£2000 - Buy new or custom build?

Lewaah

In the past year I have really started getting into my mountain biking, and I'm hoping to enter a few competitions in the new year. I currently have a specialised hardrock, and i'm looking to upgrade to a full suspension. I ride almost 100 % trails and I want to stick to 26in wheels.

So first question, should I choose a frame, and build a custom bike selecting the components I want, or would it be a lot easier and cost effective to buy a pre-built one?

Secondly, could you recommend some bikes (or frames) that may be suitable around the £2000 mark, any buyers feedback would be great. And if anyone knows any good bike sales they could point me towards that would be great.

Also if you think I should custom build one, how much should I allocate from my £2000 to each component?

Cheers guys.

DCR00

if you go down the custom build route, you will spend more than £2,000

your budget may well be that much, but the likelihood of you getting your build to your taste 1st time is highly unlikely, especially if, as it appears from your post, that you are relatively inexperienced.

Buy OTP until you know what you want/like

cat_with_no_tail

DCR00 wrote:

if you go down the custom build route, you will spend more than £2,000

Not necessarily.

Obviously, I don't know what frame he's planning on, so I just picked one at random. It's an excellent frame, at a reasonable price.

mondraker Factor RR Frame (2012) - £850 - Merlin
Reba RL Fork - £250 - Merlin
Full SLX Group (with brakes) - £360 Merlin
wheelset - Trizoid AM - £180 - Superstar
Reverb - £180 - Merlin
Nobby Nic x2 - £50 - On-one
Grips, bars, stem, pedals - £106 - Superstar
Charge Spoon - £25 - Wiggle

= £2,001

That's something that took me 10min sat here. With real planning, I could get it even cheaper than that. Cheaper still if you don't want a reverb.

That's all quality spec stuff too. This is what I keep saying. These days, you CAN build a bike to your own spec for pretty much the same price you can buy one.

That does not include the Germans of course, where your £2k will buy you a bit more.

Note it also does not include the cost of tools, workbench etc, or paying the LBS to do stuff you've not got tools for or c0cked up.

Gray172

Cat With No Tail wrote:

DCR00 wrote:

if you go down the custom build route, you will spend more than £2,000

Not necessarily.

Obviously, I don't know what frame he's planning on, so I just picked one at random. It's an excellent frame, at a reasonable price.

mondraker Factor RR Frame (2012) - £850 - Merlin
Reba RL Fork - £250 - Merlin
Full SLX Group (with brakes) - £360 Merlin
wheelset - Trizoid AM - £180 - Superstar
Reverb - £180 - Merlin
Nobby Nic x2 - £50 - On-one
Grips, bars, stem, pedals - £106 - Superstar
Charge Spoon - £25 - Wiggle

= £2,001

That's something that took me 10min sat here. With real planning, I could get it even cheaper than that. Cheaper still if you don't want a reverb.

That's all quality spec stuff too. This is what I keep saying. These days, you CAN build a bike to your own spec for pretty much the same price you can buy one.

That does not include the Germans of course, where your £2k will buy you a bit more.

Note it also does not include the cost of tools, workbench etc, or paying the LBS to do stuff you've not got tools for or c0cked up.

But you could buy the bike as a whole for less and better spec (with no reverb) and no hassle of putting it together, from the same website. Personally I think, unless you're after a bike which is very unique or taylored to your tastes and you're prepared to pay a bit more I would buy the bike as a whole. It doesn't make CWNT's point moot though.

supersonic

OnOne Titus carbon frames just £599.

The Rookie

Few things missing from that list, but yes you could build a good quality FS for £2K, save more with a Tiitus frame as SS indicates and buying some stuff from one of the 3 main german sites.

You can also selectively buy a few good used parts for even more saving....

DCR00

Cat With No Tail wrote:

DCR00 wrote:

if you go down the custom build route, you will spend more than £2,000

Not necessarily.

