Building a hardtail - questions

boogercj

Howdo?! I'm new to this forum, having been out of MTBing for a few years after my old Sunn XC bike got stolen from my work's bike shed...

I've decided to try and build a bike, as it's something I've always wanted to do.

I want to build a kind of hard core XC/Freeride bike for less than £500 out of second hand but and bobs bought from eBay, this forum etc.

So far, i've got my heart set on a second hand DMR Trailstar 16" frame, Marzzochi MX Pro or similar forks, single chainring up front and then whatever decent-ish stuff I can get hold of cheap! Truvativ Hussfelt stuff, second hand XT rear mech etc

Has anyone else done this? Is it a good idea (i.e is there anything you woudlnt buy 2nd hand?) and on the technical side - what size single ring do people normaly run for freeride, and what kind of rear cassette?

chorscroft

Cassette, chain and chainrings may be things you want to avoid second hand but it all depends what condition they're in and what mileage they've done and may be perfectly usable second hand.
Tyres are another one to look at but again it depends on condition.
If I was doing a build the only things I would definately buy new would be brake pads, gear cables and brake cables.

Conor

nonnac85

Make sure the forks are ok - that the seals are good and that there are no leaks of air / oil.

boogercj

Cool, cheers for the advice; kind of backs upwhat I was thinking and those things needn't be very expensive really. I'll prolly go for a new BB and seat as well, and maybe see if i can get decent-ish new wheels, keeping the whole thing below £500 or thereabouts...

thedirge

if you havent started yet, don't.

buy a bike, take it apart and build it again.

you'll save lots of money and won't get pissed off

The Northern Monkey

I've done it... spent waaaaay too much.

IMO it'll be hard to stay under £500.

Second hand parts will only wear out/break quicker so you could be spending more in the long run....

elPedro666

That's a bit negative! I've built all my bikes from scratch with new parts forever and it can work out if you're careful. Don't expect to save anything over a full bike (especially at £500) but you will get exactly what you want (hopefully!) and you know it's been put together properly (hopefully!).

The only downside I can see is that the kind of bike you're after may not be the best for picking up bargain parts or second hand bits that have been treated gently...

The other caution that springs to mind is to be sure of the type of bike you want to build, especially if you've been out of the sport for a while. Really think about how you plan to ride it & don't be swayed by the hype!

I'm turning into someone's Dad... :oops:

The sensible answer is, of course, to find last year's discounted stock, but where's the fun in that!?

Hope that's redeemed me a bit. 8)

The Northern Monkey

elPedro666
Aye... I wasn't exactly helpful.. sorry OP.

Just make sure you have a budget and stick to it. You may have to wait around for bits and pieces to come into your price range, or haggle a bit but you can get there eventually.

Check the classifieds on here for some good bargains... i've seen quite a few bits an pieces go quite cheap.

few pointers..

Frame - decide how much you want to spend.. I've seen a few good frames for £80, the more you spend here means you have less to spend on parts

Forks - buy the best you can from the start. you'll only regret buying poor forks and will end up buying more

Wheels - buying second had is ok, but check them out 1st. you can get some quite cheap but decent factory wheels online

Brakes - Cable disks are cheaper and fine. obviously hydros have a bit more power an need less adjustment, but cost more.

Don't forget you'll need to factor tools, lubes etc etc into the price

B

elPedro666

No, you're spot on - it probably isn't the best way to go about things - I've only just got around to getting the suspension forks I promised would go on my last but one build...in '97 :oops: I was offered some Project2s for £20 so I took them to give me a while to save for some decent sprung forks. Turns out I liked them! :twisted:

My reasoning is I want the best frame & wheels I can get, the rest is expendable and I have pretty well stocked shed! But at £500 you're right - it won't be easy

Also, like Benj said, you will always spend more than you mean to - my last £400 project went over a grand when I refused to compromise :oops:

I don't know what advice I'm giving any more :? :oops:

Maybe time is the decider - can you wait for the bargains to show up?

The Northern Monkey

boogercj
It may be best to buy a full bike for £500 (there are some very good bike at this price, they are going to be better spec'd that what you can build for £500 IMO).

Then, when you have you bike, use it to get fit + back into the sport and maybe do a custom build on the side.

thedirge

save up another 200 and get that focus black forest, its sexy

http://www.wiggle.co.uk/p/cycle/7/Focus ... 360037562/

are my eyes seeing right, is it 618.91 today? sure it was £711!?!?!

thedirge

i did something stupid, i added it to my basket to see if the price changed, it didnt and im finding it hard not to reach for the credit card!!!! help!!

edit my destination was set as america! sorry! price is 711 and still a steal

boogercj

Just make sure you have a budget and stick to it. You may have to wait around for bits and pieces to come into your price range, or haggle a bit but you can get there eventually.

