I've been riding a Carrera Subway to work and back for the past couple of years. The bike was given to me, by a colleague who found it too small.
In my hands, the drivetrain was poorly maintained, and now chain is slipping under power which is dangerous attempting to pull out of junctions. There's a few other minor issues, but as the whole bike - a new Carrera Sub way - is quite cheap (£390 for hydraulic brakes & 2x9 speed) I decided to replace the whole bike.
Halfords bike fit said size medium, so not really thinking I went with that. Collected it today. Rode it across the car park thinking it feels a little small, but can change the stem etc. On returning home I compared it with my current bike (the older 26" wheeled version) and it looked like childs bike.
And instead of measuring my current bike just took the new one back for exchange, which after chatting with the staff, decided the current bike must be size XL! So a new XL bike is on order for me.
Indeed, upon measuring the seat tube length of the current bike, it's 24". But I'm only 176cm.
Just seems bizarre that a XL hybrid bike fits an average height adult male - the same bike looked tiny beneath the colleague who gave it to me.
Anyway, after that cool story, the question is, will there be much difference between a 26" wheeled XL bike and a 27.5" wheeled XL bike? Hopefully won't have to go back again and say sorry, this one is actually too big .
at 176cm you are on the cusp into large, I'm 172 and shoot for medium, however on my Vitus Mach 3 i bought a few weeks back, I'm on small
can i suggest that perhaps you've got accustomed to a the wrong size bike, on a hybrid it probably doesn't make massive amount of difference if you can get a leg over it, its not like there's any dynamic riding going on so as long as your arms feel fine
likewise i stole my mates xl megawatt and it would've been fine for me to ride, all be it not ideal
I can imagine such a low price bike hasn't been designed/ specified geometry very well...
I had a Specialized Sirrus cheapy hybrid fire a few months. Dreadfully short bike, really odd geometry.
Short is fine on a hybrid bike.
It might be that your old bike was l in it's day but that length seat tube is XL now. How did he ascertain it was an XL?
The extra 1.5" of wheel size (it's less than that in real life) makes no difference - the bits of the bike that make the difference to how it feels on the road are hand, butt and feet positions, you can have a hybrid bike of any wheel size which puts these things anywhere (within reason) without impacting wheel size
