has anyone bought from Bikesdirect.com?

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There is a review of the Motobecane Immortal Ice in Road Bike Action magazine, Jan 2008. "very good value"; you can get full carbon, decent wheels, full ultegra ice for under $1,800 no tax, no shipping. From the article: "Motobecane has assembled a worthy competitor for enthusiasts who put time into their training, ride with conviction, and need the most race bike they can get without busting the family budget"
The best comparable that i found at my LBS was around $2,500 plus tax (their website says MSR $3,300 which is bogus) but that is still quite a price spread.... anyway, the original post was regarding whether buying from bikesdirect is Ok and I believe the answer is yes; provided you know the risks. I can say with a fair degree of certainty that their product is not crap. There is also not enough factual information about the Bottecchia carbon bikes that i can use to compare it to the Immortal bikes.Yea I subscribe to RBA and I've read that review several times. If they feel that good about the Immortal Ice, then the Immortal Spirit must be better. I'm sick of seeing mediocre bikes ridiculously priced b/c of the name on the down-tube. Buying from bikesdirect.com would allow me to get the same bike for a lot less. 16 lbs, full carbon, dura-ace, that would go for at least +$4000 at a bike shop. However, it would help to go to an authorized Motobecane dealer and test ride it first.

Yea I subscribe to RBA and I've read that review several times. If they feel that good about the Immortal Ice, then the Immortal Spirit must be better. I'm sick of seeing mediocre bikes ridiculously priced b/c of the name on the down-tube. Buying from bikesdirect.com would allow me to get the same bike for a lot less. 16 lbs, full carbon, dura-ace, that would go for at least +$4000 at a bike shop. However, it would help to go to an authorized Motobecane dealer and test ride it first.
Yeah, I guess that (no test ride) is one of the drawbacks, but, if you double check and get the correct size it cannot hurt to get the bike. If you hate it you can send it back, they will charge you $40 for their shipping and whatever it costs you (probably same) to send it. So, If you do order one, when you open it I would take a few pics of it to document how it is packaged. They will accept returns but it has to be packaged as you received it (which isnt that difficult) . I could not agree with you more about paying for the name on the downtube, I have no problem supporting my LBS but some of the bike prices are quite inflated. I'm sure that Immortal spirit is a corker of a bike. I say go for it, if you do, please let me know how you make out as I may get a MTB mailorder as well.

Ye However, it would help to go to an authorized Motobecane dealer and test ride it first.
Send them a note and see what happens.
http://www.motobecane.com/MOTOWEB_new006.html

I road a trek hybrid recreationally for 10 years and decided to get a road bike and train more seriously. I saw the BikesDirect website and ordered a Windsor which turned out to be sold out in my size. After I placed the order I started to search various cycling forums (a little late to do my homework) and found many pro and many con postings. I felt that some of each were sincere and some on both sides had a bias, if not a full blown conflict of interest. I am sure some folks have had bad experiences, and others have had good. Hard to know which is the rule and which is the exception. My guess is that they have a fair amount of repeat business. I learned that they own the Windsor, Dawes and Motobecane brands and the bikes made for those brands are pretty much exclusively sold by them through a few companies. That is why the bike company websites are so sparse. Still, not being able to afford a good road bike any other way, I took a chance and ordered a 30 speed 2008 Motobecane Sprint, from them -carbon stays, shimano ultegra 6600, vuelta xrp wheels, ritchey post, stem, handlebars, etc. My cost was almost $900. They took off $25 because of not being able to honor the Windsor order. The bike arrived promptly "90% assembled", and I took it to a LBS for completion and to make sure nothing was damaged or warped and all specs were met. They checked it all out and finished the assembly for $60 and never gave me grief about buying online. (I bought a bunch of gear from them, too.) I took the bike out for the first time yesterday, and what a pleasure. I do not know enough to really judge the bike, and only time will tell if it holds up. The e-mail responsiveness was quite good. I hope I am not posting something very negative in a few months!

I have bought 3 bikes from Bikesdirect.com. They are all well worth the money. Pay more if you want to; it's your money.

I have bought 3 bikes from Bikesdirect.com. They are all well worth the money. Pay more if you want to; it's your money.

I have to say that in the "value" category they are hard to beat. I just finished buying a bunch of stuff for a new bike I'm building and had a hard time matching the Immortal Force price for the full bike. I came close, slightly higher, but had to end up buying a used carbon frame- Giant TCR C1 (which BTW, it was in excellent condition, almost new). With a new frame, (the best I could do for new frameset was about $700 or $800) I would have gone way over the bikesdirect price for a "similar bike". Now in fairness, i do have slightly better wheels (Mavik Aksium vs Ritchey generic), BB (Dura ace vs FSA), brakes (shimano ultegra vs Cane Creek generic), handlebar (FSA compact vs ritchey generic) and saddle (very personal choice) but it took me 4 months to find the right stuff.

