hi is 130mm travel enough for trail centres, and a bit of all mountain
these days do you think.and wheel size will be 650b

It will be plenty. I’ve gone down from 140 (Orange 5) to 120 (Whyte T129) fairly recently and if anything, I’m riding the rough stuff better. Forks are slightly harsher for having less travel, I feel. Not sure what ‘All mountain’ means, but if it means rocky descents in the Lakes it will still be plenty.

120 is perfect actually

Just moved from 150 to 130, only 2 rides in so hard to tell yet.

TBH 120 is ok but you get less battered about with longer travel IMO. My mate rides everything i do with my 160 mm but i keep more speed as he gets thrown around more. Thats my take on it anyway 🙂

More than enough…especially with the ‘miracle’ 650b wheels 😉

It always used to be and trail centres seem to be getting sissified IMO so more than enough.

Gone from a 5 to a bandit 29er and feel way more confident to tackle biger stuff with less travel .

Should be good. Boardman Team FS 2014?

Looked at a Boardman the other day and it had a good spec and great lines, but the colours are still awful.

Just gone from an Alpine 160 to a Bandit 29 (new shorter travel version) and ABSOLUTLEY love it.

Tackling everything I would normally and it doesn’t feel dramatically different apart from being lighter and rolls much faster.
(I’m running 140 up front through)

You’ve 130mm too much I ride with 0mm front and rear !!!! Every ride is a mission though and i pay for my dentist’s summer break every year 🙂 🙂

plenty.

Couple of years ago, Jesse Wigman raced the fort william endurance downhill on a rigid jump bike, and came 40th out of about 120 with 13 runs in 6 hours. Yes 130mm is enough 😉 Is it ideal? Different question but yeah probably. Depends on the 130mm bike.

Depends on your weight and riding style IMO. Heavier riders need more travel to absorb the greater kinetic energy when they hit a bump. I have ridden the Fort William DH on my 120mm stumpy, but I only weigh ten stone soaking wet and I’m pretty smooth.

HTH

For most stuff it’s plenty. I can afford one bike so it has to do UK and bigger Alps/Spanish stuff so I opted for 150mm. Mine is a 26 inch bike so a 650b will be a tad different but 130mm on 650b sounds a very good option to me.

hi thanks all for replys,dont no which bike yet might stay with santa cruz or try some others

Are you talking front or rear travel?

hi, both front and rear

I’m moving from a 150mm rear and front to 150mm front 130mm rear.

I’m hoping 130mm is enough. Then again I’ve ridden the same trails on a hardtail so should survive.

I used to own a Hemlock. Ran it with 36’s up front, tried it with 100 & 160 rockers and found that it made little difference so stuck with 100. Only on the Fort Bill DH track did I think it needed more.

As has been discussed many times, it’s odd that the only bikes like this all seem to be heavy slope style bikes. Brant designed one but it’s still not seen light of day. Shame the Hemlock wasn’t a bit better looking…

Ropolato beat Gwinn (on a Demo) on a DH track with a 135mm Stumpy 29″… The geo is more important than the travel.