Will be looking to build my first fs on a tight budget over the next few months. Requirements:

1. tough. Not because I ride hard, just because I do misjudge things from time to time and when it comes to those ‘cling on and hope for the best’ moments, I would like to not be worrying too much about the frame snapping or whatever.

2, Cheap. very.

3. umm…not too fussed about travel, or sophistication, or pedalling.

I have an xc bike that I’m reasonably happy with. looking for something simple (single pivot?) to see what I like about fs.

the question is, is it possible to build a fun bike using a cheap-ass frame? I am thinking primarily about the likes of diamondback outlook, carrera titan, various saracen single pivots. all bikes that started out about £300 and look like the frames will take a decent shock as upgrade (eg 200 eye to eye. 50mm travel). prob 100 – 120 travel.

Or will I die?

You can get an old prophet frame cheap. Brilliant bikes. Exactly what you are after.

I got my old Idrive 5 for £150. Now, it was heavy, and pretty steep for a 5 inch bike, but it was a pretty effective bit of kit, I really liked some of what it did. Wouldn’t mind trying it again with a 150mm fork and maybe a slackening headset. Oh, and the Idrive setup is very undemanding on the shock so even the crappy Ario it had was up to the job.

For £150 it was blinding tbh.

I’ve just built up a Saracen Ariel 14X that I got for £345 off of EBay using the bits from my hardtail. It’s a huge amount of fun and hasn’t broken, despite several painful incidents resulting from a combination of lack of skill and an almost suicidal reluctance to buy new tyres.

Yeah as the others have said look around ebay and on here and there are a few second hand dealers about on the net. I got a 2007 Kona Coiler frame for £250 a couple of years back and built it up. It’s not light but it’s pretty bombproof!

Get a prophet, you won’t hardly notice any difference between one of them and the latest orange 5

I sold mine for £200, they go cheaper than that too

Won’t break, won’t need servicing and rides perfect.

Forget all them cheap piles of crap you mentioned

Thread ended I’d say

I have a taste for carbon Scott g-zeros, or the scandium/aluminium versions.

100mm travel. Can be had for peanuts these days, especially the alloy ones and are very light. Tough too. It took me 6 years to break the e-type bracket on my last one and I’m a 15 stone ex-MXer. My bro’s been running an alloy one for 8 years.

I’m just in the process of building up my broken frame as a 1×10 as a budget lightweighter.

Yes Prophet all the way,ive just done the same thing,awesome ride man.Built the whole thing,XT right through with talas 140’s and all nukeproof finishing kit for £950(with most of the good stuff coming of here)

You could do far worse than a Prophet.

On eBay at the minute. A bit rough round the edges, but you are buying from a shop so they will take returns. 260 plus postage seems reasonable enough… (not sure why it’s listed in Women’s Fragrances though)

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Cannondale-Prophet-17-inc-manitou-3-way-air-swinger-Shock-24039-/181153248307?pt=UK_Health_Beauty_Fragrances_Women_s_Fragrances_PP&hash=item2a2d933433

Prophet, 5, Heckler all ride nicely, and keep an eye out for a bargain..They do happen. I sold my old Sub5 for £350 complete, rideable with full Deore, Manipoos and Fox shock.

hmmm. really appreciate the views and the prophet does look exactly the type of thing I fancy. trouble is it’s still out of my price range.

I probably didn’t phrase my question well. I’ve been looking at frames such as I listed. I can’t see why one of them couldn’t be built into something fun. and they go for peanuts because the donor bikes were crap and no-one expects them to be good. like £30-60. but what could go wrong with a single pivot bike with a chunky braced swingarm?

has anyone tried polishing one of these turds and how did it go?

That’ll get you a scandium framed Scott, or would have last week on eBay. And yes, I have, and yes, they polish up just fine.

Here’s one I built for £150* (pink horn was extra):

*Some of the parts came from my previously upgraded junk pile.

Q: Do you ever see any of these frames with decent components as a new bike?
A: No, and there’s a reason for that…

Go with what everyone above is telling you to do. If your budget doesn’t stretch to a decently usable FS, then don’t get a cheap crappy one. Maybe keep an eye out for a Giant Yukon FX1/2/3? Think the frame on them is pretty decent quality, faux-bar suspension.

I like your style… this guy managed fine:

http://www.pinkbike.com/video/312784/

ebay and pinkbike classifieds should hopefully bear some fruit which you can shove righteously up the marketing mans jacksy… if they’ll fit, you could follow with a side-dish of some funny sized wheels. 😀

There was a chap on the BR forum who stripped, repainted and rebuilt an Apollo faux bar frame with half decent kit and he was saying it actually rode fairly well. Can’t for the life of me remember the name of the thread though. Northwind, I know you frequent there more than often, any ideas?

£60, frame might be rideable but you would need to spend twice that on forks and wheels to get close to half decent! Then you need a drive train and brakes that work well enough to not let the whole thing down! Then you need the rest, it would be hard on that budget!

uwe-r, I take your point, but I would need all that stuff anyway. It’ll be a slow build either way. I guess you’re saying that I should just save and get a 2ndhand bike? Well, fair point. It may come to that. This is one option, though and I wanted to know if anyone had gone down this route before I decide.

