that day at KH Cycle, saw someone introduce his "home minister" to his cycling kakis...

he said it out.. haha...

Guys,

I am new in this thread and I intend to take up biking. Have not been cycling for a long time and the last time I used to ride my grandmother's age-old bicycle of the yesteryears. Haha!

Aside from leisure, I am planning to participate in cycling marathons when I am ready. Any bike models that the sifus here can recommend and is affordable for a beginner?

(:

This post has been edited by sacrosanct: Apr 26 2012, 05:08 PM

well... it depends on your budget and how serious you want to go...

there are 2 ways...

buy a cheaper bike - for 2 reasons

1) so, that you can try it out and see if you like the sport then proceed to buy a better bike later on
2) in case you fumble and crash, you don't feel so painful crashing a cheap bike (bear in mind cheap doesn't mean dirt cheap by any means in today's bike prices)
3) if you don't sell it, you can use it as a training or daily bike when you buy a better bike (giving you an excuse to keep another bike)

go full force with a super bike
1) you don't need to bother with a lesser bike and the headaches of having to sell it when you have gotten bored with it
2) no external influences for greater desires (this is out rightly a total lie, you get seduced by bike and parts manufacturers and brain wash by evil bastards like me each and every day)

long crap short...

expect RM2k to RM3k for really basic alloy bike... RM4 - RM5k for enthusiast alloy bike...

RM7k and up for entry level carbon bikes... RMxxk to what declares you as bankrupt for the best of the best of the best...

hope i didn't drive you away

This post has been edited by butthead: Apr 26 2012, 05:20 PM

a good summarized conclusion.

next, question would be where i can get the bike?

For beginner, can try go visit pedalspot bike shop as being featured in TheStar Metro last weekend. They have lot of Merida bike and BMC...

home minister = wife? wats wrong with that.. maybe he is teaching his buddies a lesson so they don't get married to early...

swinger gonna swing and cyclists gonna cycle... leaving the single life is like having the freedom to bang any pretty chicks you like... sounds wrong bang chicks, you get aids... buy bikes, you get bankruptcy... makes no sense...

damn, my analogies is shit... lucky i am not a philosopher or the world will be filled with more idiots...

Ah, thanks for your feedback. Much appreciated!

I do intend on going full force and to be honest, I miss cycling as when I was younger I used to cycle from point A to B in my hometown. I thought of taking it up as a second sport (running is my first sport) as I have a few friends who are enthusiasts. Looking at their photos make me want to join them during their rides.

Yes, been looking at some bikes and they are expensive even for the basic ones. I know I will be seduced by various bike and parts manufacturers because I have been thoroughly poisoned by my friend's C59. My my, such a beautiful thing.

Nah, you did not drive me away and the points were good. Though, which shop would you recommend?

that's controversial i personally think.. because we should stay neutral in recommendations... or we'd be promoting a certain bike shop that we frequent a lot or something like that... biasness

i would say look at the baikbike directory and go to any shops which is nearest to where the person lives or just browse the bike brands on the internet..
http://www.baikbike.com/biking-stores/

at least to get a general feel and see if things are acceptable by him / her financially... subsequently, produce and filter a list of bikes he / she likes or prefers... filter them down according to his priorities (price, looks, value for money, specs)...

eventually, when a certain brand is preferred... it will be inevitable that he / she will visit a narrowed down list of shops... at that point, our intervention will be more meaningful as to recommend the pros and cons between the couple of shops that has the preferred bike... whether it is purely because of price competition or the intrinsic value of selecting a particular shop for a more worthy long term relationship...

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Added on April 26, 2012, 5:44 pmdude, shit...

i don't understand half of what i wrote... good luck with the interpretation, bro

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Added on April 26, 2012, 5:55 pmseriously... i am going to stay with my stance on not trying to name shops... it really depends on who you can click with...

are you going to be involved in multi-sport like "run bike run" or 70.3 or ironman tris? those might be a tad expensive even if you are not going to run 2 bike setups...

a budget would be easier to at least get you in the direction of what to look for first... if you want to filter by shops first, you might get limited to certain brands (if you don't mind that)... if you put brands in front first, then you have to choose yours shop in between the shops that has those brands... depends on whether you value bike brands more or the shop relationship / support more?

