"Adrian" wrote in message
. 244.170...

So where did "average" come into it? Although I'd suspect that it's *FAR*
more common to buy inexpensive cars than expensive bikes...

There are a hell of a lot of cheap crap bikes bought - you just don't see
the owner's talking about them.

It goes a lot further than that same 5 grand spent on a car

How? Seriously - genuine question. I'm *baffled* about what a £5k bike
will
do that a £500 one won't.

Ok, what will a 300k car do which a 30k one won't? There's an awful lot of
your answer.

Most of the answer is almost always 'go faster' - applies to both cars and
bikes. Another of the key subsets is 'being more comfortable' - oh look,
cars and bikes again. 'Easy to ride' is another one (ok, cars suffer this to
less of a degree since autoboxes etc are very cheap). 'Carry more people' is
another - cars get this one too.

Key differences include materials (CF costs a lot more than gaspipe!),
design and volume of manufacture (recumbents tend to be more expensive,
recumbent trikes more so).

My speciality is tandems - I know of bikes which cost 5K. What they will do
which your 500 quid one won't is : Carry two people. Be portable within
airline luggage restrictions (the former makes this one quite hard and
expensive). Be light enough to lift (ever crossed scottish deer fences?
having something which doesn't weigh a ton is a significant advantage). Have
better gears and brakes (a rohloff hub costs as much as your 500 quid bike
alone - but it will be strong and reliable in the way that a derailleur
system never will be).

Recumbents have similar games. Recumbent tandems even more so.

Will that do?

cheers,
clive