Walmart bikes cracks me up!!!

Just yesterday I spent some time pricing out parts on the common online bike sites as I am considering building another beater roadbike. I didn't choose the cheapest prices, but all cheaply priced parts (e.g. $100 frame, $200 wheelset) - it came in right around $900.

$500 for a 'carbon', complete roadbike is bound to get the attention of the uninformed.

 

Maxwell (the monkey)


FYI: Lee knows a thing or two about BMX (state champion)


Bummer you weren't able to pick-up the hack!

 

The funny thing is that the bike that my dad got from walmart also had the fork backwards like that! I think they probably get shipped that way for space saving and the assembly guy never fixed it.

 

We tried rotating the fork the way you said and when we do that the brake levers are on the wrong side. It is very dangerous to ride a bike with brake levers like that.

Besides, with the fork like this way we get a much smaller turning radius. Makes it easier to ride in the store.

 

:lol: :beer:

 

MY first bike was from Wal Mart 100 years ago... before the internet even existed and we could learn about the dangers and disasters of such piles of crap.

I think just having a bike... and NOT sitting in front of the TV or playing video games gets a "+1" in my book!

 

I'm guessing as a kid you started off with a 5,000 custom build XC bike ??

When I was in the Navy and making less money than someone on welfare.. I bought a Huffy mountain bike to get around on base and ride to my buddies house. It got me those 10 miles round trip to his house and the 1/2 mile to the squadron. I think it was 60$ at the time.

I wonder if anyone on here has bought a 75$ mountain bike from walmart/target/costco... made sure it was tight and ready to go, and then rode it on the trails they normally go on and see how long till something brakes or needs fixed.

I'm going to go out on a limb and say your first name is Richard?

 

That is THE coolest pic I've seen on the internet this year! Echo open faces, JT face guard, scott breithaupt sidehack....wow.:clap::beer:

 

You need to visit some old school bmx sites... although it can get a little deep with all of the "it was so much better back then" talk.

The old pictures are worth it.
Wading through some of the "we talk/don't ride anymore" crap is just the price you'll have to pay.

The best old school bmx thread, The Mel thread on OS/BMX Society
http://bmxsociety.com/topic/24729-mel-stoutsenberger/

 

Puh-lease.......no kickstand????

 

..

 

Hey JCW, welcome over to the big-wheeled forum!
I'm assuming this is the same JCW/JW from vintage and getchasome.

 

Thanks Lee,
Funny thing is, mountain bikes are my roots, not bmx.
Don't own any of these new fangled mtbs.
I'll let the young'uns do all of the Hucking, freeride, etc.

"Newest" bike I've got is this

See you in Bakersfield this weekend?

 

In their defense, they have to work. That storage unit full of 1980's bmx trophies isn't gonna pay for itself.

 

Yea, having an idea of what goes into a quality bike, I'll tell ya. Interbike is a real eye opener, with all these vendors from China trying to get you into their private "offices" to make a deal. By the end of the show, they start getting desperate to squeeze in a last deal or two, and you see them pull out the rack with a dozen teetering bikes piled up on it, each one with a sheet of looseleaf paper taped to it with a double-digit number hand-scrawled in marker.

"You're selling the show bikes?" we ask.
"No, Low Low end of show pricing!!!"

Holy crap. You can buy your entire product line from these guys, and pay under a hundred bucks a unit shipped.

Keep in mind, that $500 CF road bike isn't a $500 road bike. It's a $300 road bike in Walmarts warehouse, $275 on the ocean, $175 at the distributor, $100 at the factory. For $100, you're getting a lot of parts, and a lot of brand overhead, leaving about $10 for craftsmanship. Even if you take into acct their Gov is subsidizing the materials & MFG overhead, and if you assume that by some miracle they're actually heat treating & aligning these things for free, there's no way they're doing any R&D or product testing for that. You get what you pay for, and well, you're not paying for much.

And this is the root of why we have another industry overrun with lawyers (no offense).

The net result is, Walmart, the Dist chain, & the MFG make just a couple bucks relative, some kid gets a dangerous rollign sh!tbox, and a year later, we put hundreds of thousands of junk bikes back into the earth where they... grow into beautiful bicycle trees.

 

As someone once told me, I wouldn't focus so much on the bike, it's not always about the bike. I have seen people on P.O.S.'s ride circles around people on $6K all mountain bikes.

 

^ Word!

 

The article talk about Harry Leary and how the cops harass him for going up to Honda hills. I remeber seeing him up there. It was really cool to see pros come up to our little play ground. When I was a kid it was called "The Flats" then when Harry Leary started going up there people started to call it "Honda Hills". I always thought that name (Honda Hills) was pretty g-hey because there where no Hondas up there and every time I saw a motorcycle up there it was just tearing up the place.

 

actually, lee was dq-ed from state for his use of the illegal "sideshow bob" shoes. :lol:



tell 'em, rainman: "walmart sucks."