Carrera Zelos : did anyone tried it?

spupazza

I need to buy a new bike, and it's almost a month since I'm looking for.
The problem is that the more I look the more I get doubts and confused about what to get..
Initially I started looking for a hybrid model with suspensions, that's because I wanted a bike that could resist with no issue to bumps on teh road.

In this forum as in others I was kindly explained, that suspensions are usually a bad idea (particularly on cheap bikes), and that what I need is mostly mount fat tyres on my bike.

Yet I can't decide what bike to take. I decided to get one in Halford since I have a shop right near my house and their initial 6 weeks free of charge service .

What I'm looking to is a bike to ride 16kms everyday as fast as possible, considering the many bumps on the road it has to be resistant.

I saw Halford currently is selling the Zelos at a good price.
http://www.halfords.ie/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/product_storeId_11101_catalogId_15551_productId_888017_langId_-1_categoryId_212536
Yet I have no idea if this bike is any good or not. Here's my questions:

1-Did anyone try this bike? Is it well built and sturdy?
2-What are the fattest tyres could I mount on this one? Possibly choosing from the ones in halford's website?
http://www.halfords.ie/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/categorydisplay_storeId_11101_catalogId_15551_categoryId_212521_langId_-1
I never imagines it would be so complicate to choose the right bike.
I thank you anyone who could help me.

Lumen

I had a look at one in my local Halfords last weekend.

It looks OK. It's cheaper than most people would consider "entry level", but there are some proper Shimano components on it and the shifter design is better than some of the total crap I've seen on bikes of this price.

The biggest question would be wheels. Cheap wheels are usually awful, but a hundred quid or so would have a decent set of replacements.

Dunno about tyre sizes. Almost all road bike take 25mm, and many take 28mm. That'd be the least of my concerns.

happytramp

If you get a bike like that you'll find it weird at first and you'll think the ground is too rough. You'll get used to it after a week or two and you'll be able to do the 16K easily.

This one will be way better and not much more expensive

http://www.halfords.ie/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/product_storeId_11101_catalogId_15551_productId_810707_langId_-1_categoryId_212536

Scrappy600

Ive got a TDF for sale in the adverts section if you're interested, only 6 months old and cheaper than buying the zelos new...

Ryath

http://www.decathlon.co.uk/triban-3-uk-id_8274036.html#anchor_ComponentProductTechnicalInformation

This is much better than the zelos if they have your size and you can get to Belfast. Better gears, lighter, carbon fork.

http://www.decathlon.co.uk/btwin-triban-500-id_8239801.html#anchor_ComponentProductTechnicalInformation

If you can stretch to it this really can't be beaten for value. Just over €500 and comparable in spec to most bikes you'd pay €800 for.