Just built up a new Transition bandit frame in 26er with Hope pro2 Evos on Stans Flow, all new 2×10 XT drivetrain with the new E-13 TRS+ chainguide, Haven stem and Haven carbon bars, RLT Ti Revs. Now all this cyber talk and magazine articles is making me doubt my choice, please tell me I’m wrong.

Yeah…they are good

How much for your wheels? 😆

You’ve made a dreadful mistake.

they aren’t magic, it’s still all about the rider, enjoy your bandit!

bikes are bikes mate……enjoy what you got, cos one day you wont be able to. 8)

I just can’t believe you’ve made such a fundamental mistake. Have you no close friends who might have let you know? I bet they’re all whispering behind your back now.

It’s all about choice isn’t it.

Try a few, see how you feel about em.

For some people they’re the be all and end all, for others they’re the work of the devil. I’m indifferent, a good bike is a good bike and wheel size doesn’t matter.

I do however REALLY want a go on a Whyte 929 though, but that might just be cos it looks so damned cool!

29″ is just a wheel size that lots of different bike designs use, from xc to burly long travel things, it’s not magic nor is an all encompassing panacea for riding woes. Don’t worry about, just ride the best bike in world…the one that makes YOU smile, everything else is just distraction and falsehood.

I can’t believe the bike shop had you over like that, selling you an obsolete frame. Fortunately for you Im a collector of retro bits and bobs and I could stretch to £450 if it is pretty much unridden 🙂

I would love to have your new bike mate, i would also love to have a new carbon 29er hard tail. If you like riding your bike on your regular trails then you made the right choice, i like different sorts of riding at different times, sometimes on the road as well, i wouldn’t use either mtb for that. The point being different tools for different jobs, it’s not that bigger deal imo.

Has no-one told you?
29er is dead.
27.5er is the new 26.

You mAde a huge mistake.

29ers have a lot going for them. I no longer ride 26ers… But just enjoy your bike.

What are these 29ers you talk about??

Charlie been up and down your site and loving this canfield screamy yellies!

I’ve just put that into Google translate but it can’t recognise the language

No easy way to say this …but ..”you f****d up”……….hth. 8)

Ah well will just have to enjoy what I have and beating the pants off two guys in our riding group on 29ers, by the way the bandit is a hoot! Perhaps Santa(the wife) will bring a 29er hardtail frame to give me something to compare with.

I was so worried about making the same mistake and having read this it has redoubled my determination to go for a 29″er. If I were to go 26″ then surely I would be simply throwing my money away.

Unless I got a 650b that is, which may be an even better idea… they are even newer.

Horses for courses. What sort of riding do you do IMHO I find 26″ better for the rocky stuff and 29″ for the flowy
Maybe it’s just because I’ve pringled my 29er wheels on rocks
As said it’s a bike enjoy it for what it is and not what folk on here say what you should ride because of the size of the wheels

That Bandit is an awsome bike. Wheel size won’t make any difference to how you enjoy it.

26er’s are making a come back now the heavy marketing is over and the realism is setting in. Just be glad you didn’t spend loads of money on a 29er discovering is only as much fun as your 26er.

An don’t be fooled by people who have bought a different 29er bike to thier original 26er – two different bikes/frames aren’t equal regardless thier wheel size.

Since this debate consists almost entirely of unscientific subjective comparisons of apples and oranges, let me throw in mine.

Over the last couple of weeks I’ve done decent length tests on a 29er hardtail, which I didn’t like much and a 26″ Orange Five, which I loved. So, there you go, proof conclusive that 29ers are rubbish 🙂

Cheers,

Andy

I recently bought a new hardtail..the salesman tried to sell me trek 29er which i took for a test run..got to say i realy didnt like it it just felt numb and very odd? i just cant get used to the look of them either there just wrong sorry chaps its a nil pois from me 🙂

I’m about to sell my Spark 40 and Pipedream H/T with a view to going 29ist………or, maybe, 27.5ist (Kryton57, I may need some help with indecision, here……. 😉 )

There are good and not so good 29er bikes out there, and good and bad 26ers out there as well.

I reckon you’ve bought yourself a great bike in the Transition Bandit. It’s not only about wheelsize, get out there and enjoy your new bike 😀

toxicsoks – Member

(Kryton57, I may need some help with indecision, here……. )

Easy. You need a Niner with the RDO fork (Or Reba if you’re going soft). I was looking at a One9 last night after my revelation to Single Speed.

It’s not about what you have it’s about what you do with it.

🙂 just don’t demo one for a few days,( specially the bandit 29 er)

Don’t worry, all is not lost.

Just buy some 29er wheels, cut the spokes down and fit some 26er rims – best of both worlds

Matt Page won the cyb enduro saturday on 650b’s………… 8)

and he would have lost in any other sized bike FACT

650 b is gonna rock , your bike sounds ace though, enjoy

Cheers sputnik it is ace just having trouble getting a rubber queen to seal properly on the front leaking air over a few days, any tips anyone?

You running a non UST tubeless with sealant? I’m doing the same, just keep adding air and take a pump when out riding to top up if needed, keep adding sealant. After a couple of weeks it stopped leaking.

I’m still laughing and pointing at you for making such a fundamental error of judgement..

See this gap:

That’s a finger pointing and laughing that is.

(secretly it’s all tosh, you’ve got a great bike, you just need to ride it hard and fall off it now and forget the last part of your sentence.)

Cheers bikebuoy! Well it was What Mountain Bike’s connoisseur’s choice, 4.5 out of 5, so can’t have made that big an error of judgement, but then again I’m no expert. 😀

29ers explained by rOcKeTdOgUk, on Flickr

anyone remember when trek released a few 69’er bikes a few years ago without all the marketing ? they bombed big time .
move on a few years and add millions in advertising and bought off magazine reviews and suddenly they’re the 2 wheeled second coming .

aggressive riders tend to hate them ,mountain roadies and beardy types seem to love them and the audi set buy them because the internet said their what the cool kids ride .

40% more inertia and 37% less stiffness for a given wheel weight does not turn a bike into a 2 wheeled miracle no matter what bikeradar says .

b45her YOU’RE MY HERO!!!!! 😉