Jivehoneyjive – 😈

%thElefant, had a look at ebay and saw one frame that didn’t sell at £40 + £20 p&p. Think it was ended early rather than no-one else willing to bid that. Might be wrong…still that’s a cracker you’ve got!

Might leave it a bit and put my budget up to £100ish for the frame. That seems to open up more possibilities on ebay.

Perhaps you misunderstood… I’m wholly on your side~ there is sooo much bollocks around in order to sell people overpriced tat, whereas you are keeping it real.

I salute you… no sarcasm, mocking or disrespect~ in a world gone mad for consumerism, it’s nice to see someone rise above the brainwashing… choose wisely and you have more fun than someone who has shelled out 10x as much and is worrying if the designers are busily crafting something cooler with a proven 0000.1% performance advantage.

Sorry JHJ, I think I did misunderstand….the ‘twisted’ emoticon. I intended to convey pleasure at your sentiment of rebellion and ‘stickin it to the man’. Yeah, I think we’re on the same page and much props to the guy in that video you linked (though come to think of it, I’m not really sure what ‘props’ are….).

I note though that his bike did break…

I ride a Giant Yukon FS, which I bought new in 2009 for £310.
All I have left of the original bike is the frame, but its been built on a pretty tight budget and taken some serious abuse. 1oomm frame, but it runs a 130mm fork quite nicely. I gave it a new coat of paint last year too. Great bike for the money, and they’re quite common on Ebay, easily available for less than £100.
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Giant-Yukon-FX3-Full-Suspension-Mountain-Bike-Medium-/151076315756?pt=UK_Bikes_GL&hash=item232cd9a26c

So Scott g-zero, Giant Yukon and C’dale Prophet….

None of which were on my radar. They are now!

Maverick ml7/5 or ml8, piss all over the above. Bargains at the minute. Superb frames.

Having just seen the £50 marin in another post has reminded me of their dominance of the market back in the early noughties… not sure on pricing, but you should be able to pick up the newer shape for not too much… something like this:

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Marin-Alpine-Trail-17-fully-serviced-/181170866996?pt=UK_Bikes_GL&hash=item2a2ea00b34

or if you’re feeling the need for swanky suspension linkages:

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Marin-East-Peak-No-Reserve-/161056679335?pt=UK_Bikes_GL&hash=item257fb9e5a7

I ride a prophet I bought on ebay for iirc 180 ish it was going to be a spare bike to leave at work when going out from their. Everything else was cheapo bars stems, etc & bottom of the range shimano gears and brakes and two years later i’ve not had any problems with the kit and the bike is great. The only expense I had with the prophet were the forks – longer forks = bit more expensive but shopping around got me some reasonably priced marzocci’s and the headset – eventually needed to replace the reducer in it which was a little more expensive than a normal headset

This thread… http://singletrackworld.com/forum/topic/fun-on-a-50-susser …reminded me of my old rift zone that I rebuilt.

You can get the frames for £50 but most don’t have disc mounts. I used an a2z on mine. it didn’t sit square so I had to file the iso adapter to true it up. worked fine, but a bit of a faff.

There’s a while range of marine from the mid-90s onwards to chose from.

JHJ – they’ve gone on the watch list, thanks.

Loddrick – maverick, hmmm. I’ve not noticed them will defo keep em in mind.

kilo – 8)

So Scott g-zero, Giant Yukon and C’dale Prophet….
None of which were on my radar. They are now!

Add C’dale Rush and Mongoose Teocali to that list. Teocali is single pivot but with a linkage to give a floating BB, bearings are too small in the the link and wear fast but they’re cheap to replace.

will do, Simon, thx

but I’m still interested in hearing from turd polishers.

Anyone? Did you all die?

What about this?

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Gt-I-Drive-Full-Suspension-All-Disc-Mountain-Bike-18-Frame-/181167711075?pt=UK_Bikes_GL&hash=item2a2e6fe363

Kona, kona, kona!

They are ten a penny every bugger and his dog has a coiler, coil air, dawg, stinky or something similar lurking in the back of their garage, being common is what controls the 2nd hand prices

Mid 00s models are fine for what you want OP, sift eBay and pinkbike for long enough and you’ll find one, although winter is probably the best time to be shopping.

Just got back from a ride this morning on my prophet, first good test of some serious up hill, set in the slack setting with the talas set at 120mm, my god it climbs like a goat, no need to lock out, it just goes.you should buy one dude.

perversely, I still want to try one of the turds, but whatever I do I think I’ll prob heed cookeaa and wait until winter to do my shopping. was wondering about that anyway as previous motorbike purchases have shown the best deals to be had in the run up to christmas and in january when people either want going out money or are just skint after the festivities. I’m a bit bah humbug myself so just suffer the routine skintness that afflicts me all year round.

I’ll definitely look up this thread again at the time, so thanks all for the recommendations!