes at the same price point. The amount of times I’ve seen £10K ENVE shod Santa Cruzes receive top marks….

It would appear there are very few turkeys these days, so it comes down to you personal preferences. Don’t under estimate the difference tyres, stem, bars, etc have on how the bike feels. My mate and I have had a couple of bikes with the same frame, but personal setups. We have both loved our own bikes, but struggle with the other persons bike setup.

wrecker – Member

The amount of times I’ve seen £10K ENVE shod Santa Cruzes receive top marks…

I suppose the argument there is that price takes on different levels of importance at different price brackets, and creates different comparisons Like, if you’re spending £5000 you probably want to be damn sure that it kicks the arse of the £3300 version of the same bike, and competes with other £5000 bikes.

But if you’re spending £10000 then you’re not really fussed about value at all, and you judge the bike on its merits as a fluffer, and you’d probably not buy it if it was cheaper. (annoyingly, the swear filter means you can no longer say w***ing chariot)

Otherwise, it’d be pretty much impossible to give a £300 bike anything but five stars and a £10000 bike anything but 0. But you can’t ignore price completely either.

It’s interesting reading this and seeing how other people judge/rate bikes and how/whether cost plays a role.

Personally I set a price limit before going shopping, if I am limited to £1500 bikes then that’s what I look for….if funds allow me to look at 3-4k bikes then I’ll go there instead….what I look for is how good the bike is at fulfilling its brief….for example if it has a slack head angle and 160mm forks I want it to be good at going downhill, if it isn’t I’ll move on….if I look at a short travel XC machine I’ll want it to climb like a demon and weigh bugger all, if it’s a lump to ride and tries to wheelie me of the back going uphill then I’ll move on….basically I want the best in a particular price point….i’m not fussed at comparing a 2k trail bike to an 8k trail bike because essentially that comparison will never occur for me.

If I’m looking at 2k bikes it means I don’t have an 8k budget to blow on a bike….conversely if I’m entertaining the idea of an 8k Superbike I’m probably not fussed as to what 2k bargains are out there right now….for me they’re two completely different things.

My current FS is nothing special (Giant) but for the first time in years I had the money to buy frame only and build it up as I wanted, I’ve had great fun (and wasted loads of money) trying Rockshox suspension first only to sell it all and replace with X-Fusion stuff….i’ve lovingly sourced the last of the awesome SLX double and bash chainsets….i’ve bought carbon bars, had wheels made up from my choice of component parts etc…..it would undoubtedly have been cheaper to throw 3k at a Canyon or YT and have it dripping in Mavic, Sram XX etc but it wouldn’t have been mine and it wouldn’t have been half as much fun.

A lot of the time there is no rhyme or reason behind the choices we make regarding our hobbies, they are often decisions made with the heart rather than the head….as someone above said, sometimes just stems, bars and grips can ruin a bike for someone….i’d need to see Kesteven’s two Reigns back to back and see if there are any ergonomic features that led to him rating it worse the second time round!?

if you’re spending £5000 you probably want to be damn sure that it kicks the arse of the £3300 version of the same bike, and competes with other £5000 bikes.

Taking this test in particular, he has said that the frame and suspension are great. The spec is comparable/better than the equivalents at the same price point so it makes no sense. All of a sudden the suspension needs tokens (which I call BS on as the bloke weighs 65kg and would see naff all discernable difference) and gets hung up and the forks feel weedy (despite being the same as on most other builds at the price).
There is nothing really contentious about the build; XX1, Pike, DT Swiss wheels, reverb stealth, all just high end bling.

(annoyingly, the swear filter means you can no longer say w***ing chariot

This is now my default term for expensive bikes. Replacing ‘dandy horse’. Thank you.

I always knew “w***ing chariot” or just “w*** chariot” to be a persons bed.

wrecker – Member

All of a sudden the suspension needs tokens (which I call BS on as the bloke weighs 65kg and would see naff all discernable difference)

I weigh about 60kg, I run extra tokens in my Pikes 😕 Big difference. Ironically it’s one of the things that put me off getting DPAs, but now they do tokens for em.

still on the lookout for any potential alternate to my preferred bike of choice and i noticed someone mention the Bird Aeris…it looks good and the custom spec looks to be very good value for money. lifetime frame warranty is also a big bonus
so lets have a look at some reviews just to get an idea or not
first review i see is on Bike Radar…by none other than…Mr Kesteven

and he’s at it again…contradicting himself in what he says about the bike…he describes it as having a solid frame but then says the frame flex made it feel sluggish…

which on is it Kesteven? its either a solid frame or it is a flexy one. if you’re trying to imply that for example the front end is solid but its let down by a flexy rear end then say that!!
FFS how that man can call himself an expert bike testing journo is unbelievable!!

anyway rant over…i’m going to choose to ignore his review and the Aeris is another to add to my list of potential buys…plenty of real and honest reviews on STW