Cheap Kids Bikes
Choosing a kids bikes : Are your kids needs kids bikes?
Cheap Kids Bikes
Kids are usually very keen to learn new ideas and tricks, especially when they hit the second year of their lives. As such, it will not take long before your two-year-old son requests for his first bike, simply because he has seen that his mate owns one. In this case, you will be having no options but to buy one for him since kids can be very steadfast when it comes to agitating for their needs. Here is how you can avoid making some serious blunders when buying a bike for your kid. Do not make a blunder to just pop in a store that sells cheap kids bikes and pick one. You may end up making another trip to such a store for a replacement if you are not keen enough. Even though kids’ bikes are small, to get the same quality in the bearings, machining, assembly, finishes and lightness as an adult bike would cost about the same.
The first thing that you need to consider before buying a kids bikes for your kid is his age
When buying a kid’s bike, make sure it’s the right size. Riding a bike that you can’t control because your feet don’t touch the ground and your hands can’t reach the brakes properly is no fun. It’s also dangerous: crashing puts people off – even kids eventually. Children’s bike sizes are determined by wheel diameter, not seat height and frame size as is the case with adult bicycles. It’s better to progress in stages than to fit your child onto the biggest bike they can pedal; you can always hand down or sell on used bikes.
Cheap kids bikes: Pre-school
A child’s first set of wheels usually comes in the form of a trike or push-along. These are often breakable plastic, with simple friction bearings. A decent metal trike will last longer and can be handed down. Look for: wide-set rear wheels for stability, and a durable front wheel axle. Proper ball bearings here are a bonus.
Children can learn to ride a two-wheeler at three years old, and almost always by five. It’s much easier for them if they can balance and steer already. There are two ways to learn this: on a traditional two-wheeled scooter; or on a hobbyhorse. (Stabilisers give mobility to children who can’t balance, but they prevent a child from learning to ride a bicycle.)
You can turn a starter bike into a hobbyhorse by removing the pedals and lowering the seat so your child can put both feet flat on the floor. Find a gentle slope and let them coast down it towards you. When they’ve got the idea, refit the pedals and get them to ride towards you.
First bikes will have 12in or 14in wheels. The bike should have: a low stand-over height; ball bearings in hubs, bottom bracket and headset; 90-100mm cranks; pneumatic tires; at least one working brake.
Cheap kids bikes: Ages four to six
Bikes with 16in wheels still sometimes come with stabilizers: if so, bin them. All 16in wheel bikes come with a single speed gear. The chain stays are too short for derailleur gears, and they’d only confuse anyway. A three-speed hub gear would be nice, but they’re pricey so you won’t see them. As children of this age won’t be riding far, a single gear is okay.
Low overall weight will give a more easily manoeuvred bike. Avoid suspension and fat steel frames; thin steel tubes are fine. A lowish bottom bracket will enable your child to get a foot down from the saddle – which, as they can now ride properly, you’ll be gradually raising. Cranks should be 100-120mm; the shorter the better. A chain guard of some sort will keep clothing or inquisitive fingers out of the drive train.
By this age, children can hurtle along so easily operable brakes are a must. A light action V-brake or side pull is fine up front, but less effective at the rear: the longer cable run means more friction so the lever is harder for the child to pull. A back-pedal coaster brake is a good solution.
Cheap kids bikes: Ages six to 10
Gears are the obvious extra with 20in wheel bikes. A three-speed hub gear would be ideal: it’s easy to understand and hard to break. Again, it’s more expensive to fit, so five- and six-speed derailleurs are what you’ll usually find. For knocking around on the street, don’t discount singlespeeds: they’re lighter, simpler and rarely develop problems.
Some 20in wheel bikes come with suspension forks. They’ll be basic, un-adjustable springs that nevertheless score credibility points with children. There are two disadvantages: extra weight and less money to go round elsewhere. If the bike costs £120 or more, front suspension may be adequate. Rear suspension is poor unless you spend a lot more.
If the bike has a rear derailleur, get a derailleur guard for when the bike is dropped on its side. A kickstand is useful, as kids this age aren’t good at propping their bikes up. Look for easy-to-use shifters. Cranks will again be too long. You want 120-130mm; 140mm may do.
Ages nine to 12
Spend a little more and you’ll get a light(ish) weight aluminium mini-mountain bike that can be passed on to siblings. We’d like to see a 24in wheel bike with a single chain ring and a decent, wide-range eight-speed cassette hub (ie. 11-30T). But you’ll get a seven-speed, screw-on freewheel hub and most likely a triple chain set up front. If it’s a double, look for a smaller inner ring (22 or 24) rather than a larger (42) outer.
Bike spec should compare to an adult’s bike at the same price. So expect a micro-adjust alloy seat post, a cartridge bottom bracket, an alloy flat or riser bar, a thread less stem, brand name V-brakes and a decent set of a wheels. They’ll have off-road tyres – kids like these, but a set of semi-slicks would be better for all-round use.
