Is £800 enough money to spend on an everyday ride to work bike.

[Alan Quay]

Artstu....they are selling ok,but at £1300 you have to spend time explaining all the extra quality,at £1000 they sell themselves.
As a designer it's nice to produce the best you can,it is a bit frustrating that if you put a German name on a bike you can get £500 more for it even though you know the Germans are buying their frames from the same factory and selecting their parts from the same Chinese parts bin.
Yes my new models are all targeted at the UK preferred maximum price point of £1000,one is £695.00-a unique bike but not released until April/May,no further info at the moment.
KudosDave

KD, why not check in to a Travel Lodge in Dusseldorf for the weekend, knock up a rough design for your next bike, give it a suitably Teutonic name then plaster it with 'Designed in Germany' stickers?

How about the Kudos Doppelganger, Schadenfreude or Weltschmerz?

 

[RobF]

I think you have been persuaded by the strength of the Bosch publicity machine, KudosDave

Dave,

It has nothing to do with the Bosch publicity machine.

Crank drives, particularly 'name' ones such as Bosch, Yamaha, Shimano Steps and Impulse/Kalkhoff are a lot more expensive than hub motors.

Thus a bike with a name crank drive for £1,600 or so looks a lot better value than your Rapide with a sub-£100 hub motor at £1,400.

Oh, and the only Kalkhoff hub motor bike on sale in the UK is £1,295, and it has hub gears.

 

[Kudoscycles]

KD, why not check in to a Travel Lodge in Dusseldorf for the weekend, knock up a rough design for your next bike, give it a suitably Teutonic name then plaster it with 'Designed in Germany' stickers?

How about the Kudos Doppelganger, Schadenfreude or Weltschmerz?

It's awfully tempting but I am afraid very illegal,big fines possible. In my industry there was a company called Schreider suspension,all covered in German stickers,trying to compete with Bilstein,Eibach.
Schreider was made in Chelmsford,Essex.
The big boys ganged up on him and he stopped trading.
Do you remember that Wisper put Union Jack stickers on his Shanghai built bike,he knew that trading standards would enforce that transgression.
Many have tried 'designed in the U.K.' or 'conceived in Germany'....the design was drawn on a fag packet in the bar of some hotel!
The number of times I see a lazer engraver in China putting 'Italian design' or 'Milan' or ' Koln' on a product is amusing. The US stop it by having a law that if more than 40% is made outside the US,it must have the country of origin,maybe 'made in China'
It's strange our law says that if you put 'made in X' it has to be made in X,but if you put nothing it can come from anywhere.
But it's dishonest and it inevitably gets found out,then the publicity is self defeating....most customers want straight trading.
KudosDave

 

[flecc]

* Accepting that what I am referring to as cheap, could equally be alot of money to someone else. Cheap probably isn't the right expression.

Inexpensive is a handy word, no implications of poor quality.
.

 

[EddiePJ]

Reasonably priced could sound even better.

KD, that last sentence is interesting "most customers want straight trading" One of my pet hates is certain 'reasonably priced' bikes, being sold and described as mtb's. This description couldn't be further from the truth, and the bikes would call it a day at the first mole hill. I notice that Oxygen have now decided to add "style" after mtb.

 

[flecc]

Many have tried 'designed in the U.K.' or 'conceived in Germany'....the design was drawn on a fag packet in the bar of some hotel!

The drinks industry seems to get away with misleading names though, the pseudo Russian name Smirnoff for a vodka is typical, and there's many more examples.
.

 

[EddiePJ]

Glad that you didn't mention St Austell brewery, and Tribute.

 

[trex]

I'm sure the global bike brands can source components a lot cheaper.

that seems to be the case. However, I think the real issue of matching German build quality is not components. After all, you can cut margin and compete after you have made a good enough bike. But e-bikes rely on electronics. Key Chinese firms like Lishui and Bafang do not release their API so British firms cannot value-add to Chinese electronics via software or add-ons. Until that situation is resolved, we are stuck with Chinese designs, like it or not. You will see stupid situations like Chinese designs require brake sensors, narrowing down very significantly the choice of HDBs (only Zoom and Tektro have HDB cylinders suitable for integrated sensors) and increasing complexity.

