[Closed] Hard tail or full suspension

Personal. Hardtails are lighter and better specced generally at any specific price point. They pedal better on some surfaces, but struggle for traction on rougher ground.

Thanks mate. The more feed back the better

Full suss all the way IMO but depends what you have in mind. With the new 2015 bikes coming out now you can get a good deal on a 2014 decent spec bike. Do you have a budget in mind?

A decent HT will be so much better to ride than a low level full susser IMO.

Plus depends on the riding you do.

What scandal said. Depends where you ride.
For local XC, bridleways and the like I ride my hard tail.
At trail centres and in the mountains I'm more likely to take my FS.
In general I'd steer clear of cheaper full sussers because they will be heavy and have poor components.

Bruce +1, after getting beaten up at afan today on my HT, which is fine for 99% of my local riding. You can seemingly get a lots of bike for you money ATM 2nd hand, especially if you go 26er. That said there some real dogs for sale too, so tread carefully if you go down that route

You are right that the question's been asked many times before. I would agree that a mid range HT will probably be better than a bottom end FS but it might be swayed by what type of riding you do / want to do.

My budget is going to be around the 1200pound mark. I'm just about to move to West Yorkshire from Australia so most of my ridding will be local(there were some great tracks in the latest mbr mag). I think I am heading towards a 27.5 hard tail, just worried about the comfort. Are there any bikes you could recommend ?
Cheers

Bird Zero 2 is £1200

For £1200 used may be a much better route for full sus. If you want new then HT's will come out better but have a look round for something heavily reduced but well specced. If the frame is right then upgrades may be possible so check for a tapered head tube and the ability to take 650 wheels possibly.

Some 26" used ideas
http://www.pinkbike.com/buysell/1651116/
http://www.pinkbike.com/buysell/1651107/
http://www.pinkbike.com/buysell/1631339/
http://www.pinkbike.com/buysell/1651168/

I like hardtails.

They're fun, simple and don't stop me going anywhere I couldn't go on a full suss.
I like full suss bikes, but I don't need one for the mincing around I do.

I bet you could get a nice Canyon full suss or something in the sales for £1200.

In general I'd steer clear of cheaper full sussers because they will be heavy and have poor components.

Rode a 1500 quid full susser out in Portugal and have never been so scared riding a bike since the late 1990's or early 2000's.

Long stem, narrow bars, flexy forks, high BB, god awful rear shock. I'd rather have been on a hardtail with a nice short stem and 750mm+ wide bars.

Yes, they batter you to death but I'll be more likely to go and hit local xc rides, dirt jumps and street features on a hardtail. Full sussers bore me on anything but good fast and rough descents. I'll get a new full susser when I can afford run a 1k+ hardtail and a 3k full susser.

£1200 doesn't get you much in the way of a full sus bike. They exist for sure, but I'd argue you need to spend a bit more to get a new full sus bike worthy of purchase. Obviously some 2nd hand bikes worthy of purchase will fall into your budget.

On a hardtail though... £1200 gets you a phenomenal bike! For me it would be the Whyte 901. But there's dozens of worthy bikes within your budget. And if you're prepared to go 2nd hand, then there's some exceptionally nice bikes out there (especially some unfashionable 26" wheeled bikes) for quite a bit less than £1200 to be fair.

Also check out the end of line deals here, some very competent bikes might just be sneaking into your price range, (about $2500 au?) if the size fits...

I'm a firm believer in hard tails giving people with less experience, better 'training'. You'll understand exactly what the bike's doing, why and what you need to do with your body to stop you falling off / going slowly.

As someone who's pretty fresh to mtb'ing, I guess you're also pretty fresh to maintenance. Full sus bikes need more of that!

If I were you, I'd get a bike like either of these (honestly, if I had the money, I'd buy one for myself). The Bfe in particular will take quite a hammering. Is very well specced. Dammit. Wish I had a spare 1k! Plus, that 200 can get you a skills course, bike holiday etc.

http://singletrackworld.com/forum/topic/for-sale-cotic-soul-1

http://singletrackworld.com/forum/topic/cotic-bfe-medium-for-sale-or-swap

Also, should you get bitten by the riding bug hard, bikes like these hard tails are easy to justify keeping whilst you add a full sus, a road bike, a CX bike, a single speed........ 😉

@shaun - I'd say go with the hardtail given your budget, but within striking distance of you is some great riding which would benefit a decent full-suss. So start off with the hardtail and as/when you have the funds to get a full-suss as I suspect you'll want to do so. The bikes listed by @makecoldplay are both very good buys IMO, you will get more for your money second hand and people on here are pretty helpful recommending stuff/ads in classifieds. As for comfort a full-suss can smooth things out when pedalling seated but just get out on the bike and your body will adapt.

Hardtail all the way. The On-One Parkwood is a bargain if you feel the need to buy new. Don't be put off by the 29in wheels, it's a fun bike.

