Hi,
I have a mate who wants to get into mtb'ing. I'm thinking this is a good time of year to get a deal, so does anyone know of anything around the £450 price mark? Ideally something suited to trail riding, nothing too racey!
Cheers
Andy
If it was my money, I'd be looking at one of these:
[url= http://www.halfords.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/product_storeId_10001_catalogId_10151_productId_786851_langId_-1_categoryId_165499#dtab ]look!! a bike from Halfords!!![/url]
Seems an awful lot of bike for £400. Oh... and spend the extra £50 on getting his LBS to check Halfords have set it up properly
wot binners sed.
Cheers, looks bloody heavy tho
As the great man said;
[i]strong, light, cheap
pick two[/i]
light and cheap please - with a good frame warrenty?? or is that three 🙂
How about...[url= http://www.paulscycles.co.uk/products.php?plid=m1b0s2p2782 ]
2010 Giant Talon 1[/url]
[url= http://www.halfords.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/product_storeId_10001_catalogId_10151_productId_810649_langId_-1_categoryId_165499 ]This[/url] is another option, and as light as your going to get for that sum of money. ALso check out Decathlons models in that price range.
These are the better spec'd bikes you'll get with that money (EDIT: Excluding heavily discounted bikes), if you want a better brand name you get worse spec overall.
Approx weight = 15.2 kg. Doesn't sound bad for £400. You get what you pay for!
Best way to get a lighter one is going to be off the classifieds.
EDIT - 14.7kg for the Carerra, bit better but still think either is ok for the price range.
for trail riding the voodoo will be fine.
you'll not get much 'light' for that sort of money that's going to last 🙁
The giant does give you some gear upgrades over the voodoo though and is a 'trail' type design.
Or given that my first post was slightly over budget (especially when you add postage), how about a very similarly spec'd;
[url= http://www.paulscycles.co.uk/products.php?plid=m1b0s2p2287 ]2009 Giant XTC 4[/url]
How about one of my Merlin malt 1's 17" or 19" see my post in "for sale" last week.
Yeah i'm trying to convince 2nd hand is better at that price but he's not having it...
cheers tho
Pushing the budget a bit but if he wants new the 2009 Carrera Fury is a cracking bike.
My son has one , it's a hoot to ride and the forks can easily be extended to 140mm by moving a spacing pin.
I paid £280 for a specialized hard rock pro second hand, one year old, I think it states it weighs just over 13kg, excellent choice! Was from eBay.
No idea what the fork is like, but this looks alright for the cash...
[url= http://paulscycles.co.uk/products.php?plid=m1b1s2p2232 ]http://paulscycles.co.uk/products.php?plid=m1b1s2p2232[/url]
Don't let him go to Halfords on his own in case he comes back with an Apollo!
Merlin often have 'boxed' bikes for cheaper prices - seen them do this twice.
It is as it is delivered to them but they don't bother to assemble it.
Can save some money that way.
could watch for bargains on ebay - like this:
450 quid is a decent amount for a beginner to spend, at that price point halfords are going to be hard to beat for vfm, but, as binner said above, get a decent lbs to make sure its assembled correctly.
id rather ride a 400 quid bike properly set up than a 2k race machine thats been chucked together by someone who doesnt give a toss/doesnt know what they are doing.
not all halfords are bad though . . . .
Now thinking this one:-
http://paulscycles.co.uk/products.php?plid=m1b0s2p3118
Can anyone see a reason why it would not fit the bill? Looks good value to me (has deore etc)
This struck me as a bit of a decent deal for 450.
http://singletrackmag.com/forum/topic/beone-karma-xc-hardtail-fox-hope-xt-treats-450