[Closed] All terrain bicycle (ATB)

I've got a Ramin 3+  with Geoff bars which I love. A modern version of my 1986 Rockhopper which was very much an ATB but much much better. Wouldn't mind a pair of 29" wheels for it with some suitable tyres for rides with more road sections but it's great for my wheels on the ground xc riding on the south downs

I’m not sure but didn’t the ATB designation come just before MTB? Or is someone taking the p**s

I've read a lot of good things about the Ramin but never tried one. Have you considered 2.8" schwalbe g-one allrounds? They're a great ATB tyre in my opinion.

Yeah, it did but was quickly forgotten about, which is a shame really.

My Spanish friend called my bike a Countryside Bicycle.
An apt description.

Aaaaaaa I’m putting my fingers in my ears and a filter in my internet. ATB. FOR F***ks sake!!

I thought it was a word-by-word translation of VTT (which as a whole is mostly translated as mountain bike or MTB).

I think All Terrain Bike (ATB) a much more accurate term for most bikes than rather Mountain Bike (MTB - not sure why it isn't just MB).

Given we have so few actual mountains in most of the UK. Is a mountain bike a mountain bike if it is not on a mountain?

Similar to the French vélo tout-terrain (VTT)

I'd not really looked at other plus tyres easdoesit but I might give them a try

Yep velo tout-terrain literally translates to bike all terrain....

I remember when mtbs were called ATB's, back in the day, late 80's early 90's. Much better name imo, and my initials are ATB so I like it!!

MTBs aren't great on road. Theyre really only good off road. Where as an ATB as described in the article on bikepacking.com can be used comfortably on road as well as off. So ATB isn't really a great description for most MTBs.

So, ATB = hybrid?

I think All Terrain Bike (ATB) a much more accurate term for most bikes than rather Mountain Bike (MTB – not sure why it isn’t just MB).

MTB means multi terrain bike I thought?

That's not ALL terrain, I wouldn't ride it at BPW

MTB means multi terrain bike I thought?

A new one on me, but makes more sense than Moun Tain Bike.

So, ATB = hybrid?

Not really as that article covers ground up to drop bar fatbikes with road geometry. 🤷 Quite an interesting article thought.

Marketeers wet dream; take something which already exists - in this context, a hybrid or gravel bike - and rebadge it, positioning it as something you didn't know you either wanted or needed.
Use the bike(s) you have and enjoy them.
Ignore the marketeers and others promoting anything 'new'.
Most of them don't believe the bollocks they spout.

I was out on my ATB last night (and first thing this morning).
[img] [/img]
74km/1900m of Brecon Beacons bridleways, country lanes, tracks, forestry roads - and single-track, which my other (monstercross) bike would definitely not have been happy on, thus doesn't qualify as an ATB. I did a quick whizz round the Syfridin on the same bike a fortnight ago, and would be quite happy on it on most trail centre reds...

1988 Raleigh Mustang.

Says ATB on the top tube 😎

@Saccades You are exactly right, ATB was the first marketing acknowledgment of a bicycle to go off road (even though it had been happening since bicycles have existed) penny farthings, those hobby horse things and others didn’t require tarmac. The only thing that has changed is that the marketing system has to keep selling us more “stuff” to keep the unsustainable growth going. More categories of bikes, more axle standards, more bottom bracket sizes. We don’t actually need most of these “improvements” to enjoy cycling, it’s mostly b****x to sell more unnecessary stuff.
ATB MTB MOUNTAIN BIKE GRAVEL BIKE ADVENTURE BIKE DOWN COUNTRY BIKE DOWNHILL BIKE AAAAAH..

1988 Raleigh Mustang.

Came here to say this. My first’proper bike! Although mine was 1987 and picked up during Michael Fish’s hurricane. I remember it’s first outing was a quick ride in Findhorn bay car park getting lashed by the storm before my parents let me retreat to safety! It was shit, ergo ATB is a shit term.

As above I bought a Raleigh Maverick in 1985 and it was classed as an ATB.

Good god! 37 years……<suddenly feels old>

You are exactly right, ATB was the first marketing acknowledgment of a bicycle to go off road (even though it had been happening since bicycles have existed) penny farthings, those hobby horse things and others didn’t require tarmac.

None of the other bikes you mentioned would have fallen into the "ATB" category as it was used then. Although the term describes a use for the bike, it was used for a bike with specific features, particularly wheel size, tyre size and gearing. (There appears to be a move to re-purpose the acronym currently.)

