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New bike prices


Eric Evans

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Hi, I am also a cyclist doing road and MTB. I need to buy a supercab bakkie and they go for just over R220 000 for some decent Ranger.

Just wondering what I am paying for in buying a Cannondale Scalpel for example for R180 000.

It seems quite a lot for 2 wheels and a frame and no engine. What make a bike so expensive?

This is a serious question as I cannot see what can cost so much.

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But a Ferrari, with lots of titanium and carbon fibre, and R&D to make it light and fast (compared to a Ranger) costs R5 000 000. Shouldn't you be comparing the Scalpel to that?

 

A Ranger-level bike would be in the 10-15k range. Designed to be tough, but not that light. As soon as you try to make things lighter, the cost rises exponentially.

 

And because we are the tiny half-horse-power motors, weight is everything.

 

Ford can drop in a heavy body for the Ranger, that is cheap, and just up the engine power to push it. We can't, really.

 

But I am sure this has been covered a brazillion times here :)

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Hi Eric,

This is a good question you pose.

But first - how the heck do you manage to get a decent Ranger for 220k? 2nd hand?

As for a bike costing so much, firstly, unless your Froome or Schurter, you probs don't need to fork out so much. But hey, personal choice. 

Secondly, I have read somewhere that frames are so pricey seeing that every year or two the manufacturers have to go through various iterations of molds to build each frame prototype before settling on the "one" that makes it to market. As for all the prototype molds? They are supposedly destroyed to prevent the opposition from getting their hands on them. This mold building process is prohibitively expensive, especially for Carbon, and therefor the costs must be recuperated somehow. And then in a year or two the cycle, 'scuse the pun, is repeated.

Otherwise we will end up with a situation like Mitsubishi and Fiat have, sharing the same bakkie.

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Well firstly, you're not comparing apples with apples. Supercab Ford Bakkie != Cannondale Scalpel. A more realistic comparison would be between a supercar (eg Lambo, Ferrari )and a top of the range MTB. As with the cars, there is no way that the raw material costs of the bike equates to the asking price. It has to do with R&D costs, manufacturing overhead, component costs and then "want/prestige" factor

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I hear the argument that we need to compare the bike with a sports car but really - there is so much more engineering, materials and complexity to a bakkie - even an old bantam - than there is to a bicycle .... it is really bonkers and indefensible in my view.

Not if you are trying to make it light and safe. The level of engineering is as high, if not higher - the margin of error is so much tighter on the bike, where grams count, not kilograms.

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I wonder what the markup is on the total production cost of the Scalpel frame and LBS consumer price - I would guess somewhere between 3000 - 5000%?

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I wonder what the markup is on the total production cost of the Scalpel frame and LBS consumer price - I would guess somewhere between 3000 - 5000%?

I know LBS works on around 30-40% to get their RRP, before negotiations start. Then brands like Giant & Spez wholesaler (agent) has around the same markup to get to the wholesale price. Not sure what happens before that

Edited by Ofaniy
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Not if you are trying to make it light and safe. The level of engineering is as high, if not higher - the margin of error is so much tighter on the bike, where grams count, not kilograms.

are you on something Tim?

 

most electronics on a car is rated weapons grade, meaning it can handle the extreme cold, heat and massive vibration.

 

no way that any margin on a bike is held to a higher standard than in the auto industry, you have a controlled explosions going on under the hood, a bike remains a bike a couple of grams shaven isn't master engineering, the 10000 plus parts in you car have thousands of hours worth of engineering behind them.

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are you on something Tim?

 

most electronics on a car is rated weapons grade, meaning it can handle the extreme cold, heat and massive vibration.

 

no way that any margin on a bike is held to a higher standard than in the auto industry, you have a controlled explosions going on under the hood, a bike remains a bike a couple of grams shaven isn't master engineering, the 10000 plus parts in you car have thousands of hours worth of engineering behind them.

 

It would have been great if Ford figured this when building the Kuga to weapons-grade...

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