john m flores 

This isn't tolerances. This is design and engineering decisions regarding the size and placement of components

big john

The last new MX bike I had was a 1984 YZ490 2 stroke. Now, the 4 strokes are lighter than the 2 strokes we rode and they have electric start!

And modern mountain bikes are so much better than what was available 30 years ago it's ridiculous.

rsbob 

Another Moto vs Bike Cost Comparo…If there is a God in Heaven or somewhere…..NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

Russ Roth

The MTB is ridiculously overpriced, but at this point the pricing of the top tier bikes has just gotten absurd. They're priced that way because there's enough people with disposable income willing to pay that amount, not because they're actually worth that. Can't speak to the motorcycle but with the way cars have spiked I'm surprised they're still selling that cheaply.

PeteHski

Well I wouldn’t use “agricultural” to describe a lightweight, steel road bike frame. I was just trying to convey the completely different design challenges in making something very strong and durable vs ultra-light and efficient.

If you took that $9k moto and made everything on it as ultra-light as possible without compromising its strength and durability then the cost would go through the roof. Just like it does when you make bikes ultra-light.

PeteHski

I actually suggested that most of the cost was in the engine.

PeteHski

I totally agree they are not worth it when you can get a second or third tier version for less than half the price that weighs maybe a couple of pounds more. But there is real cost involved in making every component ultra-light. Especially when production volumes are low. I doubt the margins on these bikes are outrageous.

As an aside, top tier mtb dampers have some quite impressive engineering and technology and again making it all ultra-light and compact is inherently very expensive.

PeteHski

That is really just the benefit of 3D CAD modelling, which is nothing special these days. I am just about old enough (55) to have been involved in automotive design during the transition from drawing board to CAD. With the introduction of CAD, packaging suddenly became a whole lot easier and more precise.

dedhed

Agricultural.
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wolfchild

What about the cost of suspension, fuel system, ignition system and electrical hardware ?

Kapusta

Did not read this whole thread, but one factor is the rapid pace of change and development in MTBs vs moto. It is relentless and very fast in the mtb world. If you are not completely redesigning and making major changes, in 5 years you will have an obsolete line that you will be lucky to give away.

i’m not talking about subtle changes either. Even a beginner rider will notice a night and day difference between MTBs made 10 years apart. This has been true for 30 years.

But the real issue with the OP’s comprison is that you are talking about an elite pro-level mtb vs a good but not elite level moto. That $9k mtb is an outlier. I am a very experienced and longtime mountain biker who is willing to spend money on the sport and has a taste for the better things. I ride with many people like me. None of us are riding $9K mtbs. I am pretty much riding the bike of my dreams right now, and even during the height of Covid prices, I paid around $6K to build it. Right now (post COVID prices) it would’ve cost me well under $5K.

A friend of mine just picked up a brand new Ibis Ripmo AF SLX for around $3K. I rented one of these for three days, and honestly, it’s 90% of what a $6000 bike is.

PeteHski

Engines cost more to design, develop and manufacture than suspension hardware etc.

john m flores 

Doesn't CAD make the design of CF bicycle frames easy too?

PeteHski

Of course it makes design easier. I was just pointing out that it’s nothing special to engineer components to 1 mm accuracy in their placement etc.

john m flores 

So what's so difficult about designing and producing a CF frame these days that warrants the costs?

My point is that for any product category, there comes a price point where the price is not in direct relation to the cost of manufacture but rather perceived value. A $9,000 bicycle is not 3 times better than a $3,000 bicycle, and the manufacturer likely has a much greater profit margin on the $9,000 bike so they use all the persuasive tactics available to them to make it desirable.

PeteHski

CF manufacture at the highest level is still a relatively expensive process. If it was cheap to design and manufacture in CF there would be a lot more of it used in for example mainstream car production. Or even mainstream bikes for that matter.

Of course there are diminishing returns on performance of high end products, which especially applies to bikes. How much did Specialized spend on developing their Aethos frame to save maybe 200g? But I wouldn’t necessarily equate diminishing performance returns with increased profit margins.

I don’t actually know what the profit margin is for a $9k bike vs a $4k version of the same bike, but they will have a lot of shared development costs.

Yan 

Sorry to burst your bubble but your S-works frame was made in an Asian factory for under $300 actual cost to Specialized. Their high end models are made in Taiwan by Merida, with a Specialized logo slapped on. Their low end models are made in China.