The only thing that has changed is that the marketing system has to keep selling us more “stuff” to keep the unsustainable growth going.

And to replace things that wear out, so that parents can purchase a brand new bike for their kids rather than a secondhand one, etc. What type of sustainability are you talking about here?

More categories of bikes, more axle standards, more bottom bracket sizes. We don’t actually need most of these “improvements” to enjoy cycling, it’s mostly b****x to sell more unnecessary stuff.

Enjoyment is not binary. You can have more or less of it. Modern technology and design diversification enable us to enjoy cycling in more ways than before. When I took up cycling again, bikes were a bit crap. Road bikes had gears that were too hard, you couldn't get a longer travel mountain bike that didn't weigh a ton and wasn't built for Canadian farm boys to huck off their uncle's barn roof, tyres were either slow and grippy or fast and not grippy.

Much of the modern developments have gone towards making bikes that we, the average punter, want to and can ride, rather than bikes focussed on competition categories. Compact gearing on road bikes, "trail bikes", dual compound tyres, full suspension bikes that can fit 29" wheels and ~2.6" tyres with a conventional suspension design (because boost). I can do more, have more fun in more different ways, now than I could then. I am riding my Trek Slash down stuff I would only have ridden on my DH bike, but I can also pedal it up to the top of the hill again - despite having gone through middle age and out the other side. I can ride my road bike up hills and stay sitting down. There is a vastly wider choice of bikes.

Of course there is some unnecessary fluff, silly labels attached to the bike types, technical dead-ends. This is the cost of letting the market decide what products are made. But imagine if there was a command economy for bikes. We would all still be riding around on the cycling equivalent of the Trimphone.

By 1980 Trimphones had been around for some 15 years and needed revamping for the new era of competition.

Fifteen years of the same old inadequate product. Then competition (and marketing) came along...

You can't have the product development without the marketing. Or at least, nobody has worked out how yet.

@montgomery exactly what I'm talking about. Thanks for posting

Who’s got one and what’s your setup. Are you running 29er or 27.5 plus? Sweepy bars or drop bars? Singlespeed or 10 to 51 12 speed? What else is important to you on your ATB?

I spend slot of time pondering this

I currently own a mutant bike in this role. It’s pinnacle arkose frame with a budget in steel fork try and fit slightly bigger tyres. I also own a short travel 29er fs

On the Arkose I run 650b wheels with 50mm tyres and 700c 35mm

Gearing is 26 38 up front and 36 11 at the back

With the 650b wheels and tyres it’s pretty all terrain. Still ok on the road can ride quite a range of stuff off road. It’s a table in holiday bike as it will do most things when you get there. Of course I’m assuming this isn’t amountain bike holiday

But I have a pipe dream of riding the pennine bridleway and think at the least I need bigger tyres. So I’ve been looking at options. These are my thoughts

I could swap my frame and forks to one with bigger tyre clearance. That would keep the 2 wheel set option and still give ok road feel with the 700c wheels

Or I could start from scratch which is where you are. Here are my thoughts

I like riding drop bars on and off road. But they make a building a bike expensive and complicated if you want mtb style low gears and hydraulic brakes

For something like the King Alfred Way 2.2 inch tyres would seen ideal. Probably 29er but that makes it harder to go narrow without dropping the bottom bracket

Any way here are 4 frames that have caught my eye

Drop bar

Kinesis tripster

Fairlight Faran

Flat bar

Surly bridge club

Sonder Frontier

Mine has just evolved over the years - 26x2.4" tyres, 11 speed 34/11-46, OG bars, 29er P2 forks that stand in well for whatever sus forks would've been on the second/third/fourth hand frame.

I'm accumulating the bits for a migration to a modern 29 boost format, probably at summer's end when the current drivetrain (currently at 2770km) karks it. It will, though, be essentially the same ATB bike, but with the magical handling benefits of modern geometry that I'm sure will make my riding much more enjoyable than it's been for the last 3+ decades.

@Ampthill sounds good. Surly bridge club is the winner out of those bikes for me.

I prefer a more upright position and I'm leaning towards a set of bars with a big sweep. This is probably because I've not had much time with drop bars so never really got used to them. I also think I'd prefer 27.5 plus, if I'm to use this bike for all day rides over various paths and tracks the extra comfort sounds good. I'm not going to be using this bike to break any Strava records that's for sure.

I really need a day in a rigid bike with 2.8 inch tyres to see why it’s all about

Oh, and solid, rattle free mudguards that just work and don't get in the way.

