Buying "decent" kids bikes

YORKSHIRELASS

Hi, my sons have been left some money by a relative and we would like to use some of it to buy them both a decent bike.

DS got an own brand bike from Halfords with his birthday money just over a year ago. It cost about £100 and has been rubbish. OH spends more time fixing it than DS does riding it.

So how much do we need to spend on 24" wheel bikes to get something decent? What makes and types would you recommend (or not). We want to try and get younger son the trigger type gear shifters (E-Z fire?) rather than grip shifters because his hands are small and he seems to struggle with the grip shifters.

We occasionally go on the Mountain Bike trails in our local forest but the bikes would be mostly for road use.

Your advice would be very welcome! Thanks

Jeff_Bridges_hair

Get yourself down to a proper cycle shop for them to test out.. Im not up to sratch with kids bikes but get them to test out a few of them and find one that suits for however much they have to spend.

lfc321

Islabikes - not the cheapest, but the best kids bikes I've seen. You'll be looking at £300+ for a 24"

Edited to add: although pricey they do hold their value well, so you can sell them on as the kids grow.

mkaibear

YORKSHIRELASS wrote: »

Hi, my sons have been left some money by a relative and we would like to use some of it to buy them both a decent bike.

DS got an own brand bike from Halfords with his birthday money just over a year ago. It cost about £100 and has been rubbish. OH spends more time fixing it than DS does riding it.

So how much do we need to spend on 24" wheel bikes to get something decent? What makes and types would you recommend (or not). We want to try and get younger son the trigger type gear shifters (E-Z fire?) rather than grip shifters because his hands are small and he seems to struggle with the grip shifters.

We occasionally go on the Mountain Bike trails in our local forest but the bikes would be mostly for road use.

Your advice would be very welcome! Thanks

Bikes are too personal to be able to recommend a make / model, but the chap who said £300 is about right - anything less than that and you'll probably end up looking at what the trade calls a "BSO" - aka "Bike Shaped Object" - not really a bicycle more of a collection of badly fitting parts

Find your local bike shop, go and try a few bikes, negotiate a price with the owner, build up a relationship for servicing / parts, etc.

ROBO (research offline buy online) is an option but you then don't end up with a good pre-purchase inspection, etc.

YORKSHIRELASS

Thanks for the advice everyone. At least now I have an idea of how much we need to be spending.

I need to research local bike shops. The one in our local town wont be getting my custom because they were very unhelpful last time OH went in to buy a part!

I also might be able to get a bit of a discount for buying 2 so thats something to think about.

hubert_cumberdale

i got a GT aggressor from halfords its pretty good its was 450 reduced to 300

i wanted a specialized rock hopper but it didnt come in in time and i had to go on holiday


another great make is rotwild just coming into the UK from germany but they may be aout of your pirice range or the "range you want to pay"

Hintza

Another vote for islabikes, excellent bit of kit.

http://www.islabikes.co.uk/