[Closed] First 'proper' Mountain Bike - Pictures and words please

1991 Marin Pine Mountain bought second hand in 1994.

Page 9 here:

Mine was a Carrera Kraken in perhaps 2000 or 2001. Bought a size too big and the gearing (28:38:48 and 11-28) wasn't great for an unfit beginner actually riding it off-road but it got me started. Not sure if I've any pics of it though.

After I moved onto better things (next bike was a Kona Kahuna) I created a rigid commuter out of it and ran that for a while before finally selling it.

Love those old Marins, you still see the occasional ones knocking about. It's something about those colour combinations, excellent!

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1990 Marin Muirwoods.

Coldplay may even have written a song about it:

[i]So then I took my turn
Oh what a thing to have done
And it was all yellow[/i]

Haha, brilliant! 😀

Hi-Tec Silver Shadows too?

Those frame bags were class too, perfect for holding a mid ride Marathon Bar!

[i]Hi-Tec Silver Shadows too?[/i]

Some manner of Dunlop things, iirc.

LocalMotion - [i]surely[/i] the Rapha of their day. 😀

Mid nineties, all i remember is it was a rigid Marin...

My first proper bike was a 1996 kona hahanna. Wish i still had it, would make an ideal commuter now.

noteeth - Awesome shorts!

GT Karakoram, in "inferno" red

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OMG. I sooooo wanted one of those Karakorams 🙂

I had to make do with a 1990 (or maybe '91) Raleigh Highlander in white, green and pink, with shimano 100gs!

Can't find any photos of said bike unfortunately.

Bring back splatter paint jobs!

GT Timberline, can't recall year, but def early nineties. Also had a sort of splatter type paint job.
[url= http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2688/4247220571_a9ed645e99_b.jp g" target="_blank">http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2688/4247220571_a9ed645e99_b.jp g"/> [/img][/url]
[url= http://www.flickr.com/photos/hoppy66/4247220571/ ]Me old GT Timberline[/url] by [url= http://www.flickr.com/people/hoppy66/ ]Hoppy66[/url], on Flickr

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I had an Emmelle cougar which my Dad made me buy (sold the burner). Borrowed an early rockhopper and a ridgeback from mates. But this was the result of slogging washing up in the Royal William, Cranham. was a true revelation, therefore my first proper mtb.

1992 Scott Peak,cromoly,weighed a ton, but fun!

Raleigh Montana fully rigid, steel, king of the road. Got it in around 92 from a mate who bought it out of his mothers catalgoue to ride to work on, he never did ride it, though he did go on to win £5m on the lottery so I doubt he needs it now. But I took it upto Scotland with me when I joined the Navy and it did many a mile. Gave it to a mate to look after when I went off to sea for 3 months and came back to find it minus a saddle and front wheel. Searched for photos everywhere but can't find any 😥

Mine was a GT Timberline in white with black 'cracks' in the paint, early 90's

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got nicked from my mates garage 🙁

muddy fox courier comp around 1987

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cannodale SM700 around 1991, neither are pics of mine but both had PJ2 forks on 🙂

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Look at the geometry! They were just roadies on chunky tyres!

Emmelle courtina XL with smoked paintwork like a Diamond Back. Prob around 1990. It was a 21'' frame which apparently I would grow into. Only ride 18/19'' frame now :O)

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can't find a pic of my actual bike but it was exactly like this.

1996/97 Scott Yecora - loved it. It was stolen from my father in-laws whilst I was moving house and I only found out recently that it was my then smack head ex-brother in law that stole it!

I'm another on who brought a fluro yellow marin muirwoods in 1990 and I loved that bike, put XT thumb shifters on it, fab....... Then it was stolen and I was gutted.

A 1998 Marin Bolinas ridge. The old steel marins from around that age (97 - 99) always looke really classy.

I still have the frame & forks and a few other bits knockig about.

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Rode MILES on that

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1989 Cannondale SM600. Not that one, mine had 531 forks, Mountain LX thumbies and U brake. Crappy Chinook rims too, broke quickly so I ended up with a Massive Mavic M6 CD instead.

Stayed with me until it was nicked in 1996, albeit in 'race' spec, flexstem, XT/XTR mix and lots of purple..

'96 Kona Fire Mountain - still got it, though the frame is the only remaining original component. It also happens to be the only bike I currently own that I don't have a decent pic of...

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1986 Diamond Back Arrival. Mine is smaller tghan this by miles and looks much more 'normal bike geometry'.

Still got it, complete with most original bits except the forks which bent frequently. My dad still rides it occasionally.

