What to look for in a BMX?

I don’t do sports cars so, as part of my midlife crisis, I’m going to buy myself my first BMX for 30 years.

I don’t want to spend loads, but I also don’t want something that’ll fall apart on landing my first bunny hop.

So, what should I be looking for?

It won’t be used for racing, just messing around in the street and, if confidence/skill allows, perhaps a trip to the local skate park.

Thanks!

This has just popped up on my first search, am I in the right ballpark here?

https://alansbmx.com/products/fit-2023-trl-xl-21-tt-bike-gloss-black?_pos=2&_fid=792ae1e4a&_ss=c

Yeah that’s a nice bike. That’s what I was going to buy until I decided to go with 22″ wheels.

Where are you based? The most important thing after buying it is actually using it so it doesn’t become a dust collector.

I am not an expert.

That bike looks ace. My BMX (much older) is a similar geo – I mostly ride/rode street and park very badly, but I prefer a trails style frame for the longer back end. I tried a proper street frame and it felt terrifyingly twitchy instead of just scarily so.

Don’t be scared of skateparks. If you have a nice plaza style park near you it’s the perfect place to learn.

As above – I’ve a mate who builds BMX frames – his advice when we were looking was that unless your at the pointy end of technical indoor park riding the geometry is well twitchy, the pros ride it so that’s what’s fed to the masses, his advice was to go for trail bike geometry which will be a tad longer and slacker and more forgiving for an entry level rider.

Look for ‘full 4130 cromo’ in the frame and forks specs.

That bike above is only 4130 front triangle, meaning the seat stays and chain stays aren’t, so a potential weak spot for an adult.

Also, how tall are you? That dictates to a degree how long a top tube you need.

I’ve got a cheap Fit which is half cromo, half something else and I’ve been hanging up on jumps and pump tracks all year. Honestly at this level I wouldn’t worry about anything being too fragile.

The important thing is getting out on it.

As said id be looking for a full 4130 cromo frame and fork

As your likely to be riding skateparks and some street (street is tough on the body!) look at reputable brands like S&M, FIT, We the people, Kink, Sunday etc…

My S&M WTF is coming up for 13 years old now and cost almost 2k in 2011 due to the build components and in that time all ive needed to replace is tyres

In nearly 40 years of riding bmx the one thing ive learnt is not to buy cheap frames and components

Whats your budget? there are some great 2nd hand deals out there for lightly used bikes

Awesome looking bike – you can’t go wrong with a Fit. I’ve owned several over the years and the TRL I had a couple of years ago was one of the nicest spec’d completes I’ve had.  Let us know what you get 😀

You can have this one for free if you can pick up from B60

21″ top tube

Go get that Saracen above, that’s a lovely thing.

 if confidence/skill allows, perhaps a trip to the local skate park.

I have scars which prove confidence and skill are not related in the slightest

Can i just suggest you give bmx racing a go? It’s bloody great fun ?

@rOcKeTdOg, that’s a ridiculous offer, thank you. I might well be in B60 in the next few days, I will drop you a DM.