goodkeys

Hi everyone,

Has anyobdy any experiences to share with ordering from Priority Bicycles, and about their L-Train specifically? I will be moving in a month. From my new place I will be able to commute on a bike to work. One way is about a 15 minutes ride .

So I ordered the L-Train from Priority Bicycles.

I am excited to try it. Any user experiences for this bike? It lloks like a solid choice for low maintenance. They are on backorder for october 31st currently. I ordered a few days ago, so mine should be shipping on October 15. Any experiences with backorders from this company? Do they usually ship on the promised date?

Darth Lefty 

Priority is a legit company and they will do their best. But the whole bike industry is in turmoil from the double whammy of Covid shutdowns slowing production and shipping at the same time it doubled demand... that on top of production moving around to evade the tariffs. You might not want to use ink on your calendar.

goodkeys

Thanks Darth Lefty. Definitely not the easiest time to buy a bike. In any case Priority's support seems to be amazing and responsive. They have told me that it is difficult to estimate an exact shipping date, but they are confident that if it really will have to be pushed back it won't be more than a few days.

Any opinions on the bike itself? It seems to be a great commuter, if maybe a little heavy.

Darth Lefty 

I had a Priority. The bike was the first gen Classic, their first model. It was very well thought out. It had a few little production problems reportedly sorted out on the next generation of the bike. I won it in a contest and got some special customer service so my experience is a little better than anyone’s expected average. They sent me a front brake when they found out I was using a kid seat, a Gates belt drive to test (the first ones had a less expensive belt). I thought it was an excellent value. Light, inexpensive, easy and fun. The one you are looking at looks like an average hybrid/ fitness/ commuter design. It should be great. The weight is pretty good for $650, armored tires, and a steel frame.

goodkeys

Thanks Darth Lefty. It looks like great value for an entry-level commuter bike. Here in Europe bikes with a belt drive start at almost double that price. I've read a few reports where the wheels had been knocked out of true. Either during shipping, or when riding over potholes. I hope I'll be lucky and it won't happen with my bike. Other than that it should be low maintenance, which is exactly what I wanted. Really looking forward to my new bike.

bOsscO

Great piece of advice I was told long ago is that with any new bike, take it into your LBS for service after the first 100km. Regardless of how well the bike was assembled and how high quality the bike is, things can 'loosen up' or realign within the first 100km and is worth a service to review the bike and tighten/adjust as needed.

goodkeys

That's certainly a good idea. Thank you for the heads up!

Darth Lefty 

If you take it into a bike shop definitely have them go through the rear wheel. Machine built rear wheels on inexpensive bikes are notorious. Brand not important

Archwhorides 

Destroying factory rear wheels is mandatory

goodkeys

Never heard of that, and it's good to know. I have read that apparently the wheels on the L-Train can be bent out of true relatively easily. Some reports on the internet where it happened during shipping, or when riding over a pothole. Definitely something to keep in mind. I'll make sure to have it checked when bringing the bike in for a service.

EqualizerRiding

If your bike company needs a lbs to check your new bike, it's probably very poorly built. If your new sudden-catastrophic-failure-waiting-to-happen-aluminum-frame bike comes with loose spokes and spoke tensions all over the map, it's most definitely extremely poorly built. Get rid of the bike. If your bike company blames shipping and tells you to take it to your lbs or sends you dirty, used replacement parts for a new, poorly built sudden-catastrophic-failure-waiting-to-happen-aluminum frame bike under warranty, it's a s**t bike from a s**t company. Get rid of the bike. It's a threat to you and your family's safety and health. The s**t bike company cares about taking your money, but it doesn't give a s**t about you or your family.

