Desperately seeking advice!

Obsessively searching for an n+1 fat bike, had my heart set on a surly (cos i think theyre cool), but had my head turned by a trek farley 7.

Sold my vagabond so have £500 towards it but looking to keep it below the £750 mark to keep wife explanations to a minimum (obviously looking at used). Trek Farley is £850 but immaculate and might be worth pushing the boundaries for.

Any experiences or advice would be great. Other option is to buy maybe a new wednesday frameset and build it over time, although that requires patience!

is it one with 27.5″ wheels? if so that’ll limit tyre choices as there are a lot more for 26″. you can retro fit 26″ wheels though. otherwise they are great bikes.

Apart from Surly’s weighing a metric ton & being overly pricey, no no dilemma as long as you choose anything that isn’t a Surly.

They also underspec them with complete shite parts that are mostly useless & fail to work alongside the fact that their own badged kit is frickin kak!

like the look of a lowside mind but it’s just a mad £1400 blip in the n+1 scenario.

No its the 26 inch version with 4.7 tyres. All black (which is obviously relevant :-))

tdog

Apart from Surly’s weighing a metric ton & being overly pricey, no no dilemma as long as you choose anything that isn’t a Surly…

If you are going to build from scratch, there’s nothing wrong with Surly frames though.

They can take a load of abuse and the frame weight is pretty irrelevant.

On a fatbike it’s all the other components that put the weight up. My Pugsley frame is only 1lb heavier than a similar fatbike alloy frame.

If you want to save money on a fatbike, the best way is to build up a Surly, early model 907 (or any of the offset frame types) because then the only fatbike specific parts you need are the rims, tyres, and the BB, thus avoiding the fatbike tax on special components. It also has the advantage of being a potentially lighter build.

+1 to epicyclo’s comment about frame weight. My Singular Puffin frame is only 300g heavier than the Singular Swift 29er frame. Both steel. The only other component (apart from the wheels/tyres) that is heavier than the standard bike equivalent is the crankset because of the longer spindle. Even the BB only needs a longer plastic tube – the Puffin with an EBB doesn’t even need that.

My wife has a Surly Wednesday which is definitely heavier (by about 2Kg) than the Puffin but 1Kg of that is down to the tyres (27tpi Nates). Then again it cost about half the price of what the Puffin would have cost new (previous owner had some custom wheels made for it). The only time the weight really becomes an issue is if she has to lift the bike over a gate or fence. It’s a bit slower to get up to speed but once rolling then the extra weight isn’t that noticeable.

If what you really want is a Surly, get a Surly. The weight difference is, as mentioned above, largely immaterial. You can also be pretty sure that Surly will still be making/supporting their bikes long after other manufacturers have jumped on the next bandwagon.

Far from being ‘frikken kak’ I’ve found Surly components to generally be functional and reliable, if not exciting.

My 2011 Moonlander Mk1 (and I live by the Sea so it’s had repeated dunkings) is still going strong on mostly original components. I don’t think a chainring and BB in that time is to be moaned about.

If you really want a Surly, get a Surly. Otherwise you’ll always be wondering what if.

The completes are expensive now, but in terms of lasting my nigh on 3 year old Pug (bought complete with 1 or 2 changes at time of purchase) has pretty much continued on without missing a beat from then till now.

My Wednesday has been faultless for 3 years but the only Surly component on it is the crankset. It’s OK but the Surly chainrings are made of cheese. I agree with the comments above that weight on a fatbike frame is not a big factor as everything weighs more. Hard to accelerate but good momentum once you are up to speed

Do it , bought a Trek Farley 9 Dec 2016, my other bikes , road, full suss have been used less than 5 times between them since, just use the Farley for everything, local beaches,Lakes singletrack Grizedale ,Whinlatter, just love it!! Always some good buys on UK Fat Bike Selling Page on Facebook.

I would pick the surly, there’s very little point in weight saving on a fat bike IMO, and the surly’s frame will ride better and last longer than an equivalent alu frame.  My karate monkey is 5 years old, takes a hell of a beating, rides super nice for a rigid bike, and it’s my favourite bike by far.  One day I’ll upgrade my dune frame to a moonlander when I’ve got the cash.

