Upgrading, what first?

mymcreative

I brought a new bike a few weeks ago, and just did a course with Get Mountain Biking at Woburn Sands last weekend - it was awesome!! Loved it!

But, I am thinking of slowly (budget permitting) of upgrading the components on my bike. I have a Giant Revell 2 http://www.giant-bicycles.com/en-gb/bikes/model/revel.2/7096/43413/ and I was thinking what should I upgrade? Gears, brakes, handle bars?

The bike will spend of its time off-road, trail riding etc

Any ideas would be of help, but I can't go mad with money

Cheers,

Mark

nicklouse

Whatever wears out first.

Anonymous

Same as Nick suggests.
If everything's working fine, leave it alone. Anything else is "going mad with money"

mymcreative

Wise words

I guess it is just seeing stuff like disc brakes looks nice, especially as I have only the older style.

butcher of bakersfield

Discs will improve braking in the wet, so I think that's a fair option - if you find braking suffering in these conditions, that is. Though in general, they'll not necessarily work better than what you've got.

Seriously though, over time, you'll find through your own riding what you'd like to upgrade. What you'd like to improve.

pte1643

Gonna cost a fair whack to upgrade to discs though.

Most likely gonna need new wheels (well, hubs at the very least).

hainman

hi guys,sorry to pinch a post but ive just spent £60 on SR SUNTOUR XCM LO as the forks on my bike are zoom forks.do you think they will be ok or is is £60 pound wasted??

ol\'gregg

I'd agree with the others don't rush in and start upgrading if it's not needed. save up your cash and when the time comes you can a) buy nice new shiney bits or b) realise you want an upgraded bike and have money saved towards said bike.

hainman wrote:

hi guys,sorry to pinch a post but ive just spent £60 on SR SUNTOUR XCM LO as the forks on my bike are zoom forks.do you think they will be ok or is is £60 pound wasted??

I have suntour XCM's on my bike not a bad fork for starting out on. They are the first thing I will be replacing though when money allows as the more riding i'm doing the more I realise that they are quite spongey.

tsenior

yep, save up: consumables will need replacing soon enough and by the time you've done enough riding to wear out your drivetrain you'll have an idea on which (if any) big ticket items will improve your ride.

The only exceptions are tyres and peddles IMO, depending on what came with the bike you can make a big improvement, straight off at relatively little expence.

The Rookie

Suntour XLM are a lot lot better better than most the Zoom (steel lower, elastomer spring and no damping), so for £60 a reasonable upgrade.

Simon

mymcreative

Peddles? Sorry

mymcreative

Sorry forget that last post - brain on in gear today :?

CFS

Agree with the above posts which say replace parts as they wear out.

A possible exception is the Saddle if it is uncomfortable after a few weeks. The standard saddle which came with my Trek was really uncomfortable even with padded shorts. (Btw padded shorts may be the best investment if you don't have any).

You can get something like a WTB Speed V saddle pretty cheap.

Anonymous

CFS wrote:

saddle which came with my Trek was really uncomfortable even with padded shorts. (Btw padded shorts may be the best investment if you don't have any).

You can get something like a WTB Speed V saddle pretty cheap.

Luckily, my bike came with a WTB Speed V - and they're my favourite saddles! WIN!

paulbox

My recommendation would be to enjoy your bike as it is and start saving up for your next bike, by the time you've upgraded wheels/brakes/saddle/bars/chainset/shifters/derailleurs etc. you will have spent a small fortune.

hainman

thats simon,my mate has them on his GT AGGRESSOR so i thought they would be a good start .i just hope they go on without any problems.im going to go to a shop and get them fitted but im just nervous that they wont fit but hopefully im just being para.would there be any major problems with swapping forks?they have 250mm stearer unthreaded(hope tae god my old ones aint threaded)i think the swap-over of the disk brakes look straight forward! ,i bought a set of bars to as my bars are pure pish(excuse the pottymouth)and when i put on my new grips there wasnt much bar left so went for 31mm 680mm wide to get rid of my pipe cleaner bars haha.anyhoo i think my pennies are gona start gettin saved to get a decent bike once ive sweetened the misses hahaha.

rockmonkeysc

I would change the forks first. I replaced my Suntour XCM forks with a set of Rockshox Tora SL's only £125 but they made a HUGE difference. Things like bars aand seat posts make very little difference unless you want to alter the riding position. A new set of forks will also have disc mounts so a set of good cable discs (Avid BB5) would also be good at the same time.

mea00csf

Rockmonkey, The bike the OP has doesn't have disc brakes, even with a change of fork to one with disc mounts, they'd still need to check that the wheel hubs are compatible.

Also, if upgrading to discs, i wouldn't bother with cable disc brakes, they're horrible. You can pick up hydraulics quite cheaply (Avid Juicy comes to mind). Only reason for going with cable disc is if you're planning on being away from civilisation for days on end and hydraulics wouldn't be serviceable.