Help finding my new bike!

bamsacon

Evening all, after 4/5 years away from riding I'm in the market for a decent bike to get riding again. I used to have a Kona Kula Supreme with a pretty hardcore XC lightweight spec but I'm after something a bit different now. As I've been out of the fold for some time there is an entire wealth of new bikes/tech that has me slightly in need of help!

So, please stay with me as I now give a list of vague requirements

Budget can vary from £1000-£2000 for a new or second hand bike. Full sus seems the right thing to do. I used to be a bike mechanic so am happy to assemble and sort my own stuff.

Riding wise I live right on the South Downs and am happy to travel so will be doing lots of varied trail riding, ups and downs. I'd like a bike that can be chucked about down hills and happily fly back up!

Any info greatly appreciated, will be scouring the reviews sections and forums here for further advice.

Thanks

Sam

supersonic

Bit of a leftfield choice:

http://www.paulscycles.co.uk/m1b0s1p403 ... LT-30-2012

Might be a bit heavy - it scores fairly favourable reviews, so with all that money knocked off could be worth a look.

This is great value too, and highly reviewed:

http://www.yt-industries.com/shop/en/Bi ... icked-650B

If you want something a little less travel, look at the Giant Trance series.

bamsacon

Great start, thank you! When I stopped there was hardly any talk of 'big wheel' bikes. What is the deal with them? How do they ride? Is it just a fad? I'm sceptical but having never ridden one can hardly comment!

supersonic

Very generally, the larger the wheel the easier it can roll over obstacles, at the expense of slower handling, but that can be worked around. Of course larger wheels are heavier, and may constrain some suspension designs. 29ers (actually 28.5 if we take the same depth tyre as used on what we call standard 26) have more noticeable traits, 650b, or 27.5 (actually 27.0), less so.

650b is the way the industry seems to be going - they aren't better or worse than anything else, just very slightly different.

The Rookie

There are a few approaches to take here
1/ New bike - easy and simple
2/ Good used bike - better value but you'll be restricted to what you can find
3/ 'Spares or repairs' used bike - can be great value if you find one where minimal work is needed that is easy to DIY but many buyers will be scared off as they'll be paying shop prices! (Example we got my sons Spesh for about half the going rate as it had 'problems with the gears' the problem was a 9 speed cassette on an 8 speed bike which was easily and cheaply fixed!)
4/ Build your own - Some of the frame only options are very cost competitive, and if you get yourself a decently specced donor bike for the majority of parts it can be very cost effective as you get the 'type' of bike you want using bits from a less attractive 'type' of used bike.

If I were buying or building a new bike now I'd probably look at a 650B (can't bring myself to say 27.5 for the reasons given by SS above) although large volume 26" tyres do have the same rolling radius as many 650B tyres anyway so you could use 650B frame and 26" parts off a donor and change later for example.

The Rookie

Thanks, but we didn't want pork with that......

EDIT: relates to now deleted Spam post