like Scott is being sold by Bike Pro and KH Cycle... different people have different opinion on both shops... some brands are held solely by one shop then, those are easier choices as it is quite fixed....

looking at the RM10 - RM15k range for road bikes... look around the couple of known brands on the net like Scott, Giant, BMC, Pinarello, Specialized, Merida and see what fancies you..

http://www.giant-bicycles.com/
http://www.bmc-racing.com/int-en/home.html
http://www.specialized.com/
http://www.pinarello.com/eng/index_eng.php
http://www.merida-bikes.com/
http://www.cervelo.com/en_us/

this few brands have carbon bikes that varies in price from cheap to super expensive...BMC, Specialized, Pinarello, Trek in particular can get super expensive if you want the best of the best...

This post has been edited by butthead: Apr 26 2012, 05:59 PM

Oooowh I am so close at getting the wheelsets that I want..was home early today and thought of going to my usual lbs and just grab that wheels and be happy about it..but I changed my mind at the last minute cos I'm too lazy to go on weekdays

I want to put more miles into my 1.9kgs flex-happy and weight sagging wheels..and after that let see how a 1.4kg stiffer and muscular wheels performs..

Cash ready but mind not ready yet haha

This post has been edited by hianboy: Apr 26 2012, 06:19 PM

hahaha... maybe's it's a lucky change of mind...

i usually like to go on weekdays because they have less customers and i have more time to bug them till they take out their tools out to threaten me....

ey butthead I need your help aar...about my 2209mhr..the actual altimeter..the one with the mountain icon (looks like breasts with different sizes)

I live in a condo..level 5..but why the heck it is showing -3 ?? previously when I bought it, it was showing like 143 or so..

Isn't the feature supposed to automatically find it's correct value according to the current altitude? Rosak issssit?

Too bad, shipping by amazon for the on-axle rack is gonna be expensive... so imma gonna find it somewhere laa.. can also try if it fits or not...

anyone know where to find shops that carry a large selection or racks to choose from? like touring bike shops or something similar? I have been to a lota of bike shops and they don't have it... Is there no demand for bike racks?

it's not spoilt... the altimeters uses air pressure to determine the altitude it is at... what happens with air pressure is that it gets cold and hot throughout the day... as air becomes cold, it becomes denser and vice versa... denser air usually occurs at lower altitude..

if you are still following me... so, when you last leave the bike at home in 200 feet for instance at 30 degree Celsius it records itself at that reading with that pressure at that time... next morning when you wake up, the ambient temp drops to 25 degree Celsius and upon waking your MHR2209 up, it will see that the pressure has gone up since cold air is more denser and the altitude will show a drop... do it over multiple days and the altitude will go lower and lower...

long crap short...

to deal with this... all altimeters have a home option... this is practically where you store your bike permanently... at home for instance... in your setup menu there is an option called "home altitude" if i am not wrong.. .you have to look up the manual... find your home sea level adjusted altitude from google earth and key this into the setup home altitude...

everytime, before you leave home to go out for a ride...you press and hold the top and bottom buttons (can't remember is the left side or right side top and bottom buttons) for 2 or 3 seconds and you see "home altitude" flashing... after that, your altitude will get resetted to what you have setup in the setup...

as you live in level 5, it gets more tougher and you have to reset it every time when you are at the ground floor of your residence since that is the measured altitude from G earth...unless you have other methods to tell your actual alti in your actual level 5 home... ground floor is the way to go...

this is how barometer based altimeters worked...

i have to do this too once in a while or my ROX will show that i am leaving 20 feet underground...

i think the garmin units drag or compensate with data from the sats... and this keeps them more accurate...

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Added on April 26, 2012, 7:12 pmseems like there really is no demand for it... have you tried to call rodalink to ask them for topeak ones.. i've seen them having them, just not so cheap compared to those china mades...

P-Clips is confirmed available in the section 17 jaya hardware shop i think... hianboy, take a pic and show... it's your time to contribute...

i dunno how to mark gmaps... but it is at the corner of jalan 17a/9...
http://maps.google.com/maps/ms?msid=201081...005764,0.009645

This post has been edited by butthead: Apr 26 2012, 07:12 PM

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Added on April 26, 2012, 7:12 pm

seems like there really is no demand for it... have you tried to call rodalink to ask them for topeak ones.. i've seen them having them, just not so cheap compared to those china mades...

