Been thinking of a hardtail for a while. Like the Soul but have to admit I am bit bored of black and the orange is too loud and at that price I want to like the colour as well as the tech spec without going for a re-spray. Forgive me….

The Sandersons look really nice too, same price, similar geometry, nicer colour and I can buy one from a relatively LBS. Anyone got one? Feedback?

Sanderson

We have em on display – not a main line item by any stretch of the imagination but seem to be a solid design and appear popular with certain people.

They are nice basically, you couldn’t go far wrong with one.

they got a good review in WhatMtb recently.

Which ones have you got in the shop?

I have a Sanderson Life and a Soloist.

The Life was the nicest finished frame I’ve ever seen. Has been ridden hard, several times a week over the last year and I love it. I’m 6ft1 and have a 18″ frame – the 20″ would have worked too.
Both frames were purchased from Flying Fox in Alva. Pete has demo Soloists for test-riding.

The Soloist (20″)is a nice bike too – has been ridden hard too over the last 6 months. Mine’s the old-skool non-853 one.

Life

Soloist

The £550 Sanderson is 5.5lb, the soul just over 4lb, I know where my money would go, no matter how bad th ecolour.

£550 whats that one? I dont remember seeing a Sanderson that heavy or expensive.

The £550 Sanderson is 5.5lb, the soul just over 4lb, I know where my money would go, no matter how bad the colour.

??
Model – Breath
Weight – 4.8lbs (18 inch)

Model – Life
Weight – 4.6lbs (18 inch)

Can’t see any sanderson frames quoted as 5.5?

That’s actual weight, not from any website.

Bought from the forums, resprayed and singlespeeded – whichever the cheaper of the Life/Breath is.

Absolutely love it!

I like my Life, not given it a huge amount of thrashing, bought from the classifieds on here.

Cheers, Rich

£470 for a Soul and £550 for a Sanderson? I think I need to put my prices up 😉

Al, which one is £550?

My 18″ not-853 soloist probably does weigh 5.5lb, but it has a hoofin’ great EBB in the middle of it. [edit] and costs considerably less than £550. Mine was £260 new.

I’ve got a Life – love it. It gives such a nice ride and is great at climbing.

I have a Breath and love it.
Was nice and cheap at £225 I have no idea what the frame on it’s own weighed but my build comes in at about 27.5 lbs (no longer using gaffa tape as a chainstay protector either)

Mate just bought a life frame for £250 off Ebay brand new

Noticed the Breath on ebay for £199 with £15 postage, very tempting.

I’ve a life, and theres no way its 5.5lb, 4.5lb I might believe, but its stil pretty light.

What forks are you running on yours guys?

All I can say is I was in a shop with a £550 Sanderson frame hanging up. I picked it up and said “that’s heavy”. Staff weighted it, 5.5lb, said it was CEN tested.

Are you sure Al? If it was us then we don’t do any Sandersons that cost £550 and weigh that much.

£400-450 and 5lbs is closer to what we have.

Maybe the scales were having an off day.

Hmmmm maybe £450 then, blokey def said 5.5lb!

Would you get away with the Life on 140mm air forks?

Stuck between a 18 and 16″. I remember the 18″ I had as being abit long. Cant remember the stem or saddle position I used though so would probably use a 50mm Thomson. I’m 6ft1 and like slightly compact.

I like the look of them. I prefer the non-wishbone design for the seat stays. Good prices too. Fancy trying the Breath if one came up cheap.

140mm air forks

It’s an XC bike! More like 100mm SID’s or Rebas. Tried mine briefly at 120mm and it just felt like I’d spoilt the ride.

I’m ‘sure’ I ran mine with Pikes previously.