Do it all bike for ~£1500?

wombar

Hi All,

I've got up to £1500 to spend on a new hard tail and I need some advice on where the money is best spent. I'll just give some quick background so you have a better idea of what I need.

I do about 400 miles a month on my bike as I use it for everything. I try to do 100 miles a week (sometimes more, sometimes less) but it's usually three 25 mile rides to get some good honest exercise, and a couple 12 mile rides that incorporate my shopping on the way home.

Here are my requirements, and there's a few (probably very stupid) questions to follow.

1) Must be a hard tail. I don't care about rolling resistance etc, I just want to know that when it snows, I'm still good to go. No road bikes, no hybrids, must be a hard tail. I ride year round come snow, ice and torrential, sideways rain that goes in your ears and hits your brain. Hard tails also allow me to get into the muddy stuff if the fancy takes me. I ride a mixture of road and trails (probably 70/30) though I've just moved to a new area where there are more options to ride trails so I'm using my car less and less.

2) Must be able to fit a rack as I do my shopping on my bike. Yes I know its meant to be sacrilege to fit a rack to nice hard tail, but I don't care. I don't want two bikes, I just need (and only have space for) one. I can get a tubus rack adapter, but realistically, this discounts carbon fibre frames as I've been lead to believe you shouldn't clamp anything to these frames.

So here come the stupid questions:

1) Am I better off spending £1000 (or maybe less) as I don't really care about weight. All I'm really interested in is a smooth gear change and something that is durable as I'm covering a fair amount of miles. I've got the money to spend more, but if I'm packing the bike with 10Kgs of shopping, saving 2Kgs on the frame weight doesn't mean a lot.

I guess this question is very much down to opinion, but I've had some conflicting advice from my LBS's and I'd like some more opinions. Some just say spend as much as you can, others say save your money and upgrade down the road.

2) I presume carbon fibre is out? The rack is a must, but weight isn't my primary concern.

3) What brands would you recommend? I'm avoiding Specialized this time round as my current Hardrock Sport just isn't wearing as well as my last one. I'm looking seriously at Scott, Giant and Genius.

So, there you have it. I'm not a hardcore rider, just someone who loves to get out on his bike year round. If you had to use your bike as your primary mode of transport (I drive, just prefer to pedal) what would you do with ~£1500?

Thanks in advance

thel33ter

Charge Duster 8 - Hub gear so the snow ect. wont mess it up, nice light everything else, and steel so you can clamp whatever you want to.

http://www.paulscycles.co.uk/products.p ... 1b0s2p2885

wombar

Thanks for the suggestion, I'll see if I can find somewhere I can go take a look at one. I'm also looking at something like a Scott Scale 50 (2010) as that seems to have a pretty decent spec.

Any more suggestions or advice are always more than welcome

mobilekat

I love my Trek 6500 disc, but that is a personal preferrance.
which was just shy of £1k

http://www.trekbikes.com/uk/en/bikes/mo ... ies/6500e/

I have had 3 Treks over the years and they seem to last and last (but I am sure others will say many other things about them!)- only reason for replacing them have been theft (miss that bike) and wanting to get suspension!
I Just like the feel of the bike, and it rides well Trek geometry and me works!

OH has a Whyte 905, but they have gone a bits hens teeth at the mo, and the word on the street is they are about to go up to £1,800.... And he loves that too!

http://www.whytebikes.com/2010/905.html

And I think there is one on ebay at the mo for sub 1k....

Good luck with your search I am sure many people will have many ideas to suggest!

Mccraque

I just bought a Boardman Pro HT. That's only a grand but well specced. Depends if you are thinking of general cross country or something that you can smash the hell out of - eg more trail orientated. Mind you...I have been pounding the Boardman fairly hard and it's no problems thus far....

http://www.boardmanbikes.com/mtbht/ht_Pro.html



What about an On One 456? Ti, Carbon or Steel with as many options as you can shake a stick at?!


http://www.on-one.co.uk/bikes

wombar

Thanks for all the suggestions everyone. I'm definitely thinking more XC than trails so it doesn't need to be too tough. I'll do the rounds of my LBS' this week and see what they have in stock.

popstar

thel33ter wrote:

Charge Duster 8 - Hub gear so the snow ect. wont mess it up, nice light everything else, and steel so you can clamp whatever you want to.

http://www.paulscycles.co.uk/products.p ... 1b0s2p2885

+1. Fairly maintenance free, at least it's double less than normal geared bike.