[url= http://www.halfords.com/cycling/bikes/mountain-bikes/voodoo-bizango-29er-mountain-bike-20 ]All the bike 98% of us will ever need[/url]

[url= http://www.halfords.com/cycling/bikes/mountain-bikes/boardman-mountain-bike-team-full-suspension-650b-2014 ]All the bike 99% of us will ever need[/url]

If you're OK with buying direct, the [url= http://www.canyon.com/_en/mountainbikes/bike.html?b=3573 ]Canyon Nerve AL 6.0[/url] is a great full suss for £1200.

Long stem, narrow bars, flexy forks, high BB, god awful rear shock. I'd rather have been on a hardtail with a nice short stem and 750mm+ wide bars.

What a daft argument. So you're saying an Apollo with short stem and wide bars would be better?

That's like saying that you wouldn't ride a road bike because you tried one once and the saddle was uncomfy 🙄

There are a few decent full-sus options around that budget.
No personal experience, but they get good reviews in the mags (if that means anything!)

http://www.chainreactioncycles.com/ghost-asx-5500-suspension-bike-2014/rp-prod111439
http://paulscycles.co.uk/m1b0s1p4945/GIANT-ANTHEM-X-2-2013
http://www.chainreactioncycles.com/commencal-meta-sl-4-suspension-bike-2013/rp-prod83515

etc

Klumpy speaks the truth

I bought a Bizango, and I love it, but I do wish I'd have spent a little bit more and got that Boardman, I miss full suss at times, up in Scotland the other week it was all of the times!!!!

Tough one eh.
If you can get a decent 2nd hand full sus I would grab one. Short travel 29er (if you're tall) or a 650b if you can as 26 is out the window now.

I live in West Yorkshire and the woods are perfect for moshing about on a hardtail, and I welcome the low maintenance of it especially as it usually pretty damn muddy.
If your going for a hardtail consider a steel frame to give you a bit more give than something aluminium and make sure you can use some big travel folks with it.

Full suss all the way if you are planning to ride off road. Plenty of goods bikes for a reasonable budget.

@klumpy 98% of us would want a better bike than either of those, the vast majority of us here have better bikes than those. If that was what we could afford and there where no other choices we'd probably all get out there and ride those but for the money I'd much rather have one of the two second hand Cotic's that where posted. The ride quality would be much better.

For £1200, a HT.

I wouldn't buy new FS at that price, maybe would buy 2nd hand but I'd have to know its history or be very confident the seller is honest.

Hardtail all the way. The On-One Parkwood is a bargain if you feel the need to buy new. Don't be put off by the 29in wheels, it's a fun bike.

Amen.

Thinking about it, you could have some serious fun building your own HT on that budget, including a load of beers to aid the process.

I'm a very recent 29er convert and you could do a heck of a lot worse than to get yourself a 29" hardtail and go and play. An FS bike is a nice thing to have, but it'll bring a higher maintenance bill with it, not to mention greater weight and a less impressive spec than the equivalent hardtail.

Also +1 for getting some mates around and building it yourself. You can spread the cost over a few months and you learn a lot of useful stuff along the way.

Get the hardtail. You'll get a half decent Groupset, fork, wheels and finishing kit at that price. You then have the option of buying a nice used full sus frame at a later date and moving your bits across, if you want to..or not.

Get the hardtail. You'll get a half decent Groupset, fork, wheels and finishing kit at that price. You then have the option of buying a nice used full sus frame at a later date and moving your bits across, if you want to..or not.

Good point - it's not necessarily an either/or in the long term.

I've never ridden full suss as I love hardtails too much!

+1 for the build your own option as well - you'll love it all the more.

Lived and ridden in West Yorks for most of my life, I ride a Cotic Soul. I have a 140mm FS too, the Cotic is just more fun round here. Most of the locals I know ride hardtails most of the time. Also, the weather is shite and the mud is especially gritty so the maintenance savings on a HT can be significant compared to something with a load of joints and bearings. With your budget I would be getting a HT, definitely.

Also, if you're moving from Aus you're going to simply *love* our weather, oh yes. 😉

@klumpy 98% of us would want a better bike than either of those, the vast majority of us here have better bikes than those.

I don't see a "need" in there. And I'm not sure that the herd behaviour of STW is a good starting point for giving advice to humans. This is a place where paying a 300% premium for a frame because it has a 6 month waiting list and is made by a beard in a shed is normal. Where buying tyres on a per trail centre basis is normal. Where overshooting a corner means you start to experiment with pad/disk combinations - and post about them.

The OP wants to ride a bike.

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

😆

For what it's worth...

I reckon the single biggest thing that affects whether a bike is good is the fork (wheels and brakes come in just behind). You can go pretty fast and do some pretty hilarious stuff on a hardtail riding the fork and keeping the back nice and light, as long as the fork is good.

Rear suspension is great, of course, but the fork needs to be right first.