 

[Kudoscycles]

Dave,

It has nothing to do with the Bosch publicity machine.

Crank drives, particularly 'name' ones such as Bosch, Yamaha, Shimano Steps and Impulse/Kalkhoff are a lot more expensive than hub motors.

Thus a bike with a name crank drive for £1,600 or so looks a lot better value than your Rapide with a sub-£100 hub motor at £1,400.

Oh, and the only Kalkhoff hub motor bike on sale in the UK is £1,295, and it has hub gears.

Rob....I am not sure we agree or disagree on this point. I realise that the Bosch type crank motors are more expensive. The Bafang Max Drive is also much more expensive than the BPM motor.
But my point is whether this expense is necessary.
I have taken a Bosch motor apart and also a BPM motor apart,the Bosch motor is so over designed relative to the BPM motor. It seems to me that once the decision was made to go crank drive the Bosch engineers had to overcome the problems associated with that design by an increasingly complicated design,this is particularly true of Bosch MK2.
The Bafang sales guys admitted to me that they only manufactured the Bafang Max Drive to directly compete with the Bosch unit,I suspect the same applies to Shimano and Yamaha,if that is what German buyers want then give it to them.
Not sure you can buy a fully equipped( by that I mean lights,mudguards etc) German Bosch powered e-bike for £1600. But I do agree that an English/Chinese priced e-bike at £1400 is in a difficult marketing price point,whatever the specification,which is why I will not build a Bafang Mid Drive e-bike and sell it in the UK,it is too close to the price of a branded German assembled e-bike. There was a well known company at the NEC who were showing such bikes,priced £1600....my comment was that you needed a German brand name at that price level.
I haven't bought any car in the last 20 years that isn't VW,Audi or BMW so I suppose I also German branded led.
But this all started when a forum member asked why we don't put higher spec hardware on UK sourced bikes,the foregoing answers that question.
I suppose the best compliment that testers make when they ride my Kudos Rapide and Sonata is that 'it rides like a German bike'. I don't have loads so are relaxed that they will sell,albeit slowly.
In the meantime back to designing £1000 bikes.
KudosDave

 

[soundwave]

http://www.mhw-bike.com/cube-cross-hybrid-pro-400-black-n-red-2016-4692

79 euro left for lights guards ect

 

[Kudoscycles]

Reasonably priced could sound even better.

KD, that last sentence is interesting "most customers want straight trading" One of my pet hates is certain 'reasonably priced' bikes, being sold and described as mtb's. This description couldn't be further from the truth, and the bikes would call it a day at the first mole hill. I notice that Oxygen have now decided to add "style" after mtb.

The current vogue is 'competitively priced'.what does that mean?
KudosDave

 

[Kudoscycles]

http://www.mhw-bike.com/cube-cross-hybrid-pro-400-black-n-red-2016-4692

79 euro left for lights guards ect

That is a very cheap bike,ahem very competitively priced bike. Chain reaction cycles have it for £1499.00
KudosDave

 

[RobF]