OP mentioned that wear n tear on hardrock wasn't as good as previous bike? Smooth gear changes require some basic maintenance on multi geared bikes, but if not then those -Alfine- hub enclosed gears are the way to go.

That Charge seriously looking like proper maintenance free winter bike, but then alfine hub's can be installed on any bike.

chojin

How about this:

http://www.wiggle.co.uk/p/Bike_Sale/31/ ... 360039353/

An absolute bargain at (quite literally) half the price

wombar

Popstar, there's nothing drastically wrong with my current hardrock, it just doens't seem to be lasting as well as my last hardrock. It's just lots of little silly things which I didn't expect to occur on a 5 month old bike.

Thanks for the link Chojin, that's a good spec, but I'm not sure I could live with the colour I'll definitely have a good think about that Kona though.

How about something like this?
http://www.wiggle.co.uk/p/cycle/7/Felt_ ... 360042941/

I ride a 19" frame at the moment (I'm 6 foot) and that spec looks excellent for the money. What does anyone else think?

MountainMonster

wombar wrote:

Popstar, there's nothing drastically wrong with my current hardrock, it just doens't seem to be lasting as well as my last hardrock. It's just lots of little silly things which I didn't expect to occur on a 5 month old bike.

Thanks for the link Chojin, that's a good spec, but I'm not sure I could live with the colour I'll definitely have a good think about that Kona though.

How about something like this?
http://www.wiggle.co.uk/p/cycle/7/Felt_ ... 360042941/

I ride a 19" frame at the moment (I'm 6 foot) and that spec looks excellent for the money. What does anyone else think?

That does look like quite a good specced bike at a great price. Not a bad deal if you ask me!

thel33ter

MountainMonster wrote:

wombar wrote:

Popstar, there's nothing drastically wrong with my current hardrock, it just doens't seem to be lasting as well as my last hardrock. It's just lots of little silly things which I didn't expect to occur on a 5 month old bike.

Thanks for the link Chojin, that's a good spec, but I'm not sure I could live with the colour I'll definitely have a good think about that Kona though.

How about something like this?
http://www.wiggle.co.uk/p/cycle/7/Felt_ ... 360042941/

I ride a 19" frame at the moment (I'm 6 foot) and that spec looks excellent for the money. What does anyone else think?

That does look like quite a good specced bike at a great price. Not a bad deal if you ask me!

Tis a bargain and insanely light

wombar

Yep, the felt bike looks nice, but it seems to have carbon fibre seat stays so I'm not sure I should really be clamping anything onto them?

Either way, I'm going to look at a Boardman Pro HT tomorrow and I'll go from there. I can't quite understand how the boardman has such a good spec for £1k. It's better than some of the £1400 bikes I've been looking at.

Anyway, thanks for the suggestions and advice everyone, I'll let you know how I get on.

snotty badger

Just wondering in which way the Spesh isn't wearing well?

Comedycare

I have the Felt Six Race and it's a great bike. Tyres aren't grippy enough for British off road though, but were pretty fast on the road. I've also changed the handlebars, but that's just me. I don't think that you would regret buying it from Wiggle but the drawback is that you can't try it out. Cheers and enjoy whatever you buy.

Bar Shaker

Boardman have one less link in the supply chain. The bikes don't go through a UK importer before being distributed to shops. This extra link can account for 30+% of the cost of a bike.

Simple as that.

wombar

snotty badger wrote:

Just wondering in which way the Spesh isn't wearing well?

Like I said it's just little things that add up. There are miscellaneous creaks and groans coming from various parts of the bike and the rear tyre seems to have worn down very quickly. Maybe I'm just being picky, but my perception is that it's not a bike which is wearing as well as it should after 5 months.

It also seems to need a lot more regular maintenance and adjustment than my last Hardrock, which was solid as a rock (pardon the pun). I don't mind doing the maintenance (in fact I enjoy it), but I just think Specialized cut too many corners on the 2010 models components.

Thanks for chiming in Comedycare, I think that's the bike I'll go for if I don't find the Boardman suits me.

BazzokaJoe

loving my genesis altitude 20

saddle is a bit of a pain in the backside... but thats an easy cheap replacement

mattyboy199

santa cruz chameleon all day long !