Hi Guys,

Got £1000 to spend on a new ride, wanting a hardtail that can take some abuse preferably with 140mm plus travel, interested in the NS Bikes Core 2 so if anyone can offer any opinions, alternatives and advice, it would be greatly appreciated.

Cheers
Matt

Cotic BFe has to be on the list but you’d have to go budget or 2nd hand to get it under a grand. I’d say a new Bfe frame,good condition 2nd hand pikes,decent wheelset then use the classifieds to get your finishing kit,brakes,drivetrain.

Weight: 16.9 kg

😯

Dunno what a Core is like, but I’ve played with NS Surges and like them a lot. Can be had pretty cheap, too.
I built an Evil Sovereign (not a cheap frame) around a 140mm fork for a bit less than £1000 – mainly second hand bits, like but it is literally the best thing ever ever. Improved my riding ability exponentially, too.

I have a sov and like it too.

Weight: 16.9 kg

That was my issue with it 😕

how about completes as i don’t know if i could manage a custom build myself, or would my LBS help out with the construction?

The hard bit about a custom build is knowing what bits and pieces to put on it, but if you can work out what components you want/ can afford then putting the whole lot together should be pretty easy – you can read up about the basics and if you are relatively friendly with your LBS, they should be able to help/ show you what to do with other stuff.

A BFe with some of the new Deore would be ace as a basis for a bike, as you can pick up some good groupset deals on the usual mail order websites. If you’re totally stuck at £1k and don’t want to build yourself, have a look at the Orange Crush.

The crush is £1400 now, though!

I have an Orange Crush frame for sale, if you are going down the second hand route.

Blue Pig makes me happy 😀

Building up from a frame, you’d have to look at the Pig and possibly Summer Season, and Mmmbop if you can find one. Not that they’re neccesarily the best, though they’re very good, more that they’re very good and cheap.

I’ve got an NS bikes core – or I have that frame (the Core is the bike version of the Surge frame).

My problem with it is the value of the build, the bits you get for £1000 are rubbish. What I did was :

buy a Carrera banshee xxx from halfords
sell the frame
buy the ns surge frame (It was on special at the time). You’ll also need a seatpost but I think everything else fit (I don’t run a front mech so not sure about that). Total cost of swapping frames was about £5. Resultant spec was 2 ranges better.

Overall, I love the bike. This build is probably lighter than the core 2, but similarly strong. Probably still a good 30lbs though. If you want a ligher bike, you’ll either be spending more, or getting bits that’ll snap

Its a very fun bike to ride. I have the 17″ and I’m 6’3, I ride it on everything from XC rides (both Afans in a day) to DH tracks. I don’t personally notice the weight (what’s 5lbs between friends) – its just fun to ride.

Surge 2010-07-25 007 by 5lab, on Flickr

Surge 2010-07-25 001 by 5lab, on Flickr

wouldn’t even look at any of those frames, I’d much sooner be on a dirtjump frame with a tough 100mm fork for bikepark kinda riding.. or anything that involves jumps.

or does “Freeride” mean mincing around with an overly long fork these days? ie. same as “all mountain” but heavier.

GW – Member

wouldn’t even look at any of those frames, I’d much sooner be on a dirtjump frame with a tough 100mm fork for bikepark kinda riding.. or anything that involves jumps.

or does “Freeride” mean mincing around with an overly long fork these days? ie. same as “all mountain” but heavier.

‘Freeride’ probably means being able to cope with regular uplifts/abuse, not mincing around a trail centre. ‘DH hardtail’ is another phrase for them.

I have a charge blender, its absolutely mint, I have reba’s on it which go up to 120mm and thats fine for most of the stuff I ride on it.

GW – Member
“or does “Freeride” mean mincing around with an overly long fork these days? ie. same as “all mountain” but heavier.”

If it’s being asked on here, then yup, probably. “a hardtail that can take some abuse preferably with 140mm plus travel”, doesn’t sound like he’s off to the Rampage.

It depends what you mean by “take some abuse” If its other riders standing there and laughing at your over forked, super slack trail bike then Im sure an Orange or Ragley will be able to handle it. The question is, will you be able to?

Otherwise I’d do what GW suggests, get some sort of dirt jump frame with some rock shox pikes. This will be better for jumps, drops and bike park stuff.

dialled alpine – would probably come in around a grand and its a fantastic bike…

Yup, Dialled Alpine all the way.

Its an awesome bike. Very tough and rides brilliantly with a 140mm fork on.

Very similar to an Evil Sov but much better value.

the trouble with a dirt frame is they normally have relatively steep angles. This makes them good for jumping, but rather comprimised for riding DH.

My hardtail rides everything, from enduro to full on DH courses. I’d not hesitate taking it down either, which is why I bought a beefy steel frame and some big forks (note, at 160mm it is, to my mind, overforked, but I can’t be arsed with the hassle of swapping them to shorter forks).

