Jrasero

Last year after being sucked into the Youtube Chinese craze I ordered a Winspace T1500 Disc and built it up as a trainer/spare bike to go with my 2022 (last gen) Scott Foil RC. With the frame, Hunt Aero 65 wheels, Chain Reaction carbon saddle, SRAM Rival ETAP AXS group set, bits and pieces, LBS build up fee, and shipping and taxes the bike came to $3850. Now that's a lot of money no matter how you spin it BUT the cheapest "aero" bike are probably the Canyon Aeroad CF SL 7 Disc at $3500 but that is mechanical 105 and thus isn't integrated and for my size (2XS) would come with 27.5" wheels and also this $3500 doesn't include the $100 shipping fee nor taxes so the true cost of that bike is around $3900. Technically there was a cheaper Aero bike in the Quintana Roo SRFive $2995 but that came with a two piece aluminum stem and handlebar combo albeit it was integrated, mechanical 105, shallow aluminum wheels, and with QR's free shipping this basic aero bike would have been $3250 shipped.

So why a Chinese bike let alone Winspace? Well, the answer was because it was probably the best quality aero frame and carbon cockpit I could find that would allow for an electronic build, fully integrated cables, cheap enough for me to budget in carbon aero wheels. So everyone from Hambini, Patrick Lino, Cam Nicholls, Durianrider, GC Performance, Charles Ouimet, and countless other "independent" Youtubers covered Winspace but more specifically the T1500. My first thought was that astroturfing was being done on Winspace's part but then I started to realize that was highly unlikely since people like Cam Nicholls claimed the Winspace build and sequential posts were 100% funded by him and not sponsored ie maybe explaining why he was the most critical of the T1500. The frame was covered by a variety of people from engineers in someone like Hambini, to more influencers like Charles Ouimet, to more sales/mechanic people like GC Performance. TLDR there really isn't another Chinese frame brand that has received this much coverage period let alone for one single frame. The consensus even after being stripped, scanned, and examined by engineers was that the T1500 was a quality frame designed and manufactured like any tier 1 aero frame, however like I mentioned before Cam Nicholls who probably was the most critical about the frame noted while this was still a bargain and still performed well it was in his eyes that felt "heavy" and more in that 1B or tier 2 aero frame category, which was still fair since this was still 1st gen frame and a $1500 frame before you factored any discounts.

So my thoughts on Winspace and the T1500 are that both the company and product are excellent but not without some issues or qualms. So IMO from my research, which you should be doing a ton of if you are considering a Chinese frame is that the following companies are ranked Seka, Winspace, Elves Yoeleo, ICAN (Triaero), Tri-Fox. Yes there are countless other Chinese frame manufactures and frankly cheaper ones but IMO these are the ones to consider granted all of them has their pros and cons and frankly I would only consider the top four so excluding the ICAN, and Tri-Fox. So what makes Winspace better than these other companies. First, I want to say that in terms of quality and appearance Seka probably is regarded as the top Chinese frame brand and to my knowledge the only Chinese frame manufacture that supports threaded bottom brackets however the only way to purchase these frames to my knowledge is through Cycling100 (distributor). How it works is you put down a deposit of usually $500+ USD and the frame is built with 12 or so weeks. The total cost of the frame is $1600+ USD and the shipping is at around $300 and this does not include their aero bars which are another $325. Now I am not giving hard prices since their prices are in Euros and then get converted but when I looked at Seka a year ago the price of a shipped Exceed was around $1950 and again that was not with their $325 cockpit. It should be noted the few people that I could find that have dealt with Cycling100 which is just a distributor all had bad experiences in that the company would never respond to them, granted this was a sample size of two people so take that as you may. Which leaves me to Winspace, where I paid $1593 for a T1500 Disc with their carbon bars (Promo) and the upgraded UPS shipping. It should be noted that Winspace's bikes are not made to order so you are not waiting 12+ weeks, however stock is limited. I waited a couple months for my frame size and color to come into stock. The website does show live stock but you can live chat reps to check stock as well. Winspace commonly has 10% coupons and I think reps started to realize I was interested in the frame since I constantly had the frame in my cart or was emailing them but not checking out, so I was emailed by a rep saying they would provide the usual $100 shipping for free. Now it should be noted the bars are part of a promo where if you bought any of their frames they would provide the bars for free which I am not sure if they do this still and secondly my purchase price of the frame was $1480, but the new MSRP of the T1500 disc is $1580. The T1500 at the time was offered in grey, white, and this mixed blue so pretty limited and basic, but I went with the white which actually is more deep in person since it has these dots in some parts and this red pearlescent hue to it, granted it's far from the beautiful blended two color schemes Seka does and far from the variety Yoeleo or Elves do. At the time I could have went with the $1200 Winspace Hypers which in their own right are a high end performance bargain but I decided to go with the Hunt Aero 65 for $950 shipped. BTW most of these companies will sell their own carbon wheelsets as well. I will say hands down the best paintjob award goes down to Elves due to the quality also the pure amount of combos. Speaking of Elves I did look into their Falath Pro which hands down is probably the best value at $1090 shipped with bars and maybe it was even less since there might have been a coupon code at the time. The issue I had with Elves was that they were made to order and that there was not nearly as much Western coverage of Elves as Winspace, maybe a few Australian Youtubers at the time but that was it, but with more and more Youtubers are covering Elves if I was building/buying today they would be at the front of my list especially since the 2nd gen Falath Pro will be released soon and Cam Nicholls is covering this. Yoeleo bikes probably is right up there with Winspace in terms of Western coverage with their R12 DB Disc. With bars, free shipping and the 5% coupon code the D12 would have come to around $1500. Like Elves their bikes were made to order but they also have a huge array of color combos available. IMO the only thing that stopped me from going to Yoeleo was the fact that their customer service could never answer my questions on geometry about SOH and that the bike was made to order and that the D12 was more of an all around Aero bike and not a full on Aero bike like the T1500, Exceed, and Falath Pro. I quickly eliminated ICAN and Tri-Fox not because of price or coverage but because there were too may reviews of people getting bikes with slightly ovalized bottom brackets, overspray, tolerance issues and while none of these meant that the frame was non ridable it just meant that these frames were simply inferior to Seka, Winspace, Elves, and Yoeleo regardless of their price.