The $9000 bike in fact cost the dealer only $5000 to buy from the brand. $4000 of your money evaporated straight into the bike shop markup. That's the end of your five-figure carbon marvel fantasy right there.

Out of the $5000 Specialized gets, the majority goes to areas that have zero to do with the bike itself. A chunk goes into shareholder pockets as profit. Another chunk goes into marketing, including pro tour sponsorships. Another chunk goes into business overhead, managers, lawyers, accountants, customer service, distribution. By the time you get down to engineering and manufacturing, you're already scraping the bottom.

And bike brands don't even make the drivetrain themselves. They buy from Shimano and SRAM and only do a bolt on job.

The entire industry is merely a chain of middlemen that takes the equivalent of a $600 retail AliExpress Chinese carbon frame and inflates it to 10x the price. Sure the S-works frame will be better. But how much better? It's not 10x better and it didn't cost 10x more to produce. You're paying 10x the price for emotional benefits. Since these are all actually made by Merida, you might as well save some money, buy a Merida and be done with it.

No doubt the Specialized designers need to get paid. But exactly what can a Californian designer do that a Taiwanese designer can't, that makes the Californian designer deserve multiple times the salary? Nothing. The Taiwanese designer is just as good as the Californian designer, if not better. Most of the world's bikes are made in Taiwan.

PeteHski

So are Honda exempt from all these obvious overheads then?

I don't own an S-Works bike either. I don't think the marginal gains are worth it. But as an engineer I do have respect for those who design and develop high end products. It ultimately benefits the lower tier, higher volume versions of those products.

Yan 

I can't say about Honda's overhead but I can confidently say that Honda isn't sourcing a product for $300 from Taiwan and selling it for $5000 (like Specialized is with their frames).

Because believe it or not, no matter how much scale they have and how "agricultural" their product is, Honda cannot manufacture an internal combustion engined motorcycle for $300. Nobody can.

That just about sums it up doesn't it? What else do you need to know? End of story.

And can we talk about the Shimano and SRAM groupsets that cost $3000? They charge the maximum they can get away with. It has nothing to do with their production costs. Same story all around.

Ogsarg

Over and over, people talk about how the cost to make something doesn't justify it's price as though that is all that goes into the final product. Well, it's not. Engineering, R&D, Marketing, Quality assurance, management, accounting, liability insurance, employee benefits, etc. For a low quantity product, these costs can add up to a whole lot more than the material costs.

I spent my career, working with semiconductor manufacturing equipment. Also highly specialized and low volume. One company I worked for made a tool for rinsing and drying silicon wafers. It was a very simple tool; basically you put a carrier of wafers into a basket in the machine, close the door and it spun the carrier, while spraying the product with deionized water to rinse and then heated nitrogen to dry. Since not contaminating the product was critical, all the materials had to be high purity and a lot of engineering went into making sure that contaminants from the surrounding area could not get into the tool during processing. Still the material costs were maybe $5k and a couple k more for labor. The tool sold for 60k at that time and the company lost money most of the 9 years I was there.

Look at how many bike company's there are and how many that have high end mountain bikes and then look at the market for those high dollar machines and consider how few of them Yeti is likely to sell but the revenue from those bikes has to support an entire infrastructure. For anyone that doesn't want to pay for that, there are plenty of knock-offs on Ali Express and the like where they don't have to worry about all those other costs. Just don't complain when the frame snaps while your blasting down a single track.

Yan 

That's all very good, but did your semiconductor company sell a second tier of tool that was 99% identical and exactly the same cost to make, but priced at $30k for the purpose of artificial product segmentation and extracting maximum profits from every social class of customer?

These "knock-off" dismissals always make me laugh. When 99.5% of carbon frames are made in Asia, one really has to wonder who is knocking off who.

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phughes

Oh my lord. You are arguing for absolutely no reason. Well, actually there is a reason. You didn't actually read what I wrote. I stated there is a difference in frame materials. I also understand a mountain bike like that actually will cost a lot of money, but it isn't because the motorcycle is agricultural.You obviously have no clue the amount to R&D that goes into a motorcycle frame. Man, step back and actually read and comprehend what people write.

Anyway Bike Forums, welcome to Winter.

phughes

You have absolutely no clue. Stop while you're behind.

PeteHski

Well I can only go off my own experience of chassis vs engine development costs. If you have some data showing that development and production costs of fabricated bike frames and suspension costs more than developing and producing an engine then enlighten me please.

In my own field of high-end motorsport, engine development costs dwarf everything else put together by a huge margin.

phughes