First MTB, new vs used in 2014

bigmeanbunny
bigmeanbunny Posts: 39
edited August 2014 in MTB buying advice
Hello all.

I spend a fair bit of time checking and reading this forum, but rarely post. I had a look at the "thinking of buying a bike" topic, but a lot of the models are out of date or no longer available.

I am looking to get bike, I am actually looking for two bikes technically as I have managed to get the Missus to give MTB a go, I say Mountain, won't be going near them I imagine, am mainly after leisure cycling, bit of park lands, maybe the old trail etc, we live round Sheffield way so plenty of places to go, basically after something we can do together that is a bit more exciting that walking!

She has chosen:

http://www.decathlon.co.uk/rockrider-34 ... 02231.html


thats pretty non negotiable, seems decent for what we intend to use it for, and I need to buy a carrier for the car and all the stuff she needs as well so don't want to go crazy buying loads of kit, just in case she ends up hating it. She picked it entirely on colour and due to the amount of convincing it has taken I wouldn't care if it was made of paper clips!

For myself though I am after some advice, I have a fairly strict budget, I see a lot of people always point newbies towards buying pre-owned, however that is far more daunting I find, not sure what to look for as a start, or what to check if you turn up to view a bike, Gumtree in Sheffield seems to be either mega mid to top end stuff, or the sort of crappy looking bike I had in the 90s. Plus I intended to buy on my credit card so I can split the payments down (I have saved up £200 Cash from Selling my Raleigh Chopper so potentially have that, but that is less than I could afford non cash) which I can't do preowned.

So my point (yes there is one)

If the "buying a bike" thread was being updated, what bikes would people be recommending now? I have been keeping an eye on Halfords as noticed there was a new Carrea range out, so was hoping on a clearance sale on the older Vulcans.

Any help would be appreciated, it took me nearly a year to decide on what road bike to get! due to my indecision, so don't want a repeat of that.

Thanks for reading!

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