I've rediscovered an old Mango bike of mines

Hi all,

About 2014 i bit the bullet and got a mango single speed bike. Didn't have a clue about any bikes in general and foolishly thought they looked cool enough to splurge 300quid on.

Its collected dust since then and i've pretty much cycled 0. I've recently moved to London and i fancy taking up cycling to work every day, only a 5mile cycle door-to-door so i'm going to dust down the old mango.

Is there anything straight away from this range of bikes that is a heap of rubbish & i should replace? Or is it a fairly solid enough bike to commute in and around London on?

Cheers

At the very least, have it checked by a professionnal.

I would look at chain and bb straight away.
After that pretty much everything else Its low end sadly. Hate to sound snobbish.
Mid range components are almost bullet proof and affordable..second hand cheaper still.
You could upgrade slowly as and when needed.
If it rides....ride it is my philosophy.

Why not ride it as it is and see if you like cycling to work before you spend any money?

You might get the bug and want to upgrade to a better bike, you might find it does the job just fine as is, you might hate cycling to work.

I rode a similarly shit single speed (Viking) for like 3 years and had a great time. Just upgrade stuff as it breaks.. eventually you'll upgrade the frame and none of the old bits will remain. Theseus' bike.

Certainly you should be looking at the brake pads and tyres. They were shite when it was new and they’ll have hardened and perished by now. Replace them all. The transmission should be ok.

If you get into it then I’d suggest upgrading the brake callipers at some point. A lot of those bikes had painted rims, including the brake walls, and the braking is generally awful, esp in the wet. You can spend some time with medium/fine grit emery cloth and sand the braking surface back to the metal, that’ll make a huge difference.

Mango frames were made of pretty cheap seamed steel which is heavy and inert, and they are pretty uninspiring to ride, so don’t go mad on upgrades. If you really do enjoy riding, then do what I suggested above and put money towards a better bike for next year.

Triggers Broom...for the working man.

Tyres seem to be any two of: cheap, puncture proof, fast (low rolling resistance).

Don't know what you have on your bike, but, nothing will put you off commuting faster than getting lots of punctures.