Rob....I am not sure we agree or disagree on this point. I realise that the Bosch type crank motors are more expensive. The Bafang Max Drive is also much more expensive than the BPM motor.
But my point is whether this expense is necessary.
I have taken a Bosch motor apart and also a BPM motor apart,the Bosch motor is so over designed relative to the BPM motor. It seems to me that once the decision was made to go crank drive the Bosch engineers had to overcome the problems associated with that design by an increasingly complicated design,this is particularly true of Bosch MK2.
The Bafang sales guys admitted to me that they only manufactured the Bafang Max Drive to directly compete with the Bosch unit,I suspect the same applies to Shimano and Yamaha,if that is what German buyers want then give it to them.
Not sure you can buy a fully equipped( by that I mean lights,mudguards etc) German Bosch powered e-bike for £1600. But I do agree that an English/Chinese priced e-bike at £1400 is in a difficult marketing price point,whatever the specification,which is why I will not build a Bafang Mid Drive e-bike and sell it in the UK,it is too close to the price of a branded German assembled e-bike. There was a well known company at the NEC who were showing such bikes,priced £1600....my comment was that you needed a German brand name at that price level.
I haven't bought any car in the last 20 years that isn't VW,Audi or BMW so I suppose I also German branded led.
But this all started when a forum member asked why we don't put higher spec hardware on UK sourced bikes,the foregoing answers that question.
I suppose the best compliment that testers make when they ride my Kudos Rapide and Sonata is that 'it rides like a German bike'. I don't have loads so are relaxed that they will sell,albeit slowly.
In the meantime back to designing £1000 bikes.
KudosDave

I think we largely agree.

Part of your marketing problem - if you see it as one - is you've pushed the spec and price up with the Rapide at time when Bosch/Yamaha bikes have come down a bit in price.

My notional £1,600 name crank bike would be naked, so I agree a fully kitted commuter name crank bike would be about £250 more.

I've not yet found an ebike that matches the smooth power delivery of a Bosch, although I take Bob from Juicy's point made elsewhere about torque sensing electronics coming to hub motor bikes.

I expect one of those, properly set up, would ride very nicely.

If the cheapness of the hub motor was reflected in the retail price of such a bike, it could do well.

 

[Kudoscycles]

I also think we largely agree.
The problem with pure torque sensing bikes,that is those without speed sensor overrides,is that you have to input power to get power out.
Many customers don't realise how they work,they have been told that to get fit you need a torque sensor and who wants to admit that they don't want to get fit.
But when you explain that tired after a long ride they have to press the pedals to get power most go for a speed sensor,even though it takes away the intuitive ride.
England 15 - Scotland 6.....20 mins left.
KudosDave

 

[trex]

I have just read this post:
http://www.pedelecs.co.uk/forum/threads/ktm-macina-force-29.23273/

Stumpy150 reported the problem he had with his Tektro front disc brakes on his KTM Macina Force 29 including a ' trouser filing moment'. I would like to say that some problems (even rare) should be reported but not treated as typical issue of 'cheap components'. Brakes and forks are often used in the exchanges re 'Chinese v German' discussions, eg. Magura = good, Tektro = bad, Rockshox/Fox=good, SR/RST=bad. If anything, it confirms what KD said about German/Austrian/British bike companies sharing the same part bins, all made in Asia.
I don't buy into the common prejudice that Chinese rims are bad either. Most bikes have double walled rims nowadays, they are as tough as anything costing 10 times their price with a fancy sticker.
Back to the original topic, whether £800 is enough to get you a bike that you can use as every day transport, I would say now, after reading the entire thread, that it's a cautious yes if you don't mind riding a 24kg bike instead of a 22kg bike and are prepared to forgo the services of a local dealer.

 

[Jimod]

England 15 - Scotland 6.....20 mins left.
KudosDave

HMMM. I'll be looking for a nice discount on my next bike by way of an apology from you.

 

[anotherkiwi]

Last week I saw a 99 € bike at the supermarket. Put a decent pair of tyres and brakes on it and you have almost doubled the price!

 

[trex]

decent pair of tyres = £50, decent set of HDBs = £60 (Avid BB7) to £120 (Magura HS-11). Then headset, grips, the list goes on. I blame the LBSs.

 

[Kudoscycles]

HMMM. I'll be looking for a nice discount on my next bike by way of an apology from you.

Sorry Jim.
KudosDave

 

[flecc]

Last week I saw a 99 € bike at the supermarket. Put a decent pair of tyres and brakes on it and you have almost doubled the price!

Even worse here at under two-thirds that, Cycle King discounters often offer derailleur bikes at £49, which currently converts to under 64 €.
.