Chinese CX Frame

I’m struggling to find any decent cyclocross bikes in stock in the UK so considering ordering a Chinese frame. Any experiences? Budget is about £1500 for a full build, maybe more if I push the boat out. Was thinking about ordering some wheels at the same time to save on shipping.

This is my Chinese CX bike, just over 20,000km travelled, couple of CX seasons (we dont get many races here though) and plenty of gravel. Was about $800AUD for the frameset when I bought it a few years back, I am just running Chosen branded wheelsets from Merlin in the UK, they are cheap and have been solid for me

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Looks great - thanks for the info. Do you have any more details about the frame?

Weight Weenies has a thread about this. May be worth checking out.

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This is a super useful thread - thank you.

It’s my first cx bike so n=1 but I’m really enjoying my Vitus Energie with full cx1, picked it up for a similar price to what your looking to spend.

@jezza323 frame is a workswell bike wcb-c-112. It is identical to a cx028, gr029 or a fly fr-609 (rear derailleur hanger is differrent). They also all look identical to the Flanders Forte but the Flanders claimed weight is 75 to 100g lighter for the frame so not 100% sure. I have just ordered a fly 609 myself and starting to build it up. Frame feels great and came in 40g underweight , BB is perfectly alligned but the Matt UD finish leaves a little to be desired (not that I expected anything amazing at 700aud for frameset).

@jezza323 can you confirm if your rear derailleur cable is fully shrouded the whole length internally?

Just a thought…how about the Inflite linked below? This is from the US sote, but I know theyre available in the UK as well.

Edit: found the UK site. Looks like they have a carbot bike with Sram Rival for 2049 pounds. AL and sram apex is right at your price point.

yes thats the correct frameset, Workswell WCB-C-112

my BB has also been amazing, better than many name brand frames. Its a straight bb30 with a machined alu insert to seat the bearings (with retaining clips as per regular bb30). 20,000km with the same pair of basic rotor branded bearings and smooth as ever

@taccca my cables are not full run outer. Just outers to the frame entry and from the frame exit behind the hanger. I have also crossed my inners inside the downtube to try get a bit better routing up front

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@jezza323 Thanks mate. I was worried the rear derailleur cable would rub on the inside of the chainstay. Good idea on crossing the cables as well :slight_smile:

mine seemed to route pretty well from under the bottom bracket straight through the rear exit without touching anything. Will depend on the exact routing on your frame I think.

My other china frameset (Tideace) is a full run outer due to its routing

I had a 2017 frame and was great (canti brakes), i bought it as I could use a lot of my road parts on it. I only sold it as I wanted to go all in and got a dedicated bike w/wheels, discs etc.

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It’s my first cx bike so n=1 but I’m really enjoying my Vitus Energie with full cx1, picked it up for a similar price to what your looking to spend.

This and the Inflite where my top two choices but neither has any stock in my size (XL) unfortunately.

Lots of the Chinese frames seem to be more gravel orientated. Anyone have a steer on a chinese frame with CX race geometry?

Thanks