[Closed] The Bike You Wish You'd NEVER Had

This one! I know people rave about them but, honestly, I didn't get on with it at all. Rattled my old bones to bits.
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What is it, Stevied?

Mine was a hideous Giant thing - I don't even know what model it was. I started my off-road riding career on that awful contraption. Never looked at another Giant again.

The first hire bike I had in Afan, can't remember the brand of the model but that f***** hated me and threw me at every opportunity. Was heavy and unresponsive and continually got stuck and smashed me in the shins with its pedals.

Lot of hate for that bike - more than I thought I did actually.

Chas Roberts custom build Genesis. So beautifully made, but rode like shit and was made of butter grade steel.

What is it, Stevied?

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Trek VRX200.

I'd saved enough for a Marin Mount Vision, but the VRX had 50% off. Because they hadn't sold many. Because they were awful.

thank god MTB tech and aesthetics have moved on from that ^^ :O

Any road bike. Some are nice but they're ultimately boring as hell.

I am sure that the U-brake was ace in California 🙄

[i]Not mine,from retrobike[/i]..

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One of these:
[img] http://www.retrobike.co.uk/forum/download/file.php?id=29479 [/img]

Not mine....from retrobike

I also had a Massi full suspension bike.....what a pile of rubbish that was. It rode like a bag of junk and came apart in no time. Had a warranty repair and it looked as if someone had bodged it together with lumps of putty and chewing gum before painting it. Talk about agricultural.

Any road bike. Some are nice but they're ultimately boring as hell

Kona Manomano (1997 vintage).

Someone had tried to nick my Orange C16R from the uni bike shed but bent the frame trying to snap the lock so stripped it instead. Insurance cheque came through and it was exactly as much as the local bike shop wanted for their ex-demo Manomano.

It was a bit crap really. Heavy, terrible forks, rear suspension wasn't great either even by late 90s budget standards. Just bounced like a pogo stick on climbs and did very little on the downs. Was partly responsible for me not riding for quite a few years after uni, until I stumbled on a cheap On-One offer for a rigid geared Inbred and got back into it. Manomano got cleaned up and sold on ebay for some other mug to endure.

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An Orange P7 circa 97-ish. Coming off a lower level Kona I thought it'd be an upgrade, but everything about it felt wrong. Nickel plating looked amazing though. Sold it after a few months to a friend who loved it.

We've done this recently, but...
Alpinestars Cro-Mega DX
Horrible lumpen dead thing compared to the Kona's I had either side.
(not my bike pictured - it wasn't that big or with that long a stem)
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Thankfully, working for a bike shop at the time, made it easy to move it on.

2006 Spesh S-Works Enduro.

Put me off FS's for years - not sure why...

2010 trek remedy. HATED it. Tried not to but just couldn't get on with it. I loved the trek fuel that I had before it that was stolen. The remedy was the insurance replacement. It's the only bike I've ever had that I didn't like at least a bit.

I demo'd an Enduro around 2006 and absolutely hated it too. So glad I properly rode it before buying it.

1. The Pashley PDQ (pretty dire and quirky IMO)
2. Dawes Tracker the second, 2009, purchased from Ebay 20 years to the month since my first one ie my first MTB.

Lesson learned: You can't always revisit old flames expecting to be re-united blissfully... especially if said flame is the wrong ***** size even though advertised otherwise! In this instance my knees were also reunited with my chest.

Sad really as I seriously appreciated and totally ragged the first one - up hill and moor, up and down mountains, commuted, toured, pretty much lived on the thing - even if it was a size or two too big.

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Gt Xizang.Chain sucked so much. Ended up with me giving it the full Basil Fawlty on it's last ride.

Orange P7.

The 17" felt like a toy, so I bought a 19".

The 19" felt like a gate.

Just couldn't get on with it, I know its alot of peoples favourite though.

Didn't actually own, but the bike that surprised me in testing (after great reviews) was trek fuel ex. Hated it for some reason, felt like riding a wheelbarrow. And yet most people love them. Horses for courses and all that.

