Chinese road frame - what's good?

From personal experience of their stuff, ICAN as a manufacturer have been good. Deal direct and they have Euro warehouses and deal with taxes so no surprises and Parcelforce admin fees.

Hambini reckons Winspace are doing a good job:

Carbonda has been great for me. Easy to deal with, custom colours and has lasted well. It's now 2.5 years old and has covered over 20k km and still looks and rides like new.

Hambini reckons Winspace are doing a good job

They may well be and that's a more in-depth review than most bike mags give a product, but (and disclaimer, I'm not a composites expert nor an engineer and why would I have Hambini's CV to hand, I may be doing him a disservice here) does putting a camera inside the frame mean you can pronounce it as having no voids?

I've a road bike frame from velobuild that I've used for 4 years, would buy from them again, only issue it had was a slipping seat post that a plastic shim fixed.

I've an enduro bike from ICAN (p9) which I've ridden for 1.5 years, flawless to date and am very happy with quality.

Ican have been good so far.
1 XC bike 5 years old - throughly raced and abused.
1 gravel frame 2 years old - also riden hard.

Thanks for the replies chaps. I've ended up going with this from Velobuild - it's the best price I could find and includes all finishing kit, lighter than most other options, cheap custom paint, and comms has been good so far.

Chinese road frame – what’s good?

happy to go direct.

https://www.planetx.co.uk/i/q/FRHOLZAP/holdsworth-corsa-disc-team-edition-frameset

£399 frame and fork available in different colours and all sizes. Why risk a cheap Chinese frame when you can buy a cheap Chinese frame from px with some backup in the UK. Their customer service is improving from how it used to be.

That PX frame has maximum 26mm tyre clearance.

Is it quite heavy for a road frameset too? Or have I just been spoiled?

1647gms for that Planet X frame and fork does seem heavy - you'd normally get a seatpost within that as well - but it is painted which also adds a fair bit on top of most claimed weights.

Is it quite heavy for a road frameset too? Or have I just been spoiled?

My first thought too!

Is it quite heavy for a road frameset too? Or have I just been spoiled?

Its a £400 frame. Ignore the rrp, it's px.

Also any information on the px website should be taken with a pinch of salt 🤣

I think I'd trust Velobuild to be more helpful than px in the event of any problems! The one I've chosen is lighter, T1000 apparently (I know nothing about carbon but 1000 sounds better than 700/800) and it includes seatpost, axles, and fully-internal-cable stem-bar for the $500, and doesn't have HOLDSWORTH all over it 🙂

Good shout IMO. Are you getting it painted? I'd be interested in pics if so.

I've a Carbonda full suss MTB, it's been great so far and they were a joy to deal with.

Isn't that frameset weight for frame, fork, headset, seatclamp and axles?

Holdsworth sounds a bit heavy to be Frameset only - my caad12 disc is alloy and around 1100-1200g I think.

Looking at Dolan and Ribble (both cheaper carbon - the dolans are catalogue frames at the cheaper end I think) that would suggest the Holdsworth weight is atnleads frame and forks.

That Holdsworth looks minging though in those paint jobs. Some of the px paint jobs are gross across their bike ranges!

With all these Chinese frames are there any race / endurance geo sort of things that have mudguard mounts on them and can still take a 28cc tyre? That’s the sort of thing I’d like to replace my Caad12 with as the clip on mudguards are annoying me and I’d like to move to something with bolt through axles both ends. Caad13 disc is what I really want but the framesets have been out of stock for 2 years or so in the uk now sadly.

With all these Chinese frames are there any race / endurance geo sort of things that have mudguard mounts on them and can still take a 28cc tyre?

There are gravel bike chinese frames which meet the tyre / mudguard spec. Mudguards + race geo isn't a very common combination.

I’m just thinking in group road rides it’s usually expected you have mudguards on so you don’t throw water in the rider behinds face...

23 days after order, it's arrived! Includes custom paint as well, so pretty decent turnaround.

I weighed the main bits as I know some people like that sort of thing. Frame and fork came in a bit heavy, presumably due to the paint. Still not bad though.

Purchased from Velobuild.

That looks pretty nice and the frame weight doesn’t seem too bad 👌