Product Reviews Post Time
Jan 09, 2010 23:50:29
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4.5 of 5.0
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Schwinn Rocket Adult Dual-Suspension Mountain Bike Reviews By Customers
At last I have come through the gauntlet of mountain bike buying, much scarred, but also much wiser!
I will try to briefly explain why I consider the Schwinn Rocket is a victory for me, and hopefully save other people much grief in choosing a “good” bike.
My experience in mountain bikes goes back to the early days of mountain bikes, but is based more realistically in the biking needs of four growing boys, and their middle aged parents. Like most I have largely purchased off-the-shelf box store bikes. Like most I have had more negative than positive experiences. I attempted over the years to upgrade to better bikes from the box store, but with little real world improvement. I have used bikes on the higher end, but cannot hope to buy such bikes for six people. What I wanted was a bike that would cost no more than twice what the box store offered. For this money I wanted a bike that offered at least twice the quality and reliability as well. What I found was the Schwinn Rocket! Here is a comparison with “better quality” box store bikes and the Schwinn Rocket: WHEELS: Please, go with alloy! Steel wheels are heavy and rust practically over night. Some box store bikes have alloy wheels. Schwinn wins here with double wall rims. This is very important since it is very easy to bend rims on the trail or even on a rough road commute. FRAME: Aluminum is a must! I have box store bikes with aluminum frames, and they are worth it for their lite weight. Schwinn wins again! The quality is immediately apparent coming right out of the box. Paint is very nice for the price category and someone obviously cared to take the time to put the stickers on neatly (not to mention it isn’t overloaded with useless gaudy stickers). The Iso Drive frame is definitely superior to other suspensions I have tried. Importantly there is no bobbing over ripple surfaces. Four inches of suspension travel doesn’t hurt a bit either! GEARS: Everyone is putting Shimano stickers on their bikes these days. CAUTION! Base grade Shimano derailleurs are better than anything else the box store offers, but they often combine them with lame shifting systems. The Rocket uses better grade Shimano components and their click shifter has put the joy back into riding again. It operates smoothly and is precise, no guessing about what gear you stumbled into, or the subsequent noises that come from gears that have not shifted properly or are in need of constant adjustment. A VERY NICE shift/gear system alone makes this bike a winner for the price. BRAKES: I hadn’t given much thought about brakes as they have seldom been a problem for me. When I started using the Shimano breaks on the Rocket that all changed! I had previously considered disc brakes, but now I say, “Who needs them!?” Well, actually they would be an improvement in adverse weather conditions, but for most of us the Shimano self-aligning breaks will more than meet the need. SEAT: While the Rocket’s seat still leaves a lot to be desired, it is an obvious improvement over most seats on the box store bikes. I purchased a Lycra Gel Seat by Ergo and couldn’t be happier! So, we have: Nice quality, descent engineering, attention to detail. This bike will make a fine recreational, commuter and light/medium trail bike. All in all the Rocket is not for the serious off-road racing aficionado, but for the average person looking for the most bang out of their hard-earned buck the Rocket is the way to go! Check Special Price!
So far, so good – L. Eller – Charlotte, NC USA
Finding a good quality mountain bike that won’t cost an arm & a leg is a difficult task. I didn’t know a lot about mountain bikes but wanted to replace my boyfriend’s bike for Christmas. He’d had a Giant Iguana bike which he’d gotten for only at a garage sale 10 years ago. The only thing he insisted on having was thumbshifter gears, not gripshifters because the bike would switch gears whenever he’d stand up to ride uphill. No doubt, Giant bikes are awesome, but new they were 00 and up. This Schwinn bike seems to have all the specs he wanted/ needed: sturdy frame, thumbshifter gears, Shimano parts, 20″ frame (large), 26″ wheels, decent quality tires, a “guy friendly” seat, and easy assembly. Since Schwinn has been bought by Pacific Cycle, it’s hard to say if this is a true Schwinn bike or one made by PC with the Schwinn label slapped on. It was difficult to find reliable sources of info on mountain bikes. Many mountain bike sites are geared for hardcore cyclists who snub parts that can’t withstand BMX-style jumps and off-roading. [...] was somewhat helpful in that it listed blogs of people evaluating individual parts of bikes, but sometimes the blogs were too skewed by personal opinion to be helpful for people like me who wanted to know they were buying a decent quality mountain bike for under 0 that would handle mostly street commutes. My boyfriend was really pleased when he opened his present and assembled it right away. Amazon delivered the bike within a few days even though Christmas was a week away. I don’t advise talking to Schwinn about this bike, since they don’t seem to keep record of it once it’s sent to a 3rd party for sale. In contrast, Amazon’s customer service was very helpful. As far as I can tell, this bike is much better quality than any you’d buy from a big-box retailer which many blogs tend to snub. I’d recommend having a pro bike shop assemble/adjust it to make sure everything is running smoothly (several novices blogged about problems with brakes on their bikes, for example, and more experienced bikers advised that the brakes were fine, they just needed to be professionally adjusted). This bike looks and feels even better in person than in the pictures shown.
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Schwinn mtb – Alex L. Pangan –
This bike is a great bike to practice your mtb skills. It’s low price so it won’t matter if you bite the big one. Get this bike before you get that very expensive dream bike!!
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good bike – D – United States
I only give this 4 stars because there is no kickstand for this bike and one part was missing. I called customer service and this bike doens’t come with a kickstand? (supposedly this is to be a high end bike and it is to be customized at a dealer? Umm I search the net and the price for this is in the 0 range even though the lady made it sound like it was a VERY expensive bike?) Anyway the one part that was missing they are sending out (it should have been put on at the factory, it was the cap that covers the opening in the frame where the pedal bar come out) This bike is made in china! most bikes are these days which is a shame that we can ship the work half way around the world instead of paying our own people.
Other than those problems the bike seems sturdy enough and is mostly put together, we had to attach the one brake, handle bars and front wheel. This is for a birthday present so we weren’t able to try it out for long. The seat bar is much too long so we will have to cut a portion of it off to make it fit properly. It seems worth the 0 plus price tag.
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… great handling on trails and down hill rides. over all, Well worth its price.