alt Hacker NewsThis thread is bonkers. I'm not even American and it took me all of two minutes to find a bike for $118 USD (or about 90 GBP) available from Walmart. Here it is: https://www.walmart.com/ip/1121295
It looks like a perfectly serviceable bike, if not the most amazing experience. I bet you with proper maintenance it could last you decades and thousands of miles.
People in this thread who are claiming a new bike is nearly $1000 are on another planet.
I get that this isn't a wheelchair, doesn't have anything to do with wheelchair prices, and I would certainly not want to rely on this thing in the way a wheelchair user must rely on their chair, but c'mon, guys, stop with the wild hyperbole about bike prices.
Replies
https://www.vice.com/en/article/mechanics-ask-walmart-major-...
https://old.reddit.com/r/MTB/comments/z2d5h5/walmart_bike_un...
So for $118 you get a really poor quality bike that you probably can't repair. Or perhaps you'll end up with one that's just unsafe. $400–500 is probably a reasonable price point, but that'll get you something that's adequate at best. Heavy, clunky, and unpleasant to ride.
I used to buy cheapest I can get away of everything and I have to tell you, there is real difference between cheapest bikes you reference, bikes that cost few hundred $ and $1000 bike.
The difference is in speed, effectivity (how tired you get per km), comfort, how much it hurts when terrain is bad and pretty much any other factor you can think off. Those cheap bikes are fine if you go to work and back, 15min drive each way. Or for kids to play around town.
But if you bike a lot, then you really want better bike.
>This thread is bonkers
>People in this thread who are claiming a new bike is nearly $1000 are on another planet.
HN is absolutely chock full of people who have entirely lost touch with reality.
Anyways, my sister rode a $200 bike to work every day for like six years. Doing the math, about 19,000 miles. I grew up with a cheap Walmart bike and I had it for over a decade and probably at least 5,000 miles I would guess.
> find a bike for $118 USD
You didn't find a bike. You found a box of parts. Read the page again:
> Mountain Bike Assembly - $99.00
If you want the box of parts assembled into a bike, it effectively doubles the price. Also there's no promise it's assembled correctly, or that the bike parts are actually good. "Proper maintenance" is a handwave for spending multiple times the cost of the bike to cover up the inadequacies of the bike.
https://www.whycycle.co.uk/buying-a-bike/beware-the-bicycle-...
> We generally recommend spending a MINIMUM of about £200 on most styles of adult bike [...] there are some reasonable quality bikes at below £200 but if you intend to buy at this price, do so from a reputable bike specialist.