Flat bars on a road bike

[Drawweight]

I know this has been covered before but...

I’ve given up looking for a road bike as I don’t think I’ll enjoy it and to be honest I’m getting too old.

I’m looking out for a hybrid but I don’t have a lot of spare cash just now so I’m looking secondhand. Trouble is there’s nothing out there except 60 quid wrecks or it’s too big for me or it’s gone by the time I find it.

There are however a good number of decent road bikes going. I could get a Carrera Virago, a Felt F75 superlite or a Obrea Onix for less than 350 quid.

With a set of s/h flat bars, shifters and levers I’d get a decent bike.

Does this sound okay?

The only difficulty I can foresee is how important is it that the shifters match up with what’s on the bike? Can you use Taiga shifters on an Ultegra system or vice versa or does everything have to match? Obviously I’d buy a 2:10 system or whatever is on the bike.

What I buy will depend on what’s on eBay at the time.

So basically I’m looking as cheap as possible.

[lufbramatt]

Cable pull ratio needs to match between shifters and mech- road and MTB probably use a different cable pull. As do V brake levers and caliper brake levers.

There may be a road groupset with a flat bar lever that would work, have a look on the Shimano compatibility charts. Or Wolftooth probably do a converter pulley so you can mix and match.

[Barchettaman]

Right. I’ve done this a number of times.

A cheaper road bike is likely to have 7-10 sprockets on the back. Match it with a r/h Shimano MTB shifter pod and it is likely to pull the correct amount of cable for the equivalent road rear shifter/derailleur so no problems there.

If you get a combined MTB brake/shifter unit it is LIKELY to be for V-brakes, so will pull too much cable for road calipers. They will still work ok but will feel massively wooden and horrible.

A l/h Shimano MTB shifter pod will LIKELY not play nicely with a road front derailleur. The cable pull is different. You’ll need something like a Claris or Tiagra l/h road shifter pod.

The easiest way is road flat bar shifter pods and brake levers (or levers designed for older style Canti brakes, these pull less cable)

You may well find you need a longer stem as the handling on a flat bar conversion can be a bit twitchy.

Best of luck. Flat bar road bikes are a hoot round town.

https://www.omafiets.com.au/blogs/news/all-there-i...

[IJWS15]

I have a Giant Rapid 3 which is a flat bar road bike and has the appropriate brake/shift levers so they are available.

Mine is a Shimano 3x8, deliberately chosen due to the hills around the office, but not used the smallest chainring for at least a year (about how long since I rode out from the office). The more upmarket Rapid 0 was Shimano 105 so all options should be covered.

[ED209]

A boardman hybrid is basically a flat bar road bike, should get a good used one in budget easy. I sold mine for £200 fairly recently

[leyorkie]

Well this is PH so here go’s with budget creep. Sorry but this looks a lot of bike for the money and as it’s new you wouldn’t have any hidden costs, second hand things can go wrong and your original budget is blown.
How about one of these for £399 ?
https://www.planetx.co.uk/i/q/FBPXFBHB/planet-x-fa...

[Drawweight]

ED209 said:

A boardman hybrid is basically a flat bar road bike, should get a good used one in budget easy. I sold mine for £200 fairly recently

If only.

I spotted one on Facebook Marketplace going for £250 last night 20 minutes after it had been put up.

I messaged the guy and it had gone.

As I said in my original post cheap hybrids / mountain bikes at 60 quid are everywhere but decent quality second hand hybrids in the 3-400 range are scarce especially within worthwhile travelling range. Very few people are willing to post or courier a bike.

Edited by Drawweight on Saturday 24th April 06:26

[Deerfoot]

Not sure where you are OP but just keep checking FB marketplace, I’ve just bought a Cannondale Bad Boy for 375, there were also a couple of Whytes and an Orbea Carpe for similar money within 20km of Salisbury.

[Drawweight]

Yay.

Managed to pick up a Hoy Shizuoka in decent nick.

Surprisingly good spread of gears for a single front ring so I’m quite happy.

[dave_s13]

You just need to be patient with your Facebook marketplace and eBay monitoring

I recently bought this off eBay...£140



Put a different stem, proper pinned flat pedals and MTB bars I had lying around on it and it's great. It's my caravan bike, rather than chaining 3 grands worth of MTB to the van when we go away, this is coming instead. Also the go to stead for nipping to the local shop/bank etc etc.



It did take about 6 weeks of looking though. My main criteria were for it to be an XL frame and not total st.