Felt Z-85 Long Term Review...

Date Reviewed: April 18, 2013

Strengths:    Value, comfort, performance.

Weaknesses:    Paint (USA - 2012 version ). OEM Brakes.

One of 2 Felt bikes in my assortment and arguably the one I like the most based on 9500 miles of riding experience with this bike during the past 2.5 years. This was my first Felt bike (also recently purchased an F4). 

Comfortable and predictable ride, good choice of components out of the box (2012 version anyway). Straight off the sales floor this is a great everyday training bike for the Cat 3-4 racer or the perfect tool for the weekend group rider. The OE build offers both great performance and solid value for the money. Can't add much more to the previous reviews other than to reinforce the positive and say you definitely need to upgrade the brakes. Immediately if you live in hill country.

For someone looking for a long term relationship with this bike note that it is totally worth upgrading the group-set (or individual components) as the stock 105 components wear out. The frame is worthy, even if others might scoff at the idea of putting higher level components on an alloy "recreational" frame.

I've upgraded my saddle to a Prologo Skratch Pro, the crank to a full size Ultegra 6601, the front and rear mech's to Ultegra 6600 and my wheels to Ksyrium Equipe (which came from my F4, but which wears Cosmic Carbones). I changed out the brakes to 105 very soon after initial purchase and started riding Conti GP4000s when the OE Vittoria Rubino's wore out. Built up with these components the bike is a very solid trainer or A level group ride or fondo bike.

The only issue I've had is with the paint bubbling-up around the breather holes in the seat stays, seat post clamp area and bottle cage bosses. A little irritating since I basically put the bike thru a pro-level cleaning after every ride, but not structural and I suspect easily repaired. In fact it probably says a lot about how much I like this bike that I am considering investing in a custom paint scheme in the near future.

Bottom line:  You could do a lot worse and might be hard pressed to do better!