I have to say that in the "value" category they are hard to beat. I just finished buying a bunch of stuff for a new bike I'm building and had a hard time matching the Immortal Force price for the full bike. I came close, slightly higher, but had to end up buying a used carbon frame- Giant TCR C1 (which BTW, it was in excellent condition, almost new). With a new frame, (the best I could do for new frameset was about $700 or $800) I would have gone way over the bikesdirect price for a "similar bike". Now in fairness, i do have slightly better wheels (Mavik Aksium vs Ritchey generic), BB (Dura ace vs FSA), brakes (shimano ultegra vs Cane Creek generic), handlebar (FSA compact vs ritchey generic) and saddle (very personal choice) but it took me 4 months to find the right stuff.

Ok, for those of you out there, the truth is...... bikesdirect frames are probably the same that you get from some big name companies. motorbecan, etc, are all just trade names. recently i set up a bike company (Irish cycles at www.irishcycles.com - forgive the intermediate website for now, programmer hired). A lot of these guys like motorbecan, etc, buy what are called 'open models' from manufacturers which are generic designs they then slap a label on. then, these companies set agreements up with shimano, etc, to spec their parts.. if they do not, they work with other US companies as intermediaries because of tariff issues on imports.

Now, let's talk about China. This is where most frames of carbon are produced. Even if you think they are made in Taiwan, the firms export the work to main land China. A lot of European bikes - same thing. EU law says if 40% or more of what gives an item it's value is done in the EU, it is made in that country. So... a lot of companies then say the bike is made in Italy, etc.

When I went into starting this company which is solely geared at producing racing grade bikes for USA Cycling type Cat 1,2,3 at affordable prices I was stuck with buying a open model or designing a bike. Designing is expensive, upwards of $12K because of the cost to get the molds. We sent in a representative to the factory who visited and brought back photos, information, testing results, etc. We finally settled on a manfacturer, and a design to make the bike unqiue to us, not just an open model that a lot of these companies buy. But.... that is why our bikes cost more then Bikes direct or pedal force.

Next thing to look at is the material engineering behind them. Most bikes are T700 carbon or TR500 with about 30 to 45% resin. There is no way around it, if you're going to spec a bike with better carbon or multiple kinds of carbon, you've got to pay to play. A lot of open models are low grade carbon simply because it's easier to buy on mass and you don't have a lot of capital invested in it.

So why do I say this? Well, motorbecane, other bottechia, etc, are all names that had a valued and treasured past. when you buy those bikes today, you are buying that stamped on an open model. now, that is not necessarily a bad thing as long as you understand it and what youre buying. and, that is not to say open models are not of quality either, many are fantastic and you see them carried as Storck, Dietech, etc.

My challenge has been starting a new line from scratch that is high quality and reasonably cost effective. It's hard after taxes, etc. You really cannot make much of a profit when you produce a decent bike. So for instance, my Rival equipped bike retail msrp is offered at $2300 (full race ready - no corners cut) but my Red equipped bike is only $3623. So as you can see the big issue as producing the frame. My frames simply put, are quality.

So, something to take into account- if your buying for the parts package and you're going to swap frames out later, Bikesdirect and others works very well. If you're looking for a quality frame and a good parts package, look at some smaller builder and believe it or not, Ridley or Orbea. You pay realistically for what you get albiet when you go to Ridley or Orbea it's a lot more then other builders but it is of higher quality. :)

I am brand new to the sport; I bought a Specialized allez last week and I am in love it already. I had been doing some research for the past few weeks, trying to learn what I should think about in buying a bike, what was out there for a relatively good price, and undoubtedly, I came across bikesdirect.com. Immediately, I was amazed, as these deals were unbelievable. I decided to do some research on the website (because anything can be a scam) and looked through some forums. I came across mostly positive feedback, but a few sources who knew what they were talking about stuck out in my mind. One in particular stated that the website takes "wal-mart quality frames" and throws great shifters, derailleurs, brakes, wheels, and a carbon fork & seat post on them. They also went as far as creating sister websites to legitimize their own products which often had identical names to classic cycling companies. I decided to find out for myself if this was true, so I went back to the website and picked out the models I had been looking at: the Dawes lightning 2300, motobecane record '09, and a few others. Sifting through the garbage websites, I finally found the legitimate ones and tried to find the comparable models. There were none. So this guy was right. I have heard a lot of positive feedback (not to tarnish other posts in this thread) but a huffy quality frame will be fine most of the time. If you want great parts, go for it. But if you want a good frame that you can upgrade parts for and have a quality bike, I would not recommend it.

I am brand new to the sport; I bought a Specialized allez last week and I am in love it already..... I would not recommend it.

I don't know about the metal frames but I've ridden the carbon Immortal frame and two people I know in my weekly rides have them (Force, I think). It's a very nice frame...