Go outdoors MTB’s

pikeman65

Early last week I called into go outdoors in Sheffield to have a look at their MTB range, while I was there I looked at them their Calibre Sentinel and to my inexperienced eye it don’t look bad, I was just wondering if anyone on this forum owns one and an opinion on what it’s like for the money, I did have my heart set on a Whyte T-130-S which is approximately £600 more, but to be honest it’s a mine field out there, with so many makes and models I just don’t know what to buy, any help and advice greatly appreciated.

Sean

robertpb

It's all down to what you are going to ride, it's no good buying a downhill bike to ride what could easily be ridden on a gravel bike. So a bit more info on what you want to ride.

billycool

As above - we need to know what you want the bike to do to be able to help.

Also - just because we like a bike does not mean it's right for you. The bike has to fit you (we are all different shapes and sizes).

We can certainly help guide you in the right direction but need a bit more info.

bonzo_banana

The good thing about Go Outdoors like Halfords, Decathlon and some direct sellers is they buy direct from the factories and sell directly to the end customer which saves a huge amount of costs. If you can time your purchase with a discounted price and use of a discount code plus go through a cashback site you can get a very decent price. The Calibre Bossnut is very highly rated and the new version just released looks even better.

I've not heard which factory or factories Calibre use for their bikes. Halfords seem to use factories in Cambodia and Indonesia for their Carrera, Voodoo and Boardman bikes. I think some of their Apollo bikes are coming from lower end factories in Bangladesh and Sri Lanka. If you want a bike brand that actually manufactures their own bikes i.e. frames and some components as well as assembly then you have a limited choice of brands, Giant, Merida and some high end models.

Whyte are very good bikes but the logistics of buying from such a brand means they can seem bad value for the actual components fitted to the bike. Frankly many of the entry level bikes from the big brands are junk and best avoided and terrible compared to the bikes you get from the shop brands for the same money.

pikeman65

Sorry about that, yeah I’m gonna be riding trails mainly with maybe a little bit more rougher ground, I’m wanting a full suss due to spinal issues and seeing as I’m 54 this year I’m not gonna be doing anything crazy, I have about £3000 to play with, I’m 5’10 in height and just over 15 stone in weight although I’m still loosing weight and have lost nearly 6 stone so any help from you guys would be great please.


Sean

robertpb

For £3000 you could have a bike built to your spec. Have a look at a Bird Aeris 120LT, you can spec a bike on their website or pay them a visit and they will help you spec it. They are very helpfull, have a great guarantee and excellent value.

apreading

Agree - Bird would be my vote with that amount of money.

The Rookie

Bonzo Banana wrote:

Halfords seem to use factories in Cambodia and Indonesia for their Carrera, Voodoo and Boardman bikes. I think some of their Apollo bikes are coming from lower end factories in Bangladesh and Sri Lanka. If you want a bike brand that actually manufactures their own bikes i.e. frames and some components as well as assembly then you have a limited choice of brands, Giant, Merida and some high end models.

Until recently the better Halford's bikes were made by Merida (Carrera, Voodoo, Boardman), I've not looked recently to see if that is still the case or not.

billycool

For £3000 you can get something nicer than a £1000 Go Outdoors FS Bossnut/Beastnut/Triple B.

Do you mean the Sentry/Sentry Pro? Never seen them before. They are almost more DH bike and they weight over 16kg!! My 140mm Enduro bike is 13kg and can do XC, climb and still decend. Anything over 15kg can be a bit tiring if pedalling a lot.

You of course don't need to spend £3000. Up to £2000 would get you something really nice (and give you way too many options!)

The best thing you can do is go and try a few. See what you like.

bonzo_banana

The Rookie wrote:

Bonzo Banana wrote:

Halfords seem to use factories in Cambodia and Indonesia for their Carrera, Voodoo and Boardman bikes. I think some of their Apollo bikes are coming from lower end factories in Bangladesh and Sri Lanka. If you want a bike brand that actually manufactures their own bikes i.e. frames and some components as well as assembly then you have a limited choice of brands, Giant, Merida and some high end models.

