- · THE FR40, 51Cm bike is available for test ride at Escapades – for the road and beyond (PONDA-GOA). If interested drop a message on 9823905756
FELT bikes were officially launched in India by Ozone
ventures, on 27th March 2017. Soon after, I got to lay my hands on
FR40 - the Aluminum framed, Tiagra equipped Road bike. I tested the bike on
Rolling Goan Terrain, with some challenging up hills and some bad roads. The
bike performed superbly. The FR40 belongs to FELT’s FR series bikes that come
in 17 variants, including Carbon and Aluminum frames. The FR30 (Shimano 105),
FR40 (Shimano Tiagra), FR50 (Shimano Sora) and FR60 (Shimano Claris) are
Aluminum frame variants.
THE FEATURES THAT STAND OUT ON FELT FR
SERIES ALUMINUM VARIANTS
FRAME MATERIAL
The FR
series Aluminum bikes use 6069 alloy, the most popular alloy being 6061. The
6069 has higher tensile strength than the 6061
 |
| THE 6069 ALLOY FRAME |
VARIABLE ANGLE ADJUSTABLE STEM (VA STEM)
A nice feature
that, allows the rider to adjust the stem angle. This stem has 6 angle settings
-16, -12, -8, +8, +12, or +16 degrees
 |
| THE VARIABLE ANGLE STEM |
RIMS
The rims are
tubeless ready
WHEELS
When the
current trend is of lesser number of spokes on road bike wheels, FELT has stuck
to 32 (rear) and 28 (front) spoke wheels on FR series bikes and that’s a good
decision. The wheels are Sturdy, Stiff and Light weight.
CABLING
Internal
 |
| INTERNAL CABLING |
FINISH
No weld
marks seen. The paint job is top notch
 |
| TOP NOTCH FINISH, NO WELD MARKS SEEN |
DRIVETRAIN
Full Tiagra
2x10 speed, this is the latest version of the Tiagra with all shifter and brake
cables running under the bar tape
BOTTOM BRACKET BEARING
Pressfit 386
for high stiffness
THE RIDE EXPERIENCE
I have clocked 430 Kms on FR40 and…… the
least I can say is, the more I pushed the bike the more it demanded. Very
responsive bike – the right combination
of frame engineering, the 386 pressfit bearings and stiff light weight wheels
add up to make a bike that accelerates well and climbs even better.
 |
| THE FR40 |
ON THE CLIMBS – the bike is kitted with
50/34 and 11-28 Tiagra drive train, initially I had my doubts whether the 11-28
cassette would take the steep climbs on the mountains that surround my home
town or will I have to change the cassette to 11-30 or 11-32. But, after
clocking 430 Kms and choosing to ride the most difficult climbs in the v
icinity the 11-28 cassette stays. The bike climbs WELL!! Let me explain this in layman terms, to climb one needs lower gears, for me (on my two other road bikes) on the three steepest climbs on my ride routes, the gear combination would be 34 front-30 rear or 34 front-32 rear, But on FR40 I could go up in 34-26 on two of the climbs and 34-28 on the toughest one. Simply said, the bike is built well for efficiency. I will repeat here, the Frame Engineering, the stiff wheel set and stiff BB386 Bottom bracket bearings makes this bike a great speed and climbing machine.
ON ROUGH ROADS – the FR40 is a stiff race bike, I could
feel the roughness of the road on the bad dug up stretches. But, remembering a Hindi
proverb “Kuch Panay ke liye Kuch Khona padta hai” which roughly means “To gain something, you lose
Something” but, what you lose in this case counts
to zero when you realize what you are gaining and that is – a bike which
you can ride the whole day and not feel fatigued, a bike that yields easily to
your pedaling efforts
ON THE FLAT ROADS – speed, accelerate, speed, feel the wind on your face….feel the adrenalin
rush…..accelerate…speed…….wow!!!!!
PRICING – the
FR40 is priced at a little above 1Lac, the bike is worth every rupee.
Final Verdict
– A great bike at a great price…….GO FOR IT !!!! YOU WONT REGRET ……..