Why would you think a Surly would outlast an aluminium frame?
Surly’s frames are terribly designed and put together.
A mate had 2 pugslys break at exactly the same poorly designed welded junction. He now rides an aluminium frame and couldn’t be happier.
Having ridden loads weight definitely does matter on these things too.

I’ll give my usual advice on this.. if you are looking to try a fatbike as n+1 then go to Go Outdoors and by a Calibre Dune for £500. Upgrade the brakes if you want, and still be within your budget. Maybe look at the tyres on the new models though…

Or look on eBay and pick up a second hand one.

There’s a recent vid of Harry Main ragging the shit out of a Calibre Dune. He seems to likes it!

Don’t think I’d buy a bike off him, though!

There’s a nice On One Fatty Trail on the FB fat bike selling page (whistles)

Just get a Fatty/Fatty Trail/Dune off one of the facebook pages second hand, or ebay.  There’s one on facebook at the moment with the Alpkit ‘Jones’ bar prototypes on it for £400 which is a a bargain (IMO) if you’re medium.

p.s. if anyone wants it and not the bars I want the bars!

geex

Why would you think a Surly would outlast an aluminium frame?

Surly’s frames are terribly designed and put together….

Experience. My 1998 1×1 is still perfectly good, as are all the 1x1s I know off.

A small batch of Pugsleys did have a glitch with a welding fault but that was sorted under warranty – for some reasons just the white ones were affected AFAIK.

However my first generation Pugsley has shown no weaknesses and I know quite a lot of Pugsley owners also with no complaints.

What’s wrong with the design? They hold together well, and the handling is good.

If you’re worried about weight, a fatbike is probably not something you should be considering unless you have deep pockets.

A frame being heavy isn’t an issue if that brings with it some advantages. I’m struggling to see why it’s acceptable otherwise. Fact is, there’s no need to pay the niche tax these days when other options exist.

Not exactly a technical reply but i had a Surly (Pugsley) and never really liked it.  Bought a Farley and love it.  Very quick and fun to ride, often take it in place of my Remedy.  Only downside is the cheese wheels and lack of 27.5 rims.

Another bit of anecdotal “evidence”.

I “upgraded” my Surly ICT to a Canyon Dude. Used the same wheels and most of the same finishing kit but still shed nearly 5lb.

Strange thing is, now I’ve racked up over 100 hours on both bikes, riding the same trails around the North East of Scotland, the average speed on both bikes is identical (to one decimal place). Given that there was over 80,000′ of climbing over those 100 hours I’d have expected to see some difference.

By contrast, switching the JJ tyres for Bud/Lou drops the average speed by almost 10% (yes I am geeky enough to keep separate stats for different tyres). Some of that will be down to different tyres being used in different conditions of course, but it shows once again that tyres are a lot more important than weight.

The lighter Dude is easier to carry, but if I’m honest the ICT is more fun.

I have had a few half hearted attempts to sell the ICT frame, but it’s clear that there is very little interest even at half the current RRP. I’m now thinking I may keep the ICT and sell the carbon fibre frame instead, although only time will tell if there is any interest in that. It’s certainly a good time to be buying a second hand fatbike 🙂

I wouldn’t bother about frame weight either, i have a surly karate monkey, built up out of my parts bin, it was chosen to go with some tyres i already owned.

i now use 29×3” surly knards on it.

everyone who lifts/rides it is surprised by how ‘not heavy’ it is.

(I wouldn’t call it light, but it’s certainly not heavy for a plus bike)

i have no idea what it actually weighs.

@roverpig – I’d expect to lose 2Kg+ moving from a steel frame and fork to carbon fibre. You are hardly comparing like with like 🙂

From up-thread: my Puffin is – steel frame, carbon forks, custom wheels using Industry Nine hubs and Sun Ringle Mulfut rims with 45Nrth Husker Du tyres and a 1x drivetrain. The weight is 14.5Kg.

My wife’s Wednesday is: steel frame and forks, standard wheels with My Other Brother Daryl rims, 27tpi Surly Nate tyres and a 2x drivetrain is 16.5Kg.

Componentry is much the same, the front derailleur and lever will add a small amount but the items causing the weight difference are the forks and the tyres.