Yawn, any bicycle sub-niche designation that requires a manifesto deserves to die out (again).

Bicycles are great, ones that can go off road are awesome the shape of their bars, their luggage capacity and other trivia are all things to consider, but does anyone care about the terminology that much?

If so just bring "velocipede" back into common use.

I put some schwalbe g one all rounds in 650b 2.8 on my genesis longitude for summer mooching / camper van errands. They’re a good dry dirt track/ forest road/ cycle track/ back lanes compromise for when on hols exploring away from the camper van base and doing shopping or kid trailer pulling errands. It was those or another set of 29” wheels with road biased tyres. I really like them.

Where as an ATB as described in the article on bikepacking.com can be used comfortably on road as well as off

Only on some off road, not on tricky stuff.

1988 Raleigh Mustang

Johnny come lately ... 😉

As above I bought a Raleigh Maverick in 1985 and it was classed as an ATB.

Was it the dark red one with side pull brakes?

@thegeneralist - no it was this one, 15 speed with canti's...

I had the 5 speed version of that with caliper brakes. Got squashed by a builders van.

You flash get. 🙂

One of the things I love about my occam is that the handlebar to front wheel position reminds me soooo much of my old Maverick

The other reason I love my occam is that, apart from the abovementioned it bears no resemblance whatsoever to my Maverick ( which was an utter piece of shit objective speaking)

Reet. I'm confused...ATB? MTB? Gravel? what the hell is my 'adventure bike' then???

Surely all push-bikes are SPPTDTs??
(Self-propelled-personal-transportation-device-thingemejigs)

MTBs now are pretty specialist things, as are road bikes. A lot of us just like to ride place to place, off-road is best but we don't mind a few miles on nice lanes. We probably ride something along the CX to rigid MTB line. Anything unsuspended with chunky tyres, which is what ATBs and MTBs were until the early 90s.

Back in the day we'd do longish road rides on slicks or the regular off-road rides on knobbys, same rigid 26" bikes, mostly with bar ends. Most of our XC included a chunk of tarmac to get to the trails and back. I use my rigid 29er and fat tyre road-ish bike for the same sort of thing now, it's all good.

"Roamer, wanderer, nomad, vagabond, call me what you will"

ATB is not a new term. Its just marketing by people probably too young to remember when a bike capable of going off road was called ATB. It was as common as saying MTB for quite a while.

ATB isn't a bad name for it if you ignore the wailing and gnashing of teeth.

Mine is a Salsa El Mariachi, with 2.35 Racing Ralph's, 1x11, 34t chainring, 11-46 cassette, 660mm bars with 15 degree sweep, rigid forks and a dropper.

It really can ride anywhere without too much hardship. It's fine on road, perhaps due to the steep angles (70.5 HA) and rigid fork, but I've ridden it around all the local singletrack. It's pretty quick off road as long as it's not too rough. It's manageable on rocky tracks, the place where it's worst is at places like Afan where the trails are swoopy fast but stony. In these you want to go fast but the roughness stops you; it's actually worse than on really rocky steep mountain tracks where you're going slow on any bike. It's actually better to ride on lanes than a road bike.

You could call it a hybrid but with big tyres and MTB gears.

Only on some off road, not on tricky stuff.

It's fine on trails that are steep and technical. It only looses out in speed on rough stuff.

@molgrips Plus tyres for the rough?

I really need a day in a rigid bike with 2.8 inch tyres to see why it’s all about

I've just got back from 62 miles and 7000ft climbing on mine on the SDW and bits round it. It's great, sure you get a bit banged round but not in a really painful way. I do need to put a longer stem on though I've discovered, I'd kept the original on when I put the Geoff bar on and while the handling is fine my backside feels like someone spent the second half of the ride beating it with a meat tenderiser! I lot less painful when I was riding on the loop so I need to get a bit more stretched on the grips

This probably counts as ATB maybe? It's for local rides from the doorstep riding around Thanet. No big hills here so 9 speed 36t x 34t-11t is more than enough. Rigid forks. No dropper. Just lower the saddle for when I want to play around on urban stuff or occasionally find a small jump or two. Carry everything I need for short rides on the frame via Alpkit frame bag and Blackburn Outpost cage (with extra hole drilled to allow low down mounting), avoiding sweaty back from backpack.

