Bike on a tight budget -- Performance.com frame?

[Paul]

I am putting together a bicycle as a present for a friend of ours, and
if I spend too much money for her, she will find this uncomfortable
(completely platonic, my wife's best friend). I want to give her
maximal bike for the buck, and have quite a few serviceable parts in
my basement to construct said bike. I do need a frame and wheels, and
was browsing the web when I came across Perfomance.com. I have not
done any business with them, but was surprised to find that I could
get an aluminum/carbon fork frame for $200, and a pair of Ultegra/Open
Pro wheels for $200. I live in a small town, and the local bikeshops
don't stock bare frames, and to order them is in excess of $600. The
difference in price for wheels is similar. Complete bikes, with lower
level components than I have lying around, are over our budget (in
excess of $1200).

Has anyone had experience with the Scattante frames and the
Perfomance.com wheels? I don't expect them to ride like a high-end
road bike, but will they fall apart or go out of true quickly? Our
friend is a relative novice and would not be riding the bike very
hard. I would hazard a guess that her weight is less than 160lbs.

Paul

[Woland99]

On Apr 1, 7:55 pm, Paul <s...@sympatico.ca> wrote:
> I am putting together a bicycle as a present for a friend of ours, and
> if I spend too much money for her, she will find this uncomfortable
> (completely platonic, my wife's best friend). I want to give her
> maximal bike for the buck, and have quite a few serviceable parts in
> my basement to construct said bike. I do need a frame and wheels, and
> was browsing the web when I came across Perfomance.com. I have not
> done any business with them, but was surprised to find that I could
> get an aluminum/carbon fork frame for $200, and a pair of Ultegra/Open
> Pro wheels for $200. I live in a small town, and the local bikeshops
> don't stock bare frames, and to order them is in excess of $600. The
> difference in price for wheels is similar. Complete bikes, with lower
> level components than I have lying around, are over our budget (in
> excess of $1200).
>
> Has anyone had experience with the Scattante frames and the
> Perfomance.com wheels? I don't expect them to ride like a high-end
> road bike, but will they fall apart or go out of true quickly? Our
> friend is a relative novice and would not be riding the bike very
> hard. I would hazard a guess that her weight is less than 160lbs.
>
> Paul

Nice idea - wish sbdy gave me a decent road bike.
Dunno anything about Scattante - here are some reviews tho:
http://tinyurl.com/2wmwep

[landotter]

On Apr 1, 7:55 pm, Paul <s...@sympatico.ca> wrote:
> I am putting together a bicycle as a present for a friend of ours, and
> if I spend too much money for her, she will find this uncomfortable
> (completely platonic, my wife's best friend). I want to give her
> maximal bike for the buck, and have quite a few serviceable parts in
> my basement to construct said bike. I do need a frame and wheels, and
> was browsing the web when I came across Perfomance.com. I have not
> done any business with them, but was surprised to find that I could
> get an aluminum/carbon fork frame for $200, and a pair of Ultegra/Open
> Pro wheels for $200. I live in a small town, and the local bikeshops
> don't stock bare frames, and to order them is in excess of $600. The
> difference in price for wheels is similar. Complete bikes, with lower
> level components than I have lying around, are over our budget (in
> excess of $1200).
>
> Has anyone had experience with the Scattante frames and the
> Perfomance.com wheels? I don't expect them to ride like a high-end
> road bike, but will they fall apart or go out of true quickly?

Frames are built likely to spec where everybody else has their frames
built. I wouldn't sweat it. Just to give you a heads up, Nashbar's got
a really nice Redline road frame/fork for $400 that's built for long
reach brakes in case she wants to mount fenders for winter, or run a
poofy fast tire like a 32mm Pasela. Yes, the carbon fork has eyelets.
Other than that, it's a true road bike.

http://tinyurl.com/33n9af

The wheels will benefit from destressing and bringing up to tension
and a final true. Nothing wrong with machine *laced* wheels, if you
finish them off--indeed, you save the time of lacing, and its often
cheaper than buying the seperate components. Shouldn't take more than
half an hour. I find that machine built wheels usually need around
half a turn to bring up to tension. YMMV, of course.