So my T1500 from the day I ordered to my doorstep was about 2.5 weeks. The box was perfectly packed with zero damage. The T1500 includes all the bits and pieces you need to get started like thru axles, grommets, covers, spacers but they also included an extra rear derailleur hanger and a carbon computer mount. Like many integrated bars the internal bend for mechanical wire is pretty tight so while these bars and frame technically can support a mechanical groupset the most optimal setup would 100% be electronic groupsets. I found the bars to be more akin my liking since they aren't as thick, but I should note they are kind of weird sizing in that bar length start at 85mm, 95mm, and so on which means these run 5mm longer then traditional stems. I am 5'5" and took a size 44cm Small and went with a 95x380 bar and the fit was spot on. With Winspace's SLC 2.0 that has a slightly longer reach I probably would have went with a 85x380 bar. I personally did not build my T1500 Disc, but my LBS (Piermont Bikes) did and I was charged $385 which included tax. Yes a hefty charge, but if you are good at wrenching and have the tools you can save a bunch of money doing it yourself, but from my mechanics perspective he said the bike was super easy to build up.

So my other bike is a 2022 Scott Foil RC 20 (previous gen), which I bought for $5800. This bike originally came with 50mm Syncros carbon wheels and Rival ETAP AXS groupset. I have since changed the wheelset and upgraded 3/4 of the groupset to Force. Interestingly enough when my mechanic built up my T1500 he subjectively claimed it was probably just as heavy as my stock Scott which was around 18lbs. What was more telling is that my $3850 T1500 in my opinion felt more dynamic and felt like it had more of that aero flywheel effect than my stock $5800 Scott Foil RC. It's only until I switched the Foil's wheelset and 3/4th of the groupset did the Foil feel as dynamic and fast as the T1500, but at that point my all in cost for that bike was now close to $8K no including tax. The only issue I have had with my T1500 was that it will not work with ever direct mount trainer due to the frames geometry since it has the frog leg chain stays and two my rear Rival derailleur went bad after taking the bike on and off a trainer but that really has nothing to do with the frame. So comparing a Chinese sub $4K bike to a now $8K name brand aero bike, really there is very little difference quality or performance wise, however the reason I haven't sold my Scott and just gone all in on Chinese bikes is that I am vein and still like that name recognition, I still love my Foil's paint job more than any Winspace, and I still really value that Western warranty. To share stories one in that after I bought my T1500 I decided to upgrade the stock Syncros Capital 1.0 50mm wheels on my Foil to some 2023 Winspace Hyper D45. These wheels are insane, but I had the issue that the rear wheel would make this popping noise if the rim was compressed. I immediately emailed Winspace with a video and then send them another email confirming my serial number. At first they kind of gave me the run around saying they had to check with the factory and then check with one of their specialist, but then finally they simply agreed to just send me a completely new back wheel and IMO this was probably the best case scenario but really sums up the issue with buying any Chinese brand in that RMAing anything is a bit of a pain, granted I got my ideal solution and now in 2023 there ae actual Winspace dealers even in my state of NY and even one local to me BUT this isn't like RMAing a pair of Zipps were you just show proof of purchase and they are replacing your wheels that day. My second story is a ride who also had a T1500 built up at the same LBS (Piermont Bikes). I asked him how he liked his T1500 and he said he loved it besides the fact that the T1500 Winspace sent him did have a seat tube bottle mount. He told me he reported this to Winspace and asked for either a replacement or reimbursement for him taking the bike to a shop to have mount drilled in. This rider told me Winspace basically ghosted him. Now I don't know if this is true, but again kind of sums up the issue with going with any of these Chinese brands, granted the rider still loved his bike and when I asked him why he went with Winspace was because he didn't want to spend $9K on a bike. His bike was full Force ETAP AXS and he was riding on the 2022 Winspace Hypers. So while I am fully behind building a Chinese bike I am not quite there endorsing having your one and only bike be a Chinese bike, but this could just be my paranoia since most bikes will have zero issues even over the lifetime of the bike.