Rode cyclocross on it and the early Surftracks events at Blandford.

U-brakes were shite in mud, weren't they?

cindercone, the same time as the explosif above. loved that bike. then got a GT avalanche, splatter paint etc

After a few loaners from mates, bought a Principia Mac B ex-demo. It had been to a few mags for review, including Cycling Weekly.
So, this is my very bike-
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Then the frame was stored for years, recently to be resurrected
(with a few improvements since this pic)
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Rode it down to the bike shop and back just now 🙂

My first proper mtb was a 95 Kona Lava Dome and my mate still owns it grrr. It came with P2 forks, XT thumbies and a Exage ES chainset. It was a cracking bike and still is and I'd love to get it back off him too. Heres a picture of it how is today.
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Doesn't look improved to me - make worse more like 😛

2001 DMR Trailstar. I used it from 2005 til about last xmas when I discovered it had a crack in the headtube weld. This is the only pic I can find of it now.

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Now riding a Trailstar LT 🙂

mine was a saracen tuff trax in 1989. Lived in sheffield so used to ride it all round the north peaks even did some night riding with one cheap cat eye on the handlebars, not great on a fully rigid bike and after a few pints in the pub.

Happy day

'92 Kona Fire Mountain.
Gets ridden 10x more than anything else I own.
Now fully rigid again, and of course, converted to single-speed.

Not the best ever picture tho' ... that camera has funny ideas about perspective, it's a 19" frame, so it's a gate by comparison to more contemporary frame designs, but, it ended up looking like a child's bicycle here.

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It would appear that Chewbacca has stolen your bike...

How cool are pre-98 Kona's!

Hadge, that Lava Dome is just so right. Petty it's not still yours...I understand your plight.

Diamondback Outlook, uh, mid-90s I think. 1994? Maybe.

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Spent two summers getting hammered and the next ten years in my front room as a handy storage place for dust, until I 'rediscovered' biking about 18 months ago and quickly realised that it wasn't up to the job.

Rigid GT Timberline - bought second hand in the mid 90s for £220.
Still got it (altho has a very erratic set of Indy XCs on it rather than the original rigids - which to this day I regret binning 🙁
Still going strong
Still commute to work on it and rode John O Groats to Land's End on it in April this year. I love that bike 🙂

'92 Diamondbck Ascent which got trashed in 4 months and replaced by a Trek 9000 - a very early full susser. I wish splatter paint jobs would come back in fashion 🙂

Mine was a Raleigh Discovery, about 1989, then wished I'd bought a Kona Lavadome like my mate had, it finally died in '01 after many years of commuting. Then got a Hardrock that I still use for commuting in the winter.

Me too on the splatter paint, Diamondbacks were great bikes in the 90's.

glenh - Member
Doesn't look improved to me - make worse more like

Oh yes, MUCH worse than it was in the 90s, but better than it was when that photo was taken!

My first "mountain bike" was a bright orange Falcon Nevada, this was in the early 90s, it served me well. Try as i might i've not been able to find any pictures online of it....

Started with an old 12 speed apollo Colorado, before halfords enticed me again with the then spectacular 21 speed LX sti Apollo Kiliminjaro. Many miles ridden on that 'beast'. Followed up by the fantastic Ridgeback 706RS ( would love to find a picture of it somewhere on the web), 21 speed XT with front suspension. Loved it. Orange E2 followed in 1992/3 which was full xtr but snapped on me so replaced with Orange E3 xtr, the next day fitted some mag 21's which trnsformed this beauty. Rode for years upon years before a coyote ultralite titanium back in 1998 with Judy DH's took it to another level. Airbourne lucky strike titanium followed, then turner 5 spot and then added carbon spesh stumpy.
Not alot of bikes but all gave me experiences that were amazing

Good thread. 🙂

it needs referencing to...

www.retrobike.co.uk

Lots of your first bikes and first dream bikes on there too.

🙂

First "proper" MTB was for me 2007 GT Avalanche Expert, no pics though.

This pic came via Google images but it's almost exactly the same as mine:

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Saracen Sahara Elite, my first MTB bought for my 16th birthday (1993). Used it for ages, did loads of great rides on that (rides where people now seem to think that you need 6" travel, 2.3" tyres and a Saint groupset for the XXXC trails...)
Note please the neat cable routing (very rare back then, it was usually a right mess!), the radical 1" travel forks and the 28/38/48 chainset coupled with a 12-28 7sp cassette. 🙂

Even did a few races on it, upgraded it lovingly over the years (changing the own-brand forks on it for the super plush long travel of some RockShox Quadra 21R's!). Eventually the frame was the only original thing left. It also originally came with loads of Ritchey parts which were, without exception utterly shit. I refused to buy Ritchey parts ever again after that.