I used to have a 13″ P3 (I still own it, in fact) that was also used for everything. It probably meets the description of ‘jump frame with 100mm forks). To compare it to the surge (last rode it a year ago, but still got a pretty good idea) it was

lower (13″ vs 17″ frame) so easier to get weight behind
had a compromised steering/foot overlap
was better for jumping
blew through its fork travel on a dh track
too small to ride around on (no way to get a long enough set post to use properly)
too steep to be comfortable riding down steeper dh trails

The P3 is a better jump bike, no doubt, but as a freeride bike, doing some jumps, doing some dh, riding some singletrack, I think a long travel, slack hardtail is hard to beat (if you want a hardtail)

incidentally, winstanleys has last year’s core 1 for £900 – which has a much better spec than the core2. worth a look

Dialled Alpine gets my vote too. Just put some Marzocchi 55rc3’s mine to replace the Pikes on it and it just feels a bit too slack now though the frame is rated for 160mm. 140mm has always been enough travel I just wanted to try so different forks. Too much snow to test properly though.

I have a BFe. Had a go on a mates Surge/Core a while ago and I think I preferred it a bit, but didn’t really ride it for long enough to tell. It felt lighter and more nimble, and that was with hub gears!

The BFe is great though. Feels stable but still jumps nicely with the forks at 140mm.

are any of these ht’s big enough for 6 ft 6?

I think Cotic do up to 19″ if that’s big enough?

16″ feels spot on for me at 5’9″ 😀

hmm….. any big guys riding these?

19″ sounds a bit small but.. maybe

would this be quite a good donar bike for any of the frames above?

this will be my first build and would like to break myself in easy.

Parts list dont look to be that bad and i could always upgrade when i saw fit

AND

comes in under a 1000 pound ish 😉

you didn’t link a donor bike?

the banshee was good as it was quite a beefy build, with good quality parts. The trouble with most of the ‘extreme value’ £1000 bikes is they’re more xc oriented, and the build wouldn’t suit a bike like this

As I mentioned earlier, I’m 6’3 and ride a 17″ Surge, it fits, but I don’t know how well someone 3″ taller would get on. I believe Kona’s five-oh goes up to a 22″ framesize, which would be suitably gate-y for anyone

sorry dude,

http://www.halfords.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/product_storeId_10001_catalogId_10151_productId_512507_langId_-1_categoryId_165499#dtab

its cheap enough that i can upgrade if needed, tyres, pedals etc…

how much you sell and where your frame?

looks like a reasonable build – you might be better off getting a complete bike from winstanleys though – might cost maginally more but would be less hassle. The forks (Maz 33) aren’t great..

I sold the carrera frame (was the full sus one with a £150 rockshox rear shock) with seatpost, clamp and headset for £200 on here, as brand new. You probably wouldn’t get so much for the GT frame, but it’d be worth a shout.

the trouble with a dirt frame is they normally have relatively steep angles. This makes them good for jumping, but rather comprimised for riding DH.

I’d totally dissagree.

I had a 100mm dirtjump hardtail with a 70deg HA and a small 100mm XC hardtail with a 63deg HA at the same time and neither bike ever gave me any trouble riding steep DH. the XC frame was not so nice hitting steep dirtjumps tho.
I gave the XC bike away and snapped the DJ frame so replaced the two with my current hardtail, a 14″ dirtjump frame with 69deg HA and Pikes set at 95mm and a 410mm seatpost so I can ride XC on it with it at full extension but still slam it for everything else,there’s nothing I wouldn’t ride it down that I’d ride my DH bike down, if anything I prefer a little DJ hardtail to a DH bike riding proper steep stuff, it’s only when it becomes really rough or there are big gaps/drops the hardtail isn’t so suitable.

Just finished my Black Market Mob. 90% of the parts are second hand, and it cost about £1000. New everything would have been about £2300.

Not exactly a freeride hardtail, although I guess it could be if you put a longer seatpost on and gave it gears.

At £549.99, the GT aggressor really is the ultimate donor bike:

Chainset: Truvativ Blaze 3.1 chainset with sealed bearing BB
Forks: Marzocchi 33R
Front Brake: Avid Juicy 3 hydraulic disc brakes, 185rotors
Front Mech: Shimano Deore
Gear Shifters: Shimano Deore Rapid Fire
Handle Bars: GT oversize
Headset: GT Alloy
Hubs: Formula Disc / Shimano M475
Number of Gears: 27
Quick Release Wheels: Yes
Rear Brake: Avid Juicy 3 hydraulic disc brakes, 160mm rotors
Rear Mech: Shimano SLX Shadow
Rims: Alex DP17 disc rims
Saddle: SDG Bel Air saddle
Seatpost: Alloy Black
Stem: GT Oversized
Tyre size: 2.3″
Tyres: Maxxis Ignitor

Orange SubZero with 160mm forks, if you can find a frame. Great all-rounder.

Hey mattnuttall – I’ve got a barely-used Bfe (16″) that I’m thinking of flogging as a complete bike – could get it under your budget easy enough and with some very nice bits on.

My email address is in my profile if you’re interested.

🙂

BFe new is down to £300 DELIVERED. I might buy another one..