That wasn't really my point. Yes you can build one for the price, but my point was that the fine tuning of the build around your preferences will take you over the £2k budget

TBF that stands for an OTP bike as well

querhoch

ignore those guys and buy my downhill bike. a snip at only £1400

The Rookie

querhoch wrote:

ignore those guys and buy my downhill bike. a snip at only £1400

Lewaah wrote:

I ride almost 100 % trails

Talk about blatant thread hijack....

Lewaah

To be fair, yes I am a complete noob tbh. Well I am with the mechanical side of things anyway. Is it pretty easy to follow online guides when building a mountain bike, or will I almost definitly struggle?

Lewaah

Also a point to make is that I have pedals and hydraulic brakes which I have bought for my hardrock but I havent installed yet because I've now decided I want a full susp, so there's two components off the list.

querhoch

The Beginner wrote:

querhoch wrote:

ignore those guys and buy my downhill bike. a snip at only £1400

Lewaah wrote:

I ride almost 100 % trails

Talk about blatant thread hijack....

DH is trails too.

cat_with_no_tail

Lewaah wrote:

To be fair, yes I am a complete noob tbh. Well I am with the mechanical side of things anyway. Is it pretty easy to follow online guides when building a mountain bike, or will I almost definitly struggle?

You'll need to buy tools too then.

There is nothing massively complicated when it comes to building bikes. Most stuff just bolts-on with a hex key. There are some exceptions to that, but it's different for different people. Personally, I hate indexing. Quarter turn here, half turn there, just plsses me right off. Some people can't get the hang of bleeding brakes (you may need to shorten/lengthen hoses etc). You have to consider stuff like pressing headsets and fitting BBs. Do you buy the tools for it (when it's likely to be a one-time deal) or take it to the LBS with some jaffa-cakes.


Also, people are getting too hung up on the spec of the example build I did. As I said, I threw that together in about 10min with no real planning or shopping around. If I had a couple of hours and the exact spec the OP wanted, I'm willing to bet I could come up with something better than he can buy off the peg.

Yes, you have to put some work in to get it built, but for some people (myself included) that's part of the fun.

Yes, you can buy one with XT group and formula brakes for £100 less, but you'd need to add pedals, so £50 to add on to that. and no reverb, so you'd need to add another £180.

If I removed the reverb and the pedals from my example and changed the SLX to an XT group, it comes out at a very similar price. The one on there has Fox forks, but I don't get along with fox products, it's a personal thing, so I specced mine with 120mm Rebas.

As for the comment about tailoring it you your specific needs, I don't follow that at all. The build I made WAS tailored to my requirements. If I'd bought the bike off-the-peg, I'd have to add pedals, a reverb, change the tyres, grips and saddle, whereas building it lets me spec all that stuff myself.

I do however agree with the fact that if you're not arrsed about changing stock parts you can buy off the shelf cheaper.

arigold

Build your own if you have the tools and skills. I have saved tons haggling stuff off forums (all new!!) only downside is you don't get any receipts

Lewaah

I've never used a reverb before, nor do I know very much about them. I take it that you just used them to drop the seatpost during descents/fast sections ?

cat_with_no_tail

It is a seatpost that you lower for descents via a remote button on the handlebars.

Other brands are available, but the Reverb is the most common because RS did a good job on the marketing

Some people like them, others don't. Personally, I don't think I'd have a MTB without a dropper post of some kind now. Unless it was an out-and-out XC race weapon.

Go on then, tell us what sort of bike you're after.

rockmonkeysc

The only dropper I would consider buying is the Specialized command post. Expensive but I would rather have a mechanical post than a hydraulic one. For now I will stick with my old fashioned standard seat post

spacedog

Getting the fork steerer length wrong can bean expensive mistake to make. I have heard of people of measuring withou spacers, bearings, etc.... even without a stem! Measure it a few times and get someone to check before you get the hacksaw out....

Bribe a friend with beer to build it and watch how they do it for next time...