GamblerGORD53

Just about ANY bike, REBUILD IT as soon as you get it home. Many bikes do have sealed bearing wheels and headsets now tho.
I bought my designed in Toronto 2017 Simcoe Roadster new in 2021, discounted from $1,400 to $1000. It sat there over a year while I thought about it, LOL.
>> Both wheels had spokes NOT trued or tensioned. I tightened them pretty good by feel. The rims were cheap bare alu with pathetic eyelets. The rims show SCRATCHES like they were put through a fricking belt sander. Can you bloody imagine anything so ignorant?? Only rode them a while anyway.
>> The cruiser rubber pad pedals it came with were tight, like they ALL are when new. I took them apart right off and got them spinning nice, but they are too useless for serious riding. I got $60 Vsixty ones with studs that don't come loose like other do.
>> I thought the threaded headset felt gimpy, but I didn't have that 32 mm wrench, so I only found out a year later that it came half lubed. The caged balls were ruined.
>> The Nexus 7i was tight and coasted poorly. I fixed the left side bearing that after 300 miles. Anyway, I replaced both wheels with the SA drum brake ones I had bought the frame for. Roller brakes are 100% STUPID and drag like boat anchors. They either drag or DON'T WORK.
>> Both the 1 bolt stem and 1 bolt seat post were bare alu. Both got chucked soon after. I made a steel stem myself with a welder and nickel plating. It has a face plate with two 8 MM. bolts. Will last forever.
>> I changed the bottom rack mounts to 6 mm and added vertical struts it needed. It'll hold a 100+ lbs now. LOL.
>> The chainguard was almost totally useless with little coverage of the chain. Only good for keeping pants off the chain.
>> The alu fenders were not great. The wrap around stays are totally stupid for any adjusting. Too flimsy to attach my boot mad flaps, so it now has my 50 and 70 yo steel fenders. LOL.
>> I didn't like the 60d swept bars either. LOL. So I had an old chrome 80d bar to put on.
>>>> And then there's my biggest GRIEF with this bike. The GRIPS felt like tire rubber and were stupidly tight, impossible to take off. Took me half an hour so I could put on my mirror. The other one I cut off and chucked them. I'm using SMOOTH plastic ones made in the 1970s. OMG these parts makers now are MORONS.

Plus the bike came with NO bottle mounts. How fricking STUPID is that now?? They think people will ONLY ride them 10 miles. WTF.
No wonder they didn't sell and the company soon went poof.
My LBS that sold it to me are oblivious to all this I'm sure. 10 years ago I used to see them true all the wheels. The guy could do it perfect in seconds.

Regardless, the frame fits me PERFECT and I LOVE this bike, 41 lbs and all. I'm making a CF chaincase myself.
My SA XL-FDD dyno drum brake hub has been AWESOME for 30,000 miles and both tours on a 120 lb Rohloff14 bike. LOL.

I-Like-To-Bike

Seems to me just buying a perfect frame would have been simpler and avoid all the time, effort and frustration with everything else on the bike that you had to remove before assembling your preferred parts to it.

What else is a chainguard supposed to do but keep pants off the chain?

GamblerGORD53

LOL. You've been riding IGH bikes for 60 years.
The chain case is for keeping the chain CLEAN, also in the rain. My last chain was installed with the original lube and has had ZERO cleaning or lube in near 4,000 miles. It just passed 1/32" stretch. I'll pass it on to my CCM that needs a new one. I was unknowingly using stupid alu 3/32" rings, so that was also causing wear.
Even with my full chain case on my tour bike, I still use pant clips 99.99% of the time. At the very least pants slow you 1 mph by air drag and the flapping annoyance will take off another 5% at least. Well actually, I'm wearing shorts all summer and in the spring melting, I'm wearing high rubber boots. Same if I was riding in winter.

This bike does have good things. The rack has 1/2" steel tubes, 1 on the top center that is nice for tying extra water bottles. The fork will take any tire size 700c or 650B. The brake arm clip is the same for both drum and roller. The rear will take near 2". The chain ring is a soft steel 44T and full 1/8".
The BB is a nice square taper cartridge. There's lots of cable loops for both brake and shifter. The kickstand plate is perfect with lips to keep it straight and solid.
The rear is 132 mm, good for both SA 5w and Nexus 7i. Maybe some day I'll squeeze in the Rohloff14.
The WB is 42.5", tour bike capable easily. The TT has a nice 10 mm or 1/2" slope.

There are ZERO frames like this from any age bike. Old ones will have narrow dropouts and or skinny race tire frames. Plus few are made for racks.
New ones have dumb ideas like thru axel, threadless, steep angles, wrong trail, outboard BBs, 2"+ sloped top tubes that are likely short too, etc.
Linus has poor paint and mostly rim scratch brakes. Pashley's have ridiculous 1" higher BBs.
Surly's have a horrible fit.
My SA hubs are wonderfully QUIET.
=========
And the speed difference isn't imaginary. The SA 5w does 46 mph, while the Nexus roller only does 38.1.

Before pics >>


After >>

EqualizerRiding

Love it. Similar to the Windsor series. Excellent bikes. Great values. Have the Kensington, cromo with an 8 speed IGH for a fraction of the price of a sudden-catastrophic-failure-waiting-to-happen aluminum frame from s**t bike company. Just a fun, compliant, stable yet fairly nimble ride. Not quite as zippy as a mixte with a shorter wheelbase like the Charge Hob but just as fun and the 8 speed IGH helps navigate steeper ascents and descents. Great as a commuter, cruiser, even tourer. New was < $600. Bought used (a few rides) from lovely, retired couple who was so looking forward to riding except e-bikers swamped their hood and they no longer felt safe on the trails. At their age, they could not risk injury. It was very sad, and outrageous.