[Hank]

On Apr 1, 5:55 pm, Paul <s...@sympatico.ca> wrote:
> I am putting together a bicycle as a present for a friend of ours, and
> if I spend too much money for her, she will find this uncomfortable
> (completely platonic, my wife's best friend). I want to give her
> maximal bike for the buck, and have quite a few serviceable parts in
> my basement to construct said bike. I do need a frame and wheels, and
> was browsing the web when I came across Perfomance.com. I have not
> done any business with them, but was surprised to find that I could
> get an aluminum/carbon fork frame for $200, and a pair of Ultegra/Open
> Pro wheels for $200. I live in a small town, and the local bikeshops
> don't stock bare frames, and to order them is in excess of $600. The
> difference in price for wheels is similar. Complete bikes, with lower
> level components than I have lying around, are over our budget (in
> excess of $1200).
>
> Has anyone had experience with the Scattante frames and the
> Perfomance.com wheels? I don't expect them to ride like a high-end
> road bike, but will they fall apart or go out of true quickly? Our
> friend is a relative novice and would not be riding the bike very
> hard. I would hazard a guess that her weight is less than 160lbs.
>
> Paul

I was going to suggest the Nashbar Frame' and the $70 Bontrager carbon
forks Wheel & Sprocket is blowing out, but since this includes a
headset and seat collar (gotta be worth about $35 retail right there),
I'd say that's a pretty good deal.

You might also check ChucksBikes.com - they sometimes have some
screaming frame & fork deals.

[David Kerber]

In article <bcafd1ab-1f90-40e7-8572-49b5297e9040
@a22g2000hsc.googlegroups.com>, slav@sympatico.ca says...
> I am putting together a bicycle as a present for a friend of ours, and
> if I spend too much money for her, she will find this uncomfortable
> (completely platonic, my wife's best friend). I want to give her
> maximal bike for the buck, and have quite a few serviceable parts in
> my basement to construct said bike. I do need a frame and wheels, and
> was browsing the web when I came across Perfomance.com. I have not
> done any business with them, but was surprised to find that I could
> get an aluminum/carbon fork frame for $200, and a pair of Ultegra/Open
> Pro wheels for $200. I live in a small town, and the local bikeshops
> don't stock bare frames, and to order them is in excess of $600. The
> difference in price for wheels is similar. Complete bikes, with lower
> level components than I have lying around, are over our budget (in
> excess of $1200).
>
> Has anyone had experience with the Scattante frames and the
> Perfomance.com wheels? I don't expect them to ride like a high-end
> road bike, but will they fall apart or go out of true quickly? Our
> friend is a relative novice and would not be riding the bike very
> hard. I would hazard a guess that her weight is less than 160lbs.

There are several Scattante bikes at rides I do with my local club, and
nobody seems to have any trouble with them. I've bought a lot of stuff
from Performance, and have never had any trouble with the order, though
I've never bought or ridden one of their frames.


--
Remove the ns_ from if replying by e-mail (but keep posts in the
newsgroups if possible).

[andresmuro@aol.com]

On Apr 1, 6:55 pm, Paul <s...@sympatico.ca> wrote:
> I am putting together a bicycle as a present for a friend of ours, and
> if I spend too much money for her, she will find this uncomfortable
> (completely platonic, my wife's best friend). I want to give her
> maximal bike for the buck, and have quite a few serviceable parts in
> my basement to construct said bike. I do need a frame and wheels, and
> was browsing the web when I came across Perfomance.com. I have not
> done any business with them, but was surprised to find that I could
> get an aluminum/carbon fork frame for $200, and a pair of Ultegra/Open
> Pro wheels for $200. I live in a small town, and the local bikeshops
> don't stock bare frames, and to order them is in excess of $600. The
> difference in price for wheels is similar. Complete bikes, with lower
> level components than I have lying around, are over our budget (in
> excess of $1200).
>
> Has anyone had experience with the Scattante frames and the
> Perfomance.com wheels? I don't expect them to ride like a high-end
> road bike, but will they fall apart or go out of true quickly? Our
> friend is a relative novice and would not be riding the bike very
> hard. I would hazard a guess that her weight is less than 160lbs.
>
> Paul

Performance is fine and their al frame with fork should work fine w/o
problems. They've been in the business for over 20 years and guarantee
everything they sell, give exchanges, money back etc, etc. The frame,
if it fits properly, will ride just like any frame with the same
geometry. A $1,000 frame with the same geometry won't ride noticeably
better anyways.

Andres

Andres