Full suspension sub £1000 is it worth buying

petemadoc

I've been longing for a full suspension bike recently. I couldn't spend more than £1000 at the moment so I was thinking should I wait a year to get a better bike and carry on hiring bikes or are sub £1000 bikes good enough?

Here's some examples at the moment

http://www.wiggle.co.uk/p/cycle/7/Focus ... 360045275/

http://www.chainreactioncycles.com/Mode ... elID=42019

http://www.evanscycles.com/products/fel ... e-ec017076

I've never owned one so I'm not used to comparing the specs and don't know how much better a 2K bike would be

GHill

Depending on how tall you are and what type of riding you do, it will be very difficult to beat the Voodoo Canzo. Only a smidge over budget at £1080

http://www.halfords.com/webapp/wcs/stor ... yId_165499

Stunning value.

Anonymous

My GT i-drive 5 XCR is great value for money for the price (around £900 new). Reasonable spec of parts. Add up the value of them and they must be making very little on the bike.

Heavy though and not everyone likes the i-drive system, but I think it works well.

Halfords did them. Not sure if they still do, and GT are dropping Halfords in the new year anyway (may mean some reduced models though being sold off).

Not saying it's the best for the money though, and you can get some great discounted bikes for a little bit more than £1k that are worth twice as much.

Wait for a better bike? There will always be a better bike, no matter when you buy, and whatever you buy you'll always want to buy the better bike and probably will. It's an expensive activity

petemadoc

Well I took my cross bike to Coed y Brenin the other day but had to go round pretty carefully, strictly no jumping on fixed forks!

I want to be able to use it on the black trails round North Wales and I don't want to spend £1K and be disappointed.

Anonymous

One thing I'd say is the money generally makes a difference in weight. A lot of other things too, but if climbing is your thing you'll find you have to spend a lot more for a lighter bike.

But climbing isn't my thing so mine's fine enough. I'm used to the weight of it on climbs now anyway .

ilovedirt

Boardman FS team, £1000 bang on, you won't get much better than that for a grand.

Yorkshirepadd

Got my Giant reign 2 2009 model for £1000, don't know if 6 inch travel is too much for you.
You can also get Trances for well under £1000 if you look for 09 models.

Stevo_666

There's a few £1k ful sussers in thie months WMB. The Boardman took the honours but if I were you I'd save harder and spend a bit more as for me there is better to be had for a few hundred quid more.

newclearbomb

Have you looked at the second hand market ?

There are some pretty exotic bikes out there at the minute, plenty around the 1K mark ?


Just a thought !

petemadoc

I did consider second hand but the figures don't stack up. In reality my budget is only £600 but the cycle to work scheme means I'm looking at 1K bikes. If I bough 2nd hand I'd have to look at £600 bikes.

Anonymous

If money is very limited, then worth considering that expenditure doesn't stop with buying the bike .

Parts plus higher maintenance than on a HT (diy then you need to buy the tools, lbs then you pay a fortune for them to do it or they convince you that you need to replace things when it's not necessary), and then you'll want to do upgrades

Then likely you'll be buying a more expensive bike within a couple of years. That said though you'll get reasonable value selling the bike to trade up.

I'd try some out first and see if you'll be happy with them. Maybe try some more expensive bikes too for comparison.

Pudseyp

This (the XCT 555)
http://www.khsbikes.co.uk/bikes
and this
http://www.paulscycles.co.uk/products.p ... 1b2s1p1504

The later is a great spec and a great do it all bike...plus it's on offer at £800 so you have 200 sheets to spend on gear.....I had this very 2008 version and it was a fantastic bike

the reviews are great also
http://www.bikeradar.com/gear/category/ ... -comp-9245
http://www.bikeradar.com/gear/category/ ... elite-9740
http://www.bikeradar.com/gear/category/ ... r-08-30450
http://www.bikeradar.com/gear/category/ ... p-08-30457

cavegiant

Pauls Cycles are the best online discount (complete) bike store I know, were some great offers on Teocalis

petemadoc

All very tempting

Drool drool (like Homer Simpson)

I'm gonna hire a FS over the weekend and make sure I'm doing the right thing. Thanks for all the suggestions.

Pudseyp

To be honest, trying one out on hire in principle is a good idea, however nearly all the big brands have there own suspension design (DW link, Horst, 4-Bar, Freedrive etc..etc), so will ride slightly different from each other.

Spend £800 on the Mongoose, you won't be disapointed !