Check the classifieds on here for some good bargains... i've seen quite a few bits an pieces go quite cheap.

This was what I wanted to hear! hehehe. No, I understand where you lot are coming from, and it would be a lot easier to buy a 2007/2008 model bike on the cheap...

Thing is, I really want to make this into a kind of project that I can do up over a few months. I've just finished rebulding a classic Mini, and I've kind of got the self-build bug - it's very infectious, which I'm sure those of you that have done it will testify to. Like all these things, it just takes a sensible approach and a lot of research, IMO.

The good thing about this, also is by buying a few bits and building it up over a few months, I can spread the cost and I'm not too bothered if I go £100-150 over budget (to allow for a new set of forks maybe). I'll post up my shopping list and how much I reckon it will cost so you can see what you reckon...

adb1006

Do it. I don't know why people are so negative about self-builds and throw around the "it'll drive you mad" "you'll get pissed off" comments. It's not really difficult to build a bike so long as you have the correct tools - that's a big big factor - just don't try to bodge the job with tools you may have to hand. I mean things like proper bottom bracket tool, headset press etc.

I built mine up from scratch (see sig) and i'm glad i did. I'll never buy an "off the counter" bike again I doubt. I sourced the parts over the course of about 9 months or so and then built it up starting Friday evening and finished it Saturday afternoon. Another thing that is very helpful to have is a mate to hand to help hold things in place etc.

Not sure about your budget - if you're buying 2nd hand then you should be able to knock a fair few quid off rrp. Personally i bought all my bits new but as and when they were on offer. Cost me about £1300 to build - parts total about £2000 overall so i made a saving for sure.

There's a great feeling of accomplishment and pride when you build something up yourself from scratch (which you'll obviously know all about if you've just done it with a mini!). Not to mention it's also a great learning curve. I'm now totally confident when/if anything breaks that i have the know-how to be able to fix/replace it without having to rely on the monkeys at my LBS - and that is where you'll start to see some £££ savings.

flybywire

Go for it .. an example ..

An xc/commute ride - I bought a Trek 7000 frame on here for £20, fitted some new rigid trials forks for £30 & headset £10 (reduced from £25) = £60 for F & F's.

New carbon bikehut bars £15, charge spoon saddle £20, kmc x9 chain £14, BBB cassette £17, Hone front mech £12 & r/hand xt shifter £15 & atak alium pedals £25 = £118 new stuff

Used or "in stock" 27.2 carbon seat post £10, seat collar £5, FSA moto chainset & BB £25, fsa stem £10, 105 rear mech £10, deore l/h shifter £10, rear wheel hope ti glide hub (£10! from mate who's fully disc now, bargain hardly used) on 717 rim dt spokes £70, front xt hub on x317 £45 & tektro mini v's and scott levers £15 = £200

including tyres > £400 + upgrade oportunity on F&F's and nicer than £400 "off the peg" mtb. Nice thing about building your own is that it occupies some spare time and you can make it to your spec.

hoathy

Yep, its totally do-able and fun.

I just finshed (first ride today) a build that cost just over £550

Frame and forks off all terrain cycles (new). Both handsome dog came to £105.
Then CRC for: Tyres (£30), tubes (£8), lock on grips (13), hose guides (£4) and easton ea30 bars (£20)

thats £180

Then wellgo v8 pedals off merlin for £12
=£192

Ebay: Brakes: shimano saint dual control (so inculde shifters), also got 4 203mm rotors and braded hoses £76inc p&p. I also ebay-ed an lx front mech (£10), a raceface headset (£25), a seatclamp (£4), an ea50 stem (£7) and new gear cables (£5).
=£319

Got an xt rear mech off a mate for £15
=£334

Bought a system ex seatpost and charge spoon saddle from a lbs for £35 and disc rotor size adaptors for £12
=£381

I already had a raceface ride xc chainset, but when i got it a while back it was £50
=£431

and finally a full xt wheelset, sram cassette, 4 rotors and 4 tryes for £130 from the classified section on here.
Total: £561!
Winner!

boogercj

Aweesome, that's what I'm talking about! Here's what I've seen so far, with prices:

