A colleague is over from the states and was talking about bikes with me. He is doing an epic 6 day off road ride on hired bike and wants a sub $1500.00 Hardtail for training and riding his local stuff. There are the obvious culprits like Trek and Specialized but what would the American and Canadian versions of the Cotics, Stantons, etc.

He doesn’t want to build and is not proud about it being th latest model, he does want good quality drivetrain, and 27.5

Cheers

Chromag would have to be high on the list, excellent review in recent mag too.

Sub £1500? Full bike or frame? I have a Chromag Samurai65 and its superb. The Chromag Wide Angle gets an excellent review in this months magazine as well and beats the likes of a Ritchey Timberwolf and an Onza.

@ $1500?
i’d suggest santa cruz, but like chromag, i doubt you’d throw your leg over one for that budget with any decent spec. you might find something from surly? soma?

A full-build on a Taiwan-built Chromag is more like US$2,500, although their full-build specs are fairly nice.

Brodie?

If he wants a full bike, then other than the main culprits, Performance Bike is hard to beat. Big name, big purchasing power, good deals.

Performance Bike

Not full of your niche brands but a source for good VFM bikes.

9:Zero:7 are Alaskan and make excellent Fatbikes…

Brodie are nice.

There’s a lot on here but not many stood out for me

Some nice stuff tho if you have time for a trawl – just spent 15 mins flicking through it so thanks for the OP!

Transition Trans AM. Was tempted by one myself. Rufty tufty long travel HT, like Switchback or Shan.

Thanks everyone, will take a look later. The budget was for a full bike, he isn’t seriously into it…….yet!