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PolygonHelios800X

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BBY SIMON HAYES

WEIGHT: 7.2kg RRP $3,299

TESTLAB

124BicyclingAustraliaMay • June 2012

Nearly everyone I know has an opinion on the rise of online shopping in Australia. They’re pretty much all agreed that purchasing from an overseas

supplier does a huge amount of harm to the local market, but they also say the cheap price on certain items is difficult to ignore. Where things become a little grey for them however, is purchasing online from an Australian company. On the one hand, it’s not so great for your local bike shop. On the other hand it allows you to get a bike at a good price without sending your dollars offshore. And there’s no denying that some of the bikes coming from those local online stores are very good. So, is this the way of the future?

Still, there is a certain amount of dubiousness in the market regarding the quality of some of the frames. The perception is that you can go to China, pick a frame out of a catalogue, get your name put on it and start selling. While it is possible to do this, there are other brands who go through the entire design and manufacturing process before their bike goes on sale. Polygon is one of these. I’d heard of Polygon before but I couldn’t quite put my finger on where. However it turns out that Polygon are a Taiwanese manufacturer that have been in business for about 25 years. Up until 2004 they manufactured just for other companies, and I may say, some quite big name companies. In 2004 they released their own brand onto the Asian market and have been growing steadily ever since. Now they are turning their attention to the Australian market.

The bike I was testing was sent to my house via courier, just as it would be if you purchased it online. At that point I still had some prejudice regarding online frames, but the bike that came out of the box was very impressive. The Polygon designers appear to be trying to create a classic design with a bit of a leaning towards the aero road bike trend, particularly in the area of the down tube which is triangular before flaring out to accommodate the oversize bottom bracket. The top tube is similarly shaped but what really catches your eye is the shape of the forks. They’re straight and fat with no tapering at all. Remember those fat yellow forks that Giant used to have back in the 90s? They kind of remind me of those. The elegant side of things is more apparent at the back end. The chainstays have an interesting upward sweep, being low throughout their length before turning up to the drop-outs in a very pleasing fashion. The seat tube is thick and square at the bottom bracket but tapers to a rounded 27.2mm size near the top. This adds comfort to your rear end while giving the bike a stylish look. The seat stays are straight and of a mid

Polygon Helios

BIKE

Frame Mitsubishi Rayon-Profil carbon in tube to tube construction

Fork Monocoque carbon integratedHeadSet FSAStem Ritchey WCS 4-AxisHandlebars Ritchey WCS Carbon Evo CurveSaddle Fizik ArioneSeatPost Ritchey WCS CarbonShiftLevers Shimano Ultegra Di2 ElectronicBrakes Shimano Ultegra 6700FDerailleur Shimano Ultegra Di2 ElectronicRDerailleur Shimano Ultegra Di2 ElectronicCassette Shimano 105 5700 11-25T 10-SpeedChain Shimano 105Crank Shimano Ultegra 6700 53/39TBottomBracket Shimano SM-BB71 press fitWheels Shimano UltegraTyres Schwalbe Ultremo XZPedals N/A

WeightPrice $3,299

Distributor Bicycles Online Australiawww.bicyclesonline.com.au

SPECIFICATIONS

126BicyclingAustraliaMay • June 2012 • www.bicyclingaustralia.com 127

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I was partially expecting this bike to be a generic Asian carbon frame but I was very, very wrong. This bike has quality engineering behind it and a solid range of parts. On top of that it even looks good.

PERFORmANCE

Very good. This frame is used by the Pure Tasmania Pro cycling team and the UCI Continental team Polygon Sweet Nice, albeit with different spec, and it shows. Most riders would be happy with the performance of this machine.VALuE

Superb. For just over three grand you get a performance carbon frame, genuine quality components, free freight, and a 14 day trial period. Apart from the slightly short warranty that’s hard to match.OVERALL

Online shopping in Australia is still controversial, but there’s no doubt it is on the increase and with bikes like the Polygon it’s easy to see why. A quality bike for just over three thousand dollars that you can own without even getting out of bed. There’s no tricks or gimmicks here. This bike is definitely a performance machine and probably sits closer to the just over four grand mark in the performance stakes. What the market will look like in five or 10 years is anyone’s guess, but bikes like the Polygon will at least have us talking about it.