Until recently the better Halford's bikes were made by Merida (Carrera, Voodoo, Boardman), I've not looked recently to see if that is still the case or not.

I think it was many years ago they were made by Merida for Carrera at least. I was in a local Halfords store when they had, had a delivery of bikes and there was quite a few stacked boxes. The store in question was the Weymouth store which is quite small and not sure if it has rear access for deliveries but whatever the boxes were stacked at both the base of the stairs and at the top of the stairs of the bike section and could clearly see the origin of the boxes for many of the brands.

Halfords source bikes fairly aggressively to get a good price. Merida were used in the past from Taiwan, I think they have also sourced from mainland China, then Vietnam and now we have a mixture of Cambodia and now Indonesia. Indonesia is a big supplier to many brands, Insera sena is a big manufacturer who I think own the Marin brand nowadays and have their own brand Polygon but have also manufactured for many top brands, Scott, Kona etc.

I've noticed many brands because of Taiwan's great reputation for manufacturing bikes seem to keep stating their bikes are made in Taiwan or their reps do despite actually having changed their manufacturing location. It seems like between 2008-2012 there was a great migration away from Taiwan to reduce costs. Some Taiwanese manufacturers also manufacture in mainland China and Cambodia

pikeman65

Yeah it was the Sentry I was looking at, looked like a nice bike with plenty of travel on both shocks, I’ll look at the Bird Website see what they can do for me, are they for the more weightier rider or just a better make, when I looked at the Whyte T-130-S at James cycles in Chesterfield the salesperson made no reference to my weight and I was more than a stone in weight heavier or was he just eager for a sale I wonder.

Sean.

billycool

Pikeman65 wrote:

Yeah it was the Sentry I was looking at, looked like a nice bike with plenty of travel on both shocks, I’ll look at the Bird Website see what they can do for me, are they for the more weightier rider or just a better make, when I looked at the Whyte T-130-S at James cycles in Chesterfield the salesperson made no reference to my weight and I was more than a stone in weight heavier or was he just eager for a sale I wonder.

Sean.

My reference to weight is the weight of the bike and nothing to do with the rider.

A heavier bike can be more tiring to pedal, particularly uphill. Downhill it can be a benefit but you have to balance that out with the sort of riding that you will do.

More bike travel doesn't mean it's a better bike. It again goes back to what you want the bike to achieve.

The T-130's are nice bikes. Bird give you the option of a more bespoke bike. There are plenty of other brands in between.

pikeman65

Sorry for the late reply guys been really busy with work, thanks for telling me about Bird bikes, I looked at their website and watched a few YouTube videos which showed the AM9, looks well impressive indeed and as a few have mentioned I could get a much better bike for my money, the only thing I wasn’t sure about was the external cable routing and the very long reach, the reach I can overcome with a bigger handle bar rise and more spacers on the stem but the routing is something I could learn to get used to I suppose, the biggest plus is I won’t need a fancy routing tool, anyway I’m gonna get one from Bird, I think I’d be daft not to really so a very big thanks to you all for suggesting I look at their website.

Sean

scooter15

as far as go outdoors go they own calibre brand too. and as far as i can tell its very hard to find any kind of warranty information. ive send them a message as i was interested in the two cubed for 400/375 as it was hardtail of the year etc,
some compaines like cube have lifetime on frame for example so will see what they say. if its something daft like 12months on everything then bugger it will spend extra £50 on somthing else.

pikeman65

I’d just like to say thanks to the members who suggested I look at a Bird bike, I got in touch with Ben, looked at the website and he suggested I look at the Aeris 160, well it all starts tomorrow, I’ve got the timber I need to start my man cave, albeit the floor platform but once it’s done I can get the main building done, real progress at last.