[Closed] Talk to me about canyon carbon

A friend has a Canyon Lux CF, the frame is finished to a very high standard, another has had a 29er hardtail for a couple of years and that is also well finished and looks as good now as the day he bought it

the "finish" on the road frames is perfect, how they shape up to the competition on construction is something you take on trust/blind faith/experience/no idea, the fact Katusha and Movistar use them should mean they can't be too bad.

I run a carbon stumpy FSR 29er as my trail bike and a Canyon 29er hardtail as my xc bike. Originally I had the top end Ally Canyon frame (9.9 SLX or whatever) which had some good kit on it, Fox Terralogic, full XO etc etc. And having owned a lot of bikes Road and MTB, I have to say the frame was as well engineered / finished and material quality of any bike I owned. Really impressed and it rode great. On this basis when I got the opportunity to sell the frame and upgrade to the Carbon Grand Canyon frame and swap all the bits, I jumped at the chance. And yes I am equally impressed with every aspect of the manufacturing and ride of this frame too.
In my opinion its a no brainer. I personally think that you should be thinking the opposite, I can only compare between the two Carbon MTB's I have right now, but in future I would always make the presumption that a Canyon would seem to be a proper bit of kit manufactured with precision and care and justifying an investment running into the thousands, and in contrast for right or for wrong after my experience, I will always assume that a Specialized bike despite the beautiful marketing campaigns is basically a chuck it in a mould with a "it'll probably do, thats near enough - get it shipped" sort of attitude.

Yeah, I know what you mean about some big brands - I mean, they've got more costs so for the same price should be lower value. But there's individual lower-cost manufacturers where I've not been impressed with the ride quality or finish of their carbon stuff (on-one, I'm looking at you).

It's actually the grand canyon cf sl I'm looking at, so good to get that opinion from somebody with one, cheers.

This link might shed some light:

http://road.cc/content/news/69867-video-take-look-inside-canyon

That's very, very cool

Am also interested in this, specifically if anybody has had any issues with a canyon carbon frame which is not crash damage - such as cracked chainstays how is this dealt with?

All i can see regarding warranty is the frame replacement program which is pretty expensive on the carbon mtbs.

so good to get that opinion from somebody with one, cheers.

Yep thats my frame, Frame weight of about a kg stiff as you like, rides great and finish is spot on. You can just tell, when you buy build a bike from a frame, what are the tolerances like on push fit parts ? how clean and solid do any bosses / component mountings / cable guides and threads in bosses look ? Is there any machining marks any where ? has everything been apparently been thought through in terms of future maintenance and repair ? any inconsistencies in frame finish / lacquer coating ? Are all threaded bits, clean and the threads perfect ? Are any bits that are already fitted torqued correctly ? The answer to all of these was that both Canyons were 100%. I cant exactly say that about the Specialized !! Press Fits components that just drop in and have to be glued. Laughable bolt torques, the list goes on.

Check the geo. I was interested in a Canyon HT carbon frame but realised it was very short in the TT.

Regarding warranty,in August another friend had a 2013 Nerve CF that developed a cracked chainstay, and whilst it took about 10 days for Canyon to agree a replacement and another three weeks for the replacement frame to arrive he does have a new frame. In my experience, the timings were similar to when I had a carbon Trek frame replaced under warranty-about a month from identification of problem to getting the bike back in one piece.

As a rough guide I am 5'7" and the medium is about right for me with an 80mm stem on with a 595mm ETT (IIRC)

I looked at their TT measurement - then realised it was batshit how they were measuring it. They draw a straight line up from the centre point of the top of the seattube and that becomes their virtual TT length. Most (not all obviously, why can't manufacturers standardise this?) follow the angle of the seatpost up out the tube to come up with TT length. This'll naturally make the TT length on the canyons shorter on paper than other bikes.

@hughj

Specialized carbon made in Taiwan by one of the top 4 independent carbon fibre manufacturers, using proprietary moulds owned by Specialized.Actually very good build quality.

The entry level and mid range carbon fibre frames tend to be a little on the heavier side due to lower ratio of fibre to resin, mix of Toray and Hitachi carbon fibre, and use of metallic inserts = cheaper to manufacture.

My Tarmac Expert SL4 road frame in 54cm is 1.2kg, which is a little porky, but it rides fantastic so I am not complaining.

The top range (production) and S-Works frames use full Toray carbon fibre and higher ratio of fibre to resin, less metallic inserts which explains the higher price.

Production cost for using better quality (full Toray) carbon fibre with higher ratio of fibre to resin, is dramatically more expensive, almost double that of mixed-source carbon fibre with higher ratio of resin

Maybe mine was a Friday aternooner then, I can run my fingers down the sides of the bottom half of the downtube and theres all sorts of lumps and bumps adn inconsistencies ! the bike to the naked eye looks fine and clearly structurally sound as I have been riding it hard for all this time, so I am not complaining that its faulty nor would it justify a return to Specialized dealer, as the bike does what it is intended to do and rides well. Just saying it's far from perfection of manufacturing. Its not an S-works model, but it doesn't have ally inserts in any key places as I can see. BB shell is carbon as are headset seats etc. Frame bearings do have ally liners though. Its just an opinion, maybe I got the best of Canyon, and the worst of Specialized, who knows. I just know the difference in manufacturing quality between the two bikes [u]that I own[/u], and its chalk and cheese.