SummING uP

Many riders tend to focus on the ProTour when choosing bike companies, but some of the best bikes on the market won’t be seen at the Tour de France. Merida is an example which comes to mind. Yet there is a whole world of other racing in the Asian, Continental and American circuits who all need good bikes. One of our top teams Genesys Wealth Advisers raced last year on Malvern Star frames and I mention this because when I initially hopped onto the Polygon, my first thought was that it felt very much like one of those Malvern Star team bikes. Not the super snappy zing that you might find on a 12 grand machine, but a powerful sense of forward motion and predictable steering. Genesys won a lot of races on those Malvern Stars and as the Polygon is being used by the Pure Tasmania Pro cycling team and the UCI Continental team Polygon Sweet Nice, I’m thinking that those guys will be right up there near the front of the bunch as well.

I was impressed with the ride qualities of the Polygon. I was able to keep pace with other riders at the crit track, and it was pretty responsive riding uphill. The wet weather on the East Coast prevented me from giving it much of a flogging on our country gravel roads, but it seemed OK on rough chip tarmac. As much as any bike can

feel on that stuff at any rate.Another pleasing aspect of the Helios was

the steering. It’s slightly more responsive than a number of bikes due to the shorter fork rake but not to the point of twitchiness. The sensible speccing of Schwalbe’s Ultremo tyres helped here. These bits of rubber will hang onto just about any corner. In fact the parts spec is pretty impressive for the price. Carbon Ritchey throughout and Ultegra Di2. I suspect we’ll all be tired of hearing about Ultegra Di2 by about August so I’ll spare you except to say that it nearly always, it worked with out a blip.

TheOnlineExperienceAs mentioned before, this bike was sent to

me in exactly the same way as it would be if you bought it online from the distributors. It was pretty much built up and all I had to do was take off the bubble wrap, cut off the zip ties, adjust bars and stem, plug in the Di2 and pump up the tyres. That was it.

Given that the distributor, Bicycles

range size. No super-thin stays here.The colour is of course, black, but it’s

neither gloss nor matt. If we were talking house paint then it might be called ‘low sheen’. Additionally, the frame isn’t covered in logos, just the one on each side of the down tube and the model on the top tube.

I mentioned earlier that Polygon aren’t just a catalogue company and that is evident by the changes this bike has gone through. The previous version of the Helios was a monocoque frame made from Toray T700 carbon. This one on test here uses Mitsubishi Rayon-Profil carbon instead of the Toray. It has a blend of TR50S (24 tensile strength), MR60 (30 tensile strength) and HR40 (40 tensile strength) in a tube to tube construction. As you might expect the HR40 is positioned in places where extra strength and stiffness is required and the TR50S in places where there is an opportunity to shave some weight. This has resulted in the smallest frame, 50cm, dropping from 1,020g to 930g and the largest available, 58cm (tested here), is now 1,050g down from 1,200.

Interestingly, this same bike will undergo a further change next year, combining the monocoque and tube to tube versions to produce an even lighter frame. This is expected to bring the 50cm frame down to around 700g and the 58cm to 900g.

“Not the super snappy zing that you might find on a 12 grand machine, but a powerful sense of forward motion and predictable steering.”

Online www.bicyclesonline.com.au, offer free freight within Australia, you get a 14 day test ride a 12 month warranty (which admittedly, could be longer) and the Shimano Di2 doesn’t need any adjusting, it’s hard to see why you wouldn’t buy one direct. If you’re in Sydney you can go and try the bikes in their Manly showroom, so it’s a bit different to a faceless overseas warehouse, particularly as you can ring and ask questions to a real person. In fact, as this particular model is tube to tube construction you can even order it in custom sizes. You can’t do that with Wiggle.