Not sure I should wish I never had it, because it was my first MTB since the mid-90's and the bug really bit me.

This isn't mine, I found it on Google, it highlights one of it's issues quite well actually.

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The photo is date stamped 1999 - but I bought it new in 2005 - I bought into the then new Ride2Work scheme in work, but had to get it from Halfords.

So it was a 6 year old design, dressed with the cheapest parts Halfords could throw at it. I snapped the first ISIS BB clean in half, and knackered the following 5 replacements, I tried everything from the cheapest to the most expensive but they never lasted long.

The front wheel taco'd and sent me off into the undergrowth after the full force of a 5mph 2" jump, the rear hub cracked. The RST fork collapsed, the bars bent, the brakes were useless and the chain snapped.

The funny I-Drive pivot thing in the middle died finally, it took 4 weeks to get the parts.

It cost me £600 in a sale, I replaced the wheels with some lovely Deore / Mavic entry level wheels, the forks with some nice cheap Marz MX Lo, the brakes with some hydraulics and most of everything else I think I spent about another £800 either repairing or replacing everything to keep it going over the 12 months I owned it - in the end I chucked in the towel and spent a few grand on a new bike - I couldn't give the GT away, in the end a young lad knocked me down to £125 for it and did the only thing worth doing with it - threw the frame in the bin and put all the nice stuff on a decent frame - he must have thought it was Xmas.

Raleigh Apex.

why, oh why didn't i buy the Kona Firemountain instead?

i'll tell you why, the Raleigh had a flex-stem, which i thought would be awesome.

it was crap.

Raleigh Montage, waaaay too big for me and an absolute POS.

At least it made me want to get a decent MTB I suppose.

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not my photo, but one of these. utter tosh.

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This, this was all colours of shite...

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Just one, the Dare. Even it served a purpose, it cost me nothing really other than a couple of wasted uplift days, and helped me work out what a not-shit dh bike should feel like. But it rode like it looked.

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My C456 was a decent bike but I regret buying it, because of the piss poor build quality and On One's subsequent lying their way out of the warranty. Did lose money on that. But I still enjoyed the bike, it was the overall experience that was sour.

ononeorange - Member

I demo'd an Enduro around 2006 and absolutely hated it too. So glad I properly rode it before buying it.

After the disastrous I-Drive I actually bought a 2006 Enduro Expert - era considered, easily the best bike I ever owned - had it as my main bike for 5 years.

Horses for courses I guess.

My me!! That's a blast from the past, my first MTB in 1986 was a 21" Dawes Tracker that I could grow into...

Have to admit it was mainly the color that put me off, that and it weighed a ton.
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Giant NRS XTC, utter pants, not helped by a mega flexy fork. Oddly STW gave it a pretty darn good review, as such I've never trusted them ever since.

The two that I'd had that spring to mind are:

Orange Patriot 66 - god I hated that bike. So much so that it managed to put me off riding for a while. The idea behind it was that I could sell my DH bike and hardtail and this should do both. The reviews seemed positive but it was awful.

The other bike I really hated was a Norco Sasquatch hardtail. It was just grim and was quickly replaced by an Orange Sub Zero.

I like the Enduro's of 2006 - I thought they were great.

My Proflex Animal, not my pic (borrowed from retrobike). Always wanted a Proflex after riding a freinds 854 for the day. Worst mistake ever, horrible ride.

[URL= http://i307.photobucket.com/albums/nn304/teadrinker1977/Proflex%20animal%201997_zpsgsysy5ck.jp g" target="_blank">http://i307.photobucket.com/albums/nn304/teadrinker1977/Proflex%20animal%201997_zpsgsysy5ck.jp g"/> [/IMG][/URL]

On One Summer season in raw, a pile of shite with all the subtlety that you'd expect from a load of scaffolding poles. Never took a pic, and if I had I'd have deleted it. Hateful thing!

swavis, I bought one, rode it round a 40 mile cross fell circuit, and sold it the next day. it was pretty horrible.