Frame: DMR Sidekick 16" - £80-100 Ebay
Forks: Something like Marzocchi DJ3's 2nd hand - £100
Stem: £10 second hand
Bars: Easton EA30 - £20 from CRC
Grips: £10
Headset: FSA Orbit - £25
Seatpost: £10
Seat: There's loads under £20
Seatclamp: £10
Crankset: FSA MotoX MegaExo - £60 from CRC
Pedals - Wellgo V8 - £12 from CRC
Rear mech: SRAM X5 - £25
Chain: SRAM PC951 9 spd - £10
Cassette: SRAM PG950 - £15 from Merlin
Wheels - £100 budget
Tyres - £25 budget
Brakes - Avid SD 5.0 V-brakes from Ebay - £20 complete set with levers
Gear shifter - SRAM x5 trigger £20 from CRC

I've probably missed some bits, but that totals £570 and I'll be happy if I spend less than £650, which is what my old bike cost.

hoathy

Go with disc brakes. Make a massive differece. And you could probably get them within your budget. Especailly if you could save some money on the forks (toras can be excellent value). If you do go for v's then these seem to be damn good value: http://www.merlincycles.co.uk/?fn=produ ... egoryId=99
and if not merlin do some excellent 'disc brake kits', you can get some wheels and brakes for about £150...

hoathy

oh yeah, and in many ways (and in my opinion at least) the deore chainset is superior to that fsa moto-x one, unless the reason you went for it was the bash (if it has one...). On-One shop has some cheap fsa chainsets at the mo, if you want one, might be worth a look.

boogercj

Mmm, good find on that Deore/Mavic combo

The only reason I went for the FSA one was it looked like a good, complete single chainring option, although is it an easy job to convert a triple to a single? I want the simplicity of a single ring, as this bikes going to be more for charging through woods and stuff than long XC rides...

elPedro666

Set of XTR Vs:
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll? ... 0314852856

Let me know if you're bidding & I won't bid against you, otherwise I'll probably have a go for them... !

boogercj

Awesome. No, you go for it - I'm going to buy the frame first and work from there, so I reckon I'm a couple of months away from the brakes yet, unless I see an unbeleivable bargain!

elPedro666

Probably best I don't help - I've missed some absolute bargains recently! :oops:

mea00csf

At £500 it'll be a challenge! The good thing is that you'll get to scrimp in places that you want to and splurge in the places you want to.

I've just finished my custom build and like a previous poster mine came in at £1000 with individual components worth about £2000 using all brand new kit. That involved lots of looking around on the internet, glad i did it when i did as in many instances what i've used is now up to 50% more expensive!

Definetly budget it out realistically and try to stick to it but be prepared to spend a little more. I initailly budgeted about £800 but found bargains that while being slightly outside of what i budgeted, were too good to pass up :roll:

junglist_matty

Watch out because you'll end up spending more than you planned, I recently built up an NS Surge hardtail bike, I budgeted to spend no more than £800, but by the end that bill was a tad over the £1k mark!

You always look at something then think to yourself how about the next model up, and then sit there justifying spending an extra £30 here or there, by the end of it you've spent an extra couple of hundred quid!!!

hoathy

junglist_matty wrote:

You always look at something then think to yourself how about the next model up, and then sit there justifying spending an extra £30 here or there, by the end of it you've spent an extra couple of hundred quid!!!

but thats all part of the fun of it!

mea00csf

junglist_matty wrote:

Watch out because you'll end up spending more than you planned, I recently built up an NS Surge hardtail bike, I budgeted to spend no more than £800, but by the end that bill was a tad over the £1k mark!

You always look at something then think to yourself how about the next model up, and then sit there justifying spending an extra £30 here or there, by the end of it you've spent an extra couple of hundred quid!!!

That's exactly it!! It's not one big splurge, it's a few £20-£30 upgrades over what you thought you'd spend and bang, you're a fair whack over. The good thing is that as you're buying things one bit at a time, you can afford the the extra £20 here and there and it's only when you add it up at the end you realise how much over you went :roll:

elPedro666

Deliberately kidding yourself - that's what it's all about.

But NEVER add it all up the end :shock:

supersonic

This was my effort with new parts:

http://www.bikeradar.com/forums/viewtop ... dget+build

I bet half are out of stock now anyway lol.

boogercj

Supersonic, I actually read that post the other night and was mightly impressed!

Quick question, will a 14" Trailstar frame be miles too small for a 6ft0 rider? The 16" has a 24" top tube, which is quite long IIRC...

supersonic

Hard to say, as so much is personal preference. Have to compare to what you know if you can't test.