I’ve two sets of tyres for the Puffin: Husker Dus and Vanhelgas, I’ve not checked but the Vanhelgas are a lot slower on firm ground especially tarmac where the drag from their aggressive tread is noticeable.

Perhaps the difference is that the Wednesday is aimed at rides where you need to carry “stuff” for some distance whereas the Puffin is almost a trail bike. That’s not to say either bike can’t do both tasks, Aiden Harding used a Puffin on the Iditarod for example.

The fact that the carbon bike weighed 5lb less than the steel one (with the same wheels etc) wasn’t surprising. What was surprising was that it made bugger all difference to my average speed.

What % is the 5lb when compared to mass of bike + rider.

I sure noticed a difference going from a 38lb first gen rigid sandman to a 32b (rohloff/maverick) 9zero7

The Wednesday frame isn’t that heavy for a steel frame, 2.6kg -ish,  I don’t get the “heavy frame” thing some people are banging on about here,  my steel stanton switchback mk1 frame is ~2.4kg.  200g difference is nothing that can’t be saved elsewhere if it means that much to you.

Fatbike wheels and tyres are where the weight is,  somewhat offset overall by the light weight of rigid forks if you go that way, and going tubeless is essential IMO, the whole bike doesn’t feel too heavy, and defies it’s weight when actually riding.

Anyway, it’s also a great trail bike, quite long, low, slack for this type of bike, & very capable if you build it up with a short stem & wide bars. dropper, etc, it’s been designed to take 100mm blutos if you want, but I’m more than happy without tbh.

I bought frame, crank with 1×11, dropper, reasonable wheels off ebay & tyres when on offer ,the rest came from my parts bin, albeit with a few upgrades since, it’s been one of my cheapest bikes <£1300, but one of my favourites to ride.

Cant speak for the alloy Farley but the 9.6 is a great bike looks lush think fatties should have fat tubes look a lot smarter just me.

Check out smokestone bikes also travers bikes

To those saying light fatbikes miss the point. I’ve found lighter fatbikes far nicer to ride. And by ride I mean change direction, sprint, corner and jump not plod through miles and miles of dull terrain that no one with narrower tyres would ever even want to ride with half a steering wheel for handlebars.

Pretty sure you’ve said that anyone who enjoys even plus tyres is riding boring trails slowly, so not sure what you want people to make of that? 🙂

Geex, I think it’s you missing the point. If you want a sharp handling, lively ride then a fat bike is the wrong bike. Just stick to normal sized tyres.

Fat bikes take you places that normal mountain bikes can’t. If you find that terrain dull then fair enough but why bother with massive tyres in the first place? I spent last Saturday on the Fife coastal path riding all kinds of terrain. One minute was woody singletrack, then next was on the beach. Beach doesn’t necessarily just mean sand either. In six miles it went from wide open sandy to big techy rock lines and mini boulder fields. No other type of bike would have coped with all of that.

From riding with various big groups of fat bikers I’ve came to the following (wildly generalised conclusion). There are two types of fat bikers, those that bought it to ride in the conditions they were designed for and those that bought as n+1.

N+1 want suspension forks, fast rolling tyres, “trail geometry” and light weight. What they want is for it to feel like a normal mountain bike.

Explorer types aren’t too bothered about these things.

Both styles of bike will do any type of riding anyway, but decide which way your leaning and pick accordingly.

clubby.

N+1 want suspension forks, fast rolling tyres, “trail geometry” and light weight. What they want is for it to feel like a normal mountain bike.

Well said.

I reckon the N+1 urge would be better satisfied with that spec but with 3″ tyres instead of full fat. Some of the current models with plus wheels look “right” – which is usually a good guide.

Some great advice and experiences, a great help.

Sort of angling towards an ice cream truck, possibly a frameset and build up over time (grrr) due to cost restrictions.  Although that being said ive nearly gone for the farley a a coiple of times the last few days as its ready to go and a nice looking bit of kit.

Beach is under 2 miles from my house hence the fat urge along with pull of just being a fun ride.  If its capable at the trail centre it will also replace my steel hardtail.  Also possibly use it on next years graveldash

Buy the one with the best/lightest wheels.