Ha ha, almost identical to my experience, I think I only managed about 20 miles though 😆

Giant NRS - I bought the frame on here after breaking my bike that I posted in the other thread.

I did two or three rides on it and it then cracked. Well, I'm pretty sure it was already cracked when it arrived but I didn't check properly so there you go... As to the suspension, well the NRS design is pretty pap I reckon - you could get it to behave like a suspension bike if you didn't set it up as it should be - eg not locked out or if you did set it up locked out then it behaved as intended but that wasn't actually very good.

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I suppose at least it looked ok.

Ooo, I've got two: Proflex 857. Worse than that was an Ellsworth ID, weird geometry, far too high BB. My riding improved no end when I got an Orange 5 after that POS ......

loads............ and some will be peoples all time greats

Marin Pine Mountain .....17 oo small 19 like a gate
Marin Mount Vision........single pivot and capable but just did not fit me
Santa Cruz Bullit .....climb like an anchor
Intense Tracer......woeful bike and between sizes again
Nicola CC.....just not sure
Foes fxr wanted too love it but wrong size

Two bikes I own are on this thread.They both have their plus & minus points...
Specialized Enduro 2005.I like it but it's
A) To much bike for most stuff I do but great in the Alps.
B) The most expensive bike I've ran.I've not used it for 5 years but as I'm back in the Alps this summer it needs refurbishing.Fox front & rear will need a service plus new cables ,possible bottom bracket,every time I get the bike out it costs me money!
The other bike is the Giant NRS,bought it new in 2007.It's a 70 degree head angle & I've had some crashes on it,especially after being on the slack angled Enduro.It's really tired now & I recently bought a Anthem to replace it but I'll still use it as the 'winter hack'
[URL= http://i631.photobucket.com/albums/uu38/MarkF-XT/CYCLING%20STUFF/DSC_3754-NRSweb.jp g" target="_blank">http://i631.photobucket.com/albums/uu38/MarkF-XT/CYCLING%20STUFF/DSC_3754-NRSweb.jp g"/> [/IMG][/URL]

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climbed like an utter dog in the granny ring (it compressed the bottom link every pedal stroke, effectively shortening the chain stay half an inch).

Taking it to Colorado for 2 weeks and riding it at 11,000ft meant a lot of granny ring climbs. My most coveted bike turned out to be the most disapointing.

I also had one of these (pic courtesy of mtbr/google, not mine, I didnt own a digital camera in them days)

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the seat stays flexed sideways as much as the suspension actually worked, but it was so light and pimpy (and most FS of the time were similarly crap) I forgave it.

Raleigh Apex.

Ha, still have one of those, in original pearlescent dusky pink. Call it 'The Ape' as it's missing the 'x'. (Am clever like that)

Flex stem was immediately binned, bike became an adventure MTB that I liked in a weird 'strap anything to it treat it like utter sh*t but it keeps going' kind of way. Buckled the the rear wheel big time out in the boondocks once, managed to bring it back true-ish with a rusty pair of pliers to complete the trip. Those spokes are now rounded and will never again be moved. This bike refuses to die but now sulks unused at the back of the shed.

Reynolds K2 tubing is a mystery.

Cannondale m600 in Red White and blue, looked nice but after my kona explosif (which I regret selling immensely before a long trip abroad) was like riding on a concrete Jack in the box.

for my 15th birthday my brother got me this horrible piece of sh***...he must have hated me badly!
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(not the actual one but same colour...i was too embarrassed to take a picture of it)

frame felt like it was made from scaffolding poles
brakes were non-existent
gears never worked
wheels were made of some type of cheese and weighed a tonne
fork was useless...no travel unless you weighed the same as an elephant

i had my first OTB on it
i even tried pimping it out but it still looked and rode like shit
in the end i dismantled it and left it in a skip