‘Less is more’ applies: instead of disc brakes, look for disc mounts for later upgrading. And look for a good suspension fork (adjustable preload and damping), not full suspension. The cranks will again be too long: you want 140mm, 150mm at a push. You may get 160mm.
Cheap kids bikes: Big kids’ bikes
Children aged 12 or 13 – and some lanky younger ones – are ready for a small-framed adult bike. Most manufacturers make frames down to 14in or 15in, and some do 13in. Urban free riders and serious off-road riders may want the smallest frame for the extra clearance over the top tube, but most teenagers can go straight to 15in.
Don’t be tempted to put your nine- or 10-year-old on a 13in adult frame just because they happen to be able to reach the pedals. They’ll be much better off on a 24in-wheel bike with a 12in or 13in frame. A 24in-wheel bike may be lighter and it will be easier to control. Imagine what your bike would feel like with 28in wheels instead of 26in. The smaller bike should also have more kid-friendly cranks, etc.
Teenagers are acutely aware of peer pressure and will want a bike that’s considered cool. Currently this seems to mean simple paint jobs (such as black, white, matt grey/brown or camo green, silver, or maybe red) and a vaguely dirt-jump style frame.
Cheap Kids Bikes : what’s Should consider to buy Kids Bike
But whatever the age of the child you are buying for, here are some other things you should always take account of so that your child gets the new bikes that they deserve. There are literally hundreds of brands of kids’ bikes. We don’t have the resources to collect, test and rank even a fraction of them, and we don’t know anyone who is. A second problem for the consumer is that most of kids’ bikes are being sold at stores where you can’t trust the employees to know the difference between coaster brakes and side-pull brakes, and they similarly don’t know very much about the quality of bikes on the showroom floor. A third problem is often these same employees assemble the bikes — with no formal training as bike mechanics – so even a good bike may be assembled wrong, making any rating dubious. Given the circumstances, caveat emptor!
Wheels and brakes Don’t buy big wheels for small riders, they need scaling down too. While a larger wheel will roll over bumps and kerbs better, it will also be heavier (more inertia), and the steering will be less responsive. It’s likely that the reach to the bars will be greater too, because the bottom bracket to front axle distance will be greater, and the bottom bracket itself will be higher. All these factors make for a slightly-too-large bike that bit more difficult to control than one that fits.
Brake levers don’t necessarily need scaling down, because you can use two-finger adult levers. They must be within easy reach of the bars though (is there an adjustment screw?), and easy to operate. Check that you can operate the brakes with only the little finger of each hand.
Reach One measurement that doesn’t scale down well to children’s bikes, particularly those of younger children, is reach (how far away you are from the bars). When the child tests the bike, the balls of both feet should be on the ground while sitting on the bike’s seat and holding the handlebars. When straddling the center bar, both feet should be flat on the ground and there should be 1 to 2 inches between the child and the top bar of a boy’s bike. Some girl’s bikes have lower top bars — called a step-through frame — but it’s still important that there is plenty of room between the child and the top bar.
Weight Weight makes a bigger difference to the fun and manoeuvrability of a child’s bike than yours, because children are smaller, lighter and weaker. A kilo saved from the bike of a six-year-old weighing 30kg is like 2.5kg saved from an adult’s.
Cranks Children, like adults, need cranks that are about 20 percent their inside leg length. One-tenth of overall height is another oft-quoted rule of thumb, and though it yields a longer measurement (few of us have inside leg measurements that are half our height) it’s close enough.
Unfortunately the rule of thumb for manufacturers seems to be: stick on whatever ought to be on the next size of bike up. Over-long cranks are as ungainly as they are unergonomic. And they’ll ground more easily unless the manufacturer puts the bottom bracket higher, which is the last thing a child needs.
The next filter is seriously dangerous designs – eliminate these from the pool. In the United States, the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) has taken care of most of this and a lot of the rest of the world has followed suit so you might not find any problems. It is more likely to find dangerous features on older bikes. Many of the major bad designs features of the past were thing in front on the rider — along the top tube or handlebars — that the rider could impale themselves on if they fell forward, like spiky gear shift knobs and large bolts. Bikes without a derailleur should have well mounted chain guards.
Suspension forks For children, air sprung forks are best. They’re lighter and can be easily adjusted to suit a growing rider’s weight. Coil forks require lighter-weight springs. Stiction is a common problem on children’s forks: kids may lack the mass to get a sticky fork moving on anything but big hits. Rigid forks are better than bad suspension forks.
Frame Generally the frames are strong enough to handle moderate abuse. An average strong adult should not be able to bend it by hand. The frame should be in alignment. You can check this by standing a couple meters in front or behind the bike and checking to see if the both wheels are in the same plane. Check to make sure that the posts (seat post and handlebar stem) coming out of the frame are all bolted tight and can’t be twisted. The seat post and handlebar stem should also have been greased before they were assembled so that they don’t freeze up after the first couple of rains.
Drive train The CPSC requires bike without a derailleur to have chain guards. They can be very effective at keeping shoe laces and pant legs from getting caught between the chain and the chain ring and causing an accident.