This bike used to be my commuter but recently acquired a 26" hybrid for that instead. The stem is quite high rise, and the bars are too, from when I was commuting to reduce weight on wrists on slow paced easy commutes. Might change that, think it's just slightly too high.

@molgrips Plus tyres for the rough?

I've thought about this a lot, since my fork can take a 2.8" tyre. A friend of mine with a similar style of bike did it and then stopped, because it didn't have enough of a benefit on the rocky bits to offset the extra drag on everything else.

I ride some very rocky trails here and I don't think a big tyre would make all that much difference, really. A suspension fork does though, and I have run the bike with suspension on it before. I put the rigid fork back on though because the suspension fork didn't lock out 100%, and the squishing made it feel much less positive and somehow less satisfying to ride.

I have an old emmelle that is literally made of Tange ATB tubing.

And i quite often think i should make it into somethign very like thsoe bikes on the OP link.

Only on some off road, not on tricky stuff.

It’s fine on trails that are steep and technical. It only looses out in speed on rough stuff.

Agreed, anything rough at speed isn't great on a rigid bike but I've ridden enough steep tricky stuff on a rigid to think it's an advantage as often as not. Perhaps more of an advantage the steeper and trickier it gets as you're going slower. Big impacts are still more likely to send you off line though.

Jeff Jones has been trying to tell everyone this for almost 20 years and while his bikes aren't to everyone's tastes, he's right.

I’ve ridden enough steep tricky stuff on a rigid to think it’s an advantage as often as not

Yeah agree, you can really lean on the front wheel in a way that you can't with a suspension fork. So whilst the head angle is steep it's not as bad as you think it's going to be once you sus it out.

Of course, still not as good as a nice slack MTB and I can still do more on mine, but I can still do most of it on the rigid. The key point for me is that there are good steep trails that are remote, for me, and require a lot of lanes and fire road to get to which is a chore on my old slack MTB and takes ages.

I was up riding up cutgate today, feeling smug on my new Stumpjumper (last time I did it I was on a 26 inch Zesty about 8 years ago, and it's much easier on a modern trail bike!) and a guy came rattling down on a rigid bike, fully loaded. Was hugely impressed, its a very rocky descent in places.

Then, some nutter came down on a gravel bike, but he didn't look like he was enjoying much. Just shows these kind of bikes really can do pretty much anything. Not sure I'd be fussed for proper trail riding though!

Yes, Jones bikes are fantastic ATBs. Unfortunately a bit too pricey. Stooge also fantastic ATBs.

I have a rigid Ramin 29er with Rock Razors f&r which is my "Flat barred aggro-gravel ATB". Does a pretty good job as I'm not a fan of drops off-road, but agree with anything "anything rough at speed isn’t great on a rigid bike", although there is nuance to that as well. Fast roots are particularly rubbish mind.

On the whole my favourite type of riding and bike. Always regretted ditching mine for a Rockhopper, and spent the next 25 years buying and swapping MTBs in an attempt to rebuild an ATB. The nearest I got off the peg was a Genesis Vagabond and then a Longitude. I also never stopped calling mine ‘ATBs’ Do I get a prize or summink? I settled at 2.1 tyres so not sure about plus size.

The old trails near me were designated ATB. Just another name for a mountain from back in the day.

I think a company owned the name so no one else could use it hence MTB stuck.

I was riding 'gravel' on one of these circa 1980something

Didn't the industry originally go with "ATB" because the word on the street was that Gary Fisher (or one of his crowd) had trademarked "mountain bike" until it turned out that, as is so often the case, the word on the street was "bollocks" at which point everyone adopted "mountain bike" and we didn't hear about ATBs again? Until now, obv.

^ perhaps Mountain Bike was the more emotive term anyway and it captured the imagination more than the rather practical sounding 'All Terrain Bike'. Some marketing is about simply understanding what's exciting about the product and Gary Fisher et al got it. So mountain bike may have become the general term whether TM'd or not, like we often call vacuum cleaners 'hoovers' whatever the brand actually is. It has that sort of quality.

'ATB' just reminds me of the 90's/00's cheap BSOs which presumably they couldn't legally call a 'mountain' bike because they were barely capable of riding in the local park without falling apart.

ATB is such a generic term, it could apply to a cheap hybrid, or an expensive rigid MTB, or a gravel bike. Hence why we have more specific bike genres based on what they're aimed at doing - gravel/adventure/bikepacking/etc.

I suppose ATB would work as a general category, with the specific types of bike below it. Much like the term mountain bike covers XC/Trail/enduro/downhill.