Re: The Bicycles thread Not old enough to get my driving license yet, so my primary means of commute is still a bicycle! My first cycle as far as I remember was a BSA champ. It did not last very long before I graduated to a Firefox Raider which was my first geared bicycle. It came with 6 gears and with insanely powerful brakes compared to the BSA. I distinctly remember that I almost did a nose dive into the pavement on a downward slope after pulling the front brakes with the same force as for the BSA . The Raider did a good job and after a while I had to upgrade to a bigger bike as I was growing fast. The Decathlon stores intrigued me and after paying them a visit, I was really impressed with the quality of Btwin bikes. Got a Btwin Rockrider 5.1 which was an amazing choice. It had 21 gears and nothing too fancy. Came with a solid frame, lifetime warranty and peace of mind. Only caveat was that it had gripshifters which I changed to paddles later. It served for a good 8 years with no issues whatsoever. And now(about 6 months back), I decided to go for a proper mountain bike which feels like an upgrade even from the Btwin.
Narrowed it down to a few bikes, like the Trek Marlin 5, some models from Polygon, Giant etc. Budget was around 30k and what I found was that these models offer the most basic of components and the only good part about them is possibly the frame. They are exorbitantly priced for what they offer. Some components were the exact same as my Rockrider 5.1 which costed 12k . I then decided to check out what Decathlon has in store for a price of 30k. I checked out the Rockrider 520(26k)and the Rockrider 540(32k). Ride quality is significantly better on the 540 owing to the 100mm hydraulic fork with lockout, as well as the hydraulic disk brakes which made a world of difference. 520 comes with an 80mm coil fork and regular disc brakes, as well as a 24 gear setup while the 540 has 27. The geometry of both however, are the exact same. I decided to go for the 540 as I was really impressed with the suspension setup and the hydraulic brakes. Stand and bell had to be fitted at an additional cost à la decathlon. Chose the large size frame as it fit me rather well(5.1 was a small frame). However stuffing it into my Ertiga even after folding the last 2 rows was not an easy task.
This bike comes with 27.5” tyres by Btwin which offer good grip and comfort, 160mm hydraulic disc brakes(Rebranded Btwin by Tektro), A 3 speed Microshift front derailleur, 9 speed Shimano Altus rear derailleur(for a total of 27 years) and a set of Shimano Altus paddle shifters. The suspension fork is the Suntour XCR which offers 100mm of travel and being hydraulic, they are extremely smooth. They offer a hydraulic lockout function as well to use on flat roads to achieve higher speeds and avoid loss of energy while pedaling hard. This component list was matched only by bikes in the range of 40-50k atleast from the other so called premium brands. I have always had a good experience with decathlon and not to mention this bike comes with a lifetime warranty as well, so it was a no brainer.
I had a great first week with this before I ran into an issue where the front disc brake had leaked its mineral oil completely and puddled on the floor where I had parked it. I contacted Decathlon and they asked me to bring it in to have a look. They confirmed that this was a manufacturing defect and does not usually happen. The brakes cannot be fixed as the oil chamber is sealed from the factory. At the time, they did not have stock of the same brakes, so they offered to change the front brakes to a better model from Tektro. I agreed to it, however after a few days I felt that both the brakes had to be the same and I did not like the feeling of having different lever travel and brake bite on the front and rear. I called them up and asked for a solution to this, and they said that it would be hard for them to source just the original brakes and that only the new ones were available. A short while later the manager called up and told me that the entire bicycle can be replaced. They even sent a truck to pick up the old one and an hour later the new bicycle was delivered with the same accessories fitted. That is impressive customer service! +1 to Decathlon for this experience. The best part is, there was never a mention of the bill or any additional charges for fitting or replacing the brakes or anything. As it was understood that this was a serious issue and they were only focused on fixing it. Everything was done free of cost. 6 months and 1000km later I have not run into any issues with the new bike whatsoever. The ride quality really impressed me even over the pathetic Bangalore roads. It picks up speed rather quickly for a heavy mountain bike and is a comfortable commuter! We shall see how it fares in the coming years!
Last edited by Pegasus1134 : 19th November 2019 at 14:57.
Reason: Typo
|