What bike £450??

jaybiking

Hello all,

I am in the process at looking for my first real bike to get, its for road, rough terrain cycling, my mates have all got Trek i think, the catalogue i'm looking at is Evans, they stock mainly Trek, Specialized, Pinnacle, Scott, GT, Saracen, Claud Butlers etc. I like the look of the Specialized Hardrock Sport Hyd Disc '07'. Is this a good choice for £429.99 ? Need help. Also as novice as I am is Hardtail the kind of thing i'm looking for, I guess my mates have similar as they seem the most popular.

Help really Helps

Jay

patchb

hi.
My friend has just got the Specialized hardrock hydraulic disk version today. The brakes are a bit weak and the bike is a little on the heavy side. Try looking in other shops and look for the Giant XTC series. I have one and find it to be a very good bike for the money. Also try and test ride the bikes before you buy one.

dcp1975

Yeah the hardrock is a bit on the heavy side and the fork to be honest is awful! Try and test them first though, any of these are very well specced bikes for your price range
plus at this time of year the 07 models are reduced so best to have a look round

GT Avalanche 2.0 disc £400
Mongoose Tyax Elite £280
Mongoose Tyax Super £400
Giant Terrago disc £400

supersonic

Some good threads on the buying section on this price band, or trying putting the models in the search thingy.

h i r 0

You can get the £499 Carrera Fury from Halfords for £405 at the moment. It's £50 off in-store and there's a 10% voucher on Kellogs Cornflakes. It's well reviewed, and I'm picking mine up on Saturday.

PhetPhan

the fury is fantastic!!!
and with the deal its even better

LaurenceGough

Mongoose ftw! I own the Tyax Elite and I love it!

beattie41

Trek 6000. Awesome bike - good forks and brakes. Good frame. £475.

nonnac85

have been looking at the hardrock hyd disk 07 myself in evans. is now £370. what do people recommend around a similar price other than the tyax which i didnt like?

supersonic

Have a read of the What Bike thread in general.

banana_man

I have a Spesh Hardrock Sport with mechanical disks and i'd definitely recommend stumping up the extra cash for hydraulics, cos the mechanical ones just don't cut it when you need them to. Nevertheless the hardrock is still a good bike for the money; it's definitely deserving of the nickname "lardrock" but i don't see it as that much of a hinderance and prefer having a solid frame. As for the forks, i tried a mates avalanche and i found the hardrock's forks better by far, but still, there's room for improvement.

Sev101

I have a specialized Hardrock pro 07 and had a few disasters with a couple previous so in the space of three months I had three bikes as follows!!

GT Outpost - somewhere to start - changed gear at will and uncomfortable as hell

GT Avalanche 1.0 - Better quality than the outpost but heavy as hell and then the left Crank fell off on the third time out!! - CRAP!!

Specialized - Built to last - SRAM gears now have had a service are changing like a dream, changed to shimano clipless pedals and came as standard with a marzocchi mz comp fork no complaints so far - plenty of travel for what I need and will handle tabletops and drops etc as long as not huge!! - dont find it heavy can keep up with my mates who ride an orange 5 pro (2200.00) and a cannondale prophet (1600 - 1800.00) and believe they dont hang around them boys!!!

I can only speak from experience but I love my specialized and would recommend to anyone on a budget.

supersonic

A crank falling off doesnt make the whole bike crap - they fall off because they havnt been tightened properly , usually. The Hardrock Pro is 4lbs heavier than the GT!

hednesfordxcer

don't touch halfords

dcp1975

What's wrong with your bike then? Seeing as you went to Halfords? Nothing wrong with the bikes Halfords sell, people who arent 'up on the uptake' with bikes can still purchase a decent bike from there and use their LBS for servicing or learn themselves, dont let Halfords put you off not all outlets are the same.

Big n Daft

hednesfordxcer wrote:

don't touch halfords

Still spamming every single thread someone recommends a Halfords bike on then?

It won't become any less boring and idiotic the more you do it.

To my knowledge, there are at least 10 Fury owners on this forum, a good few are also buying Boardmans, to date yours is the only complaint I've seen?

Tell you something?

Sev101

I think the guy who wrote after me misunderstood what I was saying - I did not mean that the bike was crap just that the set up of it had not been the best obviously and therefore crap that bits had been falling off on ride 3!!!!!

I did not realise the GT was lighter certainly did not feel lighter but again slight changes in geometry do make a huge difference and maybe it just wasnt the bike for me!!

Dan.hkr

i feel i can comment on this as i brought a spec hardrock hyd disc, this is a great bike i dont know why people slate it so much! the fork is slightly bouncy and its a little heavy but its a solid bike (if you have you heart set on this you can get it from dales cycles for £329 for the hyd disc version!) BUT...
BUT....
i looked at the fury after having my bike for a month and realized it is brilliantly speced and maybe i had made a mistake buying the hardrock, when the offers came up for the fury i decided to go for it, i sold the hardrock to my dad, to help fund the money for the fury, and wow what a bike, feels so so soooo much better than the hardrock! if you can spend the extra £50 i would get the fury, if £329 seems like a bargain to you then get that but you may regret not getting the great spec of the carrera as they are miles apart.
the hardrock frame itself is great looks great and is strong so is a good base to upgrade on, but beleve me you will be looking almost instantly for upgrading parts.

hope this helps abit, am writing it while at work so havnt got time to read back through it, but if it isnt clear

carreara fury = AMAZING £380.99 deliverd (with xmas £25 off deal and extra 10% off deal im not sure if still on)
Hardrock hyd disc = Good + cheaper at dales cycles £329 delivered

Dan.hkr

oh and if your a weight weenie i believe the weights are
Fury = 29.5lbs
Hardrock = 36lbs (admitedly the weight of maybe a full on downhill bike!!!!)

easyg

There have been loads of other threads like this not so long ago, in which I for one listed all the main rigs for a c. £500 budget amongst other users, so just go back a couple of days in the buying advice space and you should find them.

Good luck - and for what its worth the Fury is probably the deal to go for at this budget currently but you must try to test them as it is perosnal ultimately.

Wallm0nkey

I have my fury a week now and love it (admittedly it hasn't been out a whole lot yet) But hoping to get some proper time on it this weekend.
I originally got it rode about 50m from the shop and the chain snapped scrattched the frame gear mech snapped off and crank twisted or something as the pedals wouldn't move! Took it straight back and it was a newer member of staff who set it up. So they appologised replaced the whole bike and gave me £40 vouchers.
I figure people make mistakes I don't blame halfords they sorted so ended up just a little problem.