I eventually gave the bike away to a local kids cycle club.

1991 alpinestars cro-mega DX, had it from new sold it this year.

This was my first proper mountain bike circa 1987, well not this one but it was just like it.

The original Raleigh Maverick

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1988 Kona Lava Dome - don't have any digi pics, they would all be on film.

19" frame. Bought from Aire Valley Cycles. Ended up with Pace RC36 EVO2 forks, hope/X517 wheels and full XT kit. Eventually frame upgraded to a Kona Kula - the only bike I really regret selling.

Sold the frame to some bloke via Bikemagic classifieds, met him in a services on M1 vaguely near Bedford in about 2001.

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Pic from:
http://www.klassickona.com/oldgold/98bikes/lavadome.html

Another Muddy Fox Courier rider here, then I had one of these;
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Farmer John's Cousins, Tioga T-Bone, Mountain LX, Araya RX7s and possibly the best paint job EVER!

Peugeot tim gould replica (the cheap one), tried google for an image but no joy. Put a rockshox sticker from mbuk on the pogo stick forks it came with but unfortunately it did nothing for the damping lol!
Good memories of that bike, the first bike i didn't break on a weekly basis.

Another Lavadome here, fully rigid. Actually started on a Muddy Fox Courier but the Lavadome was my first 'real' bike. Swapped it for a brand new Carrera of some sort - took me about two rides to regret it 🙁

So.... A few years back I started looking for another one and eventually found a Hahanna almost exactly similar on ebay. Snapped it up for £50-ish.

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Saracen Tufftrax in 1995.

Bought it from a mate who had a serial bike habit so it was hardly ridden and in perfect nick for £180. Similar to the one below:

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Don't remember much about it spec-wise but it had Kona P2 forks and some kind of rapid-fire shifters. I can still remember my first ride on it, from Ullapool, up Glen Achall and back by Strath Nimhe. It felt like some kind of magical conveyance with hunners of gears and would go up anything. Rode it for about 3 years, fully rigid, including some big days like Laggan to Spean Bridge via Corrieyairick Pass, Fort Augustus and Great Glen Way (before it was named so).

Sold it to a mate for £120 and he still has it, gathering dust in his garage.

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My 1991 Scott Montanna next to the new bike.
It used to have a Girvin Flex Stem now its got some Mag21 SLTi's
In the new year it will be back in the peaks for its 20th birthday ride 🙂

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Muddy Fox courier too but I had the big yellow paw wheel disc on - thought it was the bomb.

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have been riding some of the old trails I used to ride the courier on recently but now on a Zesty - how did we do it????

muddy fox courier around 86/ 87 i reckon.

also had one of those squiggely painted gt karakorams a good few years later. brush painted over it in gold hammerite 😯
saw it in my mums garage when i was there a while back, couldn't believe it's not been skipped. brought back some memories 😀

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A 2008 Trek 4500 WSD - lovely little bike, but on hindsight far too short for me. The Trekadee has gone on to a new owner, a young girl that's depressingly better than I'll ever be! 😆

*grumble* Couldn't even ride a bike at her age *grumble*

2005 Gary Fisher GED.

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Except it came with the next years Drop Offs (The decent looking all black ones) Replaced it with a Turner Rail last year, and then rebuilt it and tried to sell the Turner, then rebuilt the Turner, so now the GF is in the shed, needing some chainring bolts to be rideable.

Some beautiful bikes on here, still think the early Konas look lovely. That Scott is awesome Andy W, it's great that you're keeping it going.

another raleigh maverick.

Stu_N - That Lava Dome really does look great, I remember being after one in 97, they looked great.

My first mtb was a peugout raider like this one ...
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but i crashed it and ended up getting a custom build replace frame from the factory through insurance .... even had a custom built in france sticker on it !

it got stolen years and years later.

Nothing fancy. ca. 1990 a Professional Matterhorn with a tasty red/white/blue fade paint, and then ca. 1994 a Hawk of some sort. I remember it had underbar shifters and was satin black. I even stuck some slicks on it and went TTing with it.

1995 Univega Alpina 502, this one isn't mine.

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I loved that bike...it got stolen from about 6ft from where I was sitting!!

My first proper MTB was a second hand Diamondback Ascent way back in 1988.
Shitty plastic exage brake levers and an under the chainstay u brake.

Same as this but with a pink Cosmic Trail frame bag and matching pink cables.

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