P-Clips is confirmed available in the section 17 jaya hardware shop i think... hianboy, take a pic and show... it's your time to contribute...

i dunno how to mark gmaps... but it is at the corner of jalan 17a/9...
http://maps.google.com/maps/ms?msid=201081...005764,0.009645

[/quote]

Thanks butthead.. I've been to rodalink last weekend.. and they were out of stock..

Will head to the hardware shop this weekend!!!! thanks Butthead...

p/s - Where is beavis?

other rodalink branches? there is bangsar, hartamas and dengkil if i am not wrong..

if you can wait, let hianboy show you the pics first...

ebay would be the last option... also not cheap...

actually, there is a beavis in this forum... but that idiot is also me as well.. just an account i forgotten the password to...

This post has been edited by butthead: Apr 26 2012, 07:42 PM

thx bro..u somehow had solved what puzzled me..the manual is rubbish. First they don't put the unit of measurement in the setting. I assumed since I chose KMH instead of MPH, then the rest of the setting is in metric SI? Hence I believe my altitude is in meter. The format is x.xxxx so let say after I checked out my home altitude using this tool http://www.daftlogic.com/sandbox-google-ma...nd-altitude.htm it says my house 41m...so in my computer i put 0.0041...correct?

No wonder it went to negative value before as I turn on the air conditioned unit every night. Last thing..if what I grasped from your point above is correct, every time I bring my bike out for a ride, I need to reset the actual altitude into my home altitude (pressing top right and bottom right for 3 secs, tried and works), it will auto calibrate to the actual altitude?

I can reset it every time for more accurate reading (for example at a based of a hill) or only when I bring my bike to the ground floor of my condo? And what is this air pressure at sea level function...what values should I enter?

*eughh..too many questions and bad sentence structures ..sorry for that. haha

This post has been edited by mrjgx: Apr 26 2012, 07:51 PM

while waiting for shit to run in the office... dunno if they are still around...

http://www.lelong.com.my/25-genuine-deuter...0-12-Sale-P.htm

http://www.bicyclebuysell.com/view_item.php?id=135986

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Added on April 26, 2012, 7:54 pmlemme read manual ah... i go download on the net first...

the meter is stupid as you can't set the speed and alti measurements units separately.. i think mph is feet and kph is meters... i liked to have kph with feet as feet usually shows higher figure but that's not possible (somehow i get more motivated seeing big numbers)

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Added on April 26, 2012, 8:06 pm

here is the setup for home alti




here is how to set it...



it is actually not 0.000 it is 1,000 (1 thousand).. so if yours is 41, you are right to set it 0.041

you are right that you have to reset it at your home everytime...at the place where you actually check the altitude and setup for the home alti number in setup mode...

home alti is jus to instruct the 2209 to set the actual altitude back to what you preset in the home alti.. in other words, compensate for the pressure changes.. you should not be pressing the home alti at any other place else unless you are sure that place is the same altitude as your home...

it actually does not calibrate the readings, sorry if i used the wrong wording... jus to tell the meter that for this pressure, it should now be this high...

hence, you have to find a fixed point where you know the altitude...

my rox has 3 home alti settings if i am not wrong... so, i can store a home alti setting of my house, and then another one like HOA in genting sempah or any place i like... just select which home alti data to apply when i am there...



This post has been edited by butthead: Apr 26 2012, 08:12 PM

Wanted an entry level hardtail for my early morning rides in the dark.
Ended with Specialized hardrock 27 speeder. Not bad, more or less comparable to what i had ridden before, a Fuji Nevada. So sticking to specialized for now......

Yeah, I do not mind looking at budget bikes anyway, because am still an amateur in this particular sport so I need to learn more. Thanks for the links and am checking them out now. Cannot afford the best of the best right now, need to save up first!

Thx bro..my manual didn't have the notes saying about the unit of measurement..weird. hehe. So finally I understand the function now..reset it to my home altitude when taking out my bike for a ride..and hopefully in car it will not change the value that much (i believe it has a transport mode). hehe.