A really good fork will consume a huge proportion of a £1,200 budget. If you're suspending the rear wheel as well, you're going to have less money for the fork. So the most important thing suffers to pay for something you can actually do without.

If you're buying a perfect bike, the right order of things to spend money on is: fork (£500), wheels (£300), brakes (£200). That's £1,000. Obviously we're going to blow through your budget if we carry on like that specc'ing a hardtail, but you can get a really good hardtail frame for £500. A decent full-sus is another £1,000 on top of that.

That's the sort of maths that pulls me towards hardtails anyway. My ideal hardtail is about 2.5x your budget. My ideal full-sus is waaaay more, so I've never bought it.

🙂

This (as posted by DezB)

http://paulscycles.co.uk/m1b0s1p4945/GIANT-ANTHEM-X-2-2013 <

I would've said Hardtail for your budget, something steel that can take forks of varying lengths, try for 650b too if you plan on keeping it for a while...easy enough to do, On-One, Stanton, Cotic etc....

That said, i didnt realise the 650b 130mm FS Boardman was only £1000, i'd try and get a ride on that, read all the reviews i could find on the internet etc etc....the Sektor fork is fine, i have one on a hardtail, the x5/x7 2x10 drivetrain is also fine, funnily enough i had this on a complete build i got from On-One and despite my reservations and love of all things Shimano it has been great and lives on giving faultless service on the next bike i built.

Provided that Boardman rides ok with no silly angles or weird ride characteristics then thats where my money would go....jesus, we really are being ripped off by the big names in this sport!

Thanks for all the awesome feed back. I'm probably more lost than ever now hahaha. The more I read the better bike I want. Couple more questions. Am I taking a massive back step if I was to get a really good second hand 26inch?? And the other is I'm starting to like the sound of building my own bike but where do I start. I'm here on holiday at the moment and move here in December so seeing the weather won't be the best it could be a good chance to build 1.

I got myself a very nice, second hand, FS for your budget and as long as you don't mind have having out of vogue wheels, that'd be a good way to go. The classifieds on here are a good place to go looking for decent, gently used bikes (paint may be a bit thin from all the polishing though).

But as you're fairly new to riding i suggest a hardtail - new or second hand. There are many reasons for this and most are listed above. But the main reason is that it'll make you a better rider in the long run. Some might disagree with this, but they'd be wrong.

Question to the masses. Where are these trail centres that require a FS bike? I've only ridden the Scottish ones (apart from AE) and my considerably cheaper than £1200 hardtail was spot on. Are the English/Welsh ones really that much different?

I agree with bigdummy regarding good forks on a hardtail. That and a strong back wheel and you are good to go.

I'd go for a hardtail and then you can N+1 it with a full sus later - but the weather/ground conditions will suit a hardtail better - more time riding, less time building.

That said, you could certainly get a decent full sus if you shop around or go second hand.

Am I taking a massive back step if I was to get a really good second hand 26inch??

Not at all. You'll get a lot more for your money that way.

Question to the masses. Where are these trail centres that require a FS bike?

There arent any really.

I've ridden DH courses on my hartail...but i'm not as fast and it's a lot harder!
It's progression, FS exists to make our lives easier, unless you really like HTs then it makes sense to go with the best bike for the job which is usually FS these days....and i say that as a HT rider (Ragley Piglet 2 on 26s and On-One 45650b on 27.5s).

I will go as far as to say that FS can make you a lazy rider, it got to the point on my last FS bike that i was spending most of the ride sat down....it was like pedaling a big comfy armchair around the woods, nothing wrong with that i suppose but i got lazy with body positioning, weighting the bike etc....going back to a HT was a steep learning curve again.

re. building your bike, i took the plunge this year too, previously i'd bought complete or handed parts to the LBS and had them build it up.
This year i did it myself, pressed the headset with a C-clamp and a rubber mallet, cut the fork steerer with a plumbers pipe cutter....only thing i did concede defeat with was indexing the bloody gears, i couldnt get my head round it at all and had the LBS do it...there are Youtube videos out there that will talk you through everything so i'd happily give it another go.

I've ridden DH courses on my hartail...but i'm not as fast and it's a lot harder!
It's progression, FS exists to make our lives easier, unless you really like HTs then it makes sense to go with the best bike for the job which is usually FS these days

I've ridden DH on my hardtail too and although it's fun but it's hard fun. I'm not knocking FS, i bloody love mine and for some trails it is easily the best tool for the job. It's just i've read a few post on here recently where people wanted FS bikes for mostly trail centre riding and of the ones i've ridden (mostly here in Ireland and the Scottish ones) a hardtail is the perfect tool. The climbs aren't overly technical and the descents are trail centre smooth with the odd rocky bit. Just thought there might be more demanding ones that i've yet to ride that would be better on an FS.

p.s. I hated indexing gears too until i was told the secret. It's piss easy and I can share if you wish?

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