info on montra Celtic

[Girish V]

Dear all,

I'm thinking of upgrading my 4yr old act 110+which is still serving me well. My daily usage is a commute of 14-15km, planning to double it and looking for a new ride.

Waiting for the new montra Celtic which looks like vfm, but failed to see any user review. Can you please enlighten me whether this is a worthy upgrade?

Thought about purefix, but single speed might be a problem for long commute, the next one available at BOTS in my budget is specialized sirrus only.

Cheers

Girish

[Prashanth Chengi]

Unless you have long sections which are steep climbs on your commute, distance should not be a worrying factor, while evaluating to buy a Purefix. It'll be faster and more fun than most hybrids/MTBs and can give road bikes serious competition too! I think the Purefix is a fantastic choice for a commute bike. 

/Prashanth

Girish

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[Ashok Kumar S]

Pick it based on the route you use would be my suggestion. My commute route has lots of humps, pot holes and at times i happen to do a bit of off roading too during commute. So, I use MTBs for commute and my roadie for other rides. Thin tyre bikes could be a risk under muddy, unpaved, hostile roads and under bad climate conditions. Again depends on how aggressively one rides.

[Prashanth Chengi]

+1 to Ashok's points. 

In the Purefix's favor however is the fact that it is shod with 700x28 tyres which is far better equipped to handle Blr's roads than typical road bikes shod with 700x23 tyres. It's versatile, hardy and can run rings around MTBs while engaged in city commute use.

/Prashanth

[Girish V]

Dear Prashant and Ashok,

thank you very much for the replies.

My commute will be from Devegowda petrol pump to HAL airport road and it does include some steep gradients, but not too many. I think I can manage them in a single speed. And, most of the roads are paved, so should not be a problem unless I ride on the footpath (rarely).

The reason I am thinking of an upgrade is, in my current commute (7 km from Manipal hospital to Karthik nagar, Marathahalli), I am almost always in single gear and that too the highest gear in the front and 7th gear at the back. For this Mr Prem from BOTS suggested that I might be riding too hard and asked me to increase the cadence. I did check my cadence for the past two days and I am averaging around 55+/-5 which seems to be alright, hence planning for an upgrade thinking I might have overgrown my beloved Act 110+.

Since, I am using my current bike almost as a single speed, I was inclined towards purefix, but the suggestion from BOTS was to think beyond commute, so the confusion.

I think the breaks are necessary in Bangalore traffic and the extra break costs close to couple of thousands and if I go for bullhorn, then that will add another couple pushing the price to almost 30k. Hence was looking at Montra as I can get a road bike at the price of a good hybrid. As I am not planning to sell my Act 110+, this I THOUGHT might be a better option.

cheers

girish

PS: The new bike is thanks to my wife and after a lot of effort could push the budget to 30k, but no more than that, not even from my pocket :(

[berkeleydb]

Girish -- Unless you are fairly certain that you are only going to be be doing commuting on your bike, and pretty much no other riding (longer rides on the outskirts of the city, or out of town), you might want to consider other factors at this point -- since you are looking at upping your budget to ~Rs30K.  For the commute as well -- your commute might change in the future, so you should_not (IMO), focus too much on a specific route.

I would categorise a commute as a not too long ride (subjective, but say not more than ~25kms one way, which is quite long for a commute), through city roads / traffic.  The road condition can be considered fair, and you can say there won't be much of climbs (hopefully you can avoid all flyovers).  (I am familiar with the incline, going from Marathahalli side, towards Manipal Hospital; just checked on cycleroute.org -- looks like that stretch is between 5-7%.)  With those factors, it is not so much speed that is a issue, but overall ride experience that one would look at.

A good single speed, like Purefix, should give a nice, zippy ride, w/o the overhead of gear maintenance.  And while I have not really ridden one for any considerable period of time, I think it will give you a much 'purer / free-er' riding experience.  While changing gears does become second nature on a geared bike, I think you will realise with a single speed that changing gears is after all, a chore.  Atleast till you hit that next climb. ;)

You may find some stretches tough to handle w/o gears, but in your regular commute, you can just expect to get used to them (as in, your fitness will improve).  Also, since the distance won't be much, a climb or two usually will not matter so much.  (In some places like Banshankari, there are some roads with fairly steep climbs... those, or as a said, flyovers, might be an issue.)

That said, if you go for a good hybrid, you don't have to worry much about the gradients etc. on your commute,  And you can also look at doing long(er) rides, out side the city -- incase that is something you think you might want to do at some point.

If budget is a fairly important factor, do check if there are any good used bikes up for sale.  If you get a good used Trek or Bianchi hybrid (just to name couple of good brands), within your budget, it will be a good option.

The Montra bikes do seem to be good; not sure I have seen the Celtic model.  I did recommend a Montra MTB to a friend, ~1.5yrs back.  (He has not ridden in much, so I don't have specific feedback on how well it holds up over time.  but I don't think I will hesitate to recommend that one, to others newbies, even now.)  Going by what I have seen in the Montra bikes -- If they have 2-3 similar bikes, see if one of them has particularly good components, for not much a higher price compared to the other similar models.  That may make a particularly good buy.

Do try to get a test ride done, for whatever you are picking up.  With a used bike, you might be able to get a longer test ride. :)

Best of luck with the buy,

-{db}.