Forge vs Switch9er:: New Hardtail Decision Time

Long story short, I’m in the market for a new hardtail and narrowed the search down to either of these contenders.

Usage: Red/black/naturals use – I’m based in the middle of 7 Stanes country so it’ll be used for a bit of everything – long days out in the hills and short blats round the local Reds and Off-Piste.

I’ve got an old 26″ Soul which is on child-seat duties so totally sold on a nice steel frame, can’t stretch to Carbon or Ti & don’t really want Alu for this one.

I love my main bike (Bird Aeris mk 1.5) but at 5 years old and *lots* of hammer its starting to need more and more TLC of late, hence the desire for a deputy for if/when it’s needing bearings/bushes/general fettling works.

Really happy with Bird as a brand and company – I’ve been well looked after as a customer so zero qualms about ordering from them again. Always hear good things about Stantons too (the Switch9er won Enduro mag’s hardtail review) so it’s definitely a contender too.

Any feedback on either? Anyone managed to get, build up and actually try one a Forge yet? They only went on sale a week or so ago so it’s a bit of an unknown – albeit pretty safe – option?

Thoughts??

Still need to bump these?

i know Bird do it with all their bikes, but it really rubs me the wrong way that the frame is £695 but doesn’t include the rear axle, which is an additional £20

That minor gripe aside, it’s a lovely thing. Geometry looks right, that teal colour is ace.

Aren’t the Forge’s frame only? Can’t see complete builds on their site anywhere.

Aye, soz should have made that a bit more obvious. Buying frame only and will raid the parts bin / eBay / LBS stock for the rest of build.

Bird do that so you can pick your axle broadly don’t they – normally offer Allen key / qr versions.

Plus for £695 with 831 top / downtube s and 4130 the rest + a bling paint finish that seems about right.

The Switch9er is £649 for Taiwan 4130 with standard paint job. £100 to upgrade the paint job or £940 for a 631 tubeset (albeit U.K. made). So the Bird looks good value in comparison.

I’d imagine both will ride great though.

Having had a quick look at the geometry Bird are more likely to have a size that fits as they have 4 sizes vs 2. The Forge is also more hardcore with slacker head angles and slightly longer chainstays for stability.

Both bikes seem to have broadly the same amount of bb drop so depending on fork length the bb’s should be similar ish heights.

I like the look of Stanton but I’ve also had 2 Bird full suss bikes so I’d go Forge in this case. The geometry / paint job / 853 tubes / customer service would win it for me.

joebristol

Bird do that so you can pick your axle broadly don’t they – normally offer Allen key / qr versions.

Only one offered. Maybe I’m being cranky, and there are lots of customers buying bikes without axles, but it just annoys me as a hidden cost compared to just about every other frame

In normal times there has been an option of a bird branded qr, Rockshox branded qr and a RS stealth axle when I’ve previously ordered 🤷‍♂️

Just sold my Switch9er as I wasn’t happy with the routing of the dropper post. It looped under the bottom bracket and in the back of the seattube through a slot in the yoke. Whilst this may be fine for a Reverb, for a cable operated dropper it was a pain in the erse as it never worked right. Had it in the LBS for them to have a go and I had a go myself including replacing the cable outer and inner more than once. Just too many friction points for me and a very tight radius round the BB, even if you don’t use their cable guide on the BB shell. That was with a One Up V2 dropper.

20 months ago I would have been all over this, or the Pole Taival. Aa it was, only the Taival was around.

Super low BB drop mind. I would have said 150mm fork minimum for that.

Going by what’s available it’s likely to be running a set of 160mm Zebs up front, so no worries on that front.

I’ve been looking at that Forge for when my hardtail no longer has to have a WeeRide clamped on it half the time. Geometry looks great – I’d be running a 160mm fork too because more is more! (By that point the 27.5 parts on my Zero AM can go on my eldest’s bike as she’ll be tall enough).

@haggis1978 – strange that you had so much hassle. I fitted my Brand X dropper to my 18″ SW9er 1200km ago and it hasn’t needed touching since. And that’s using the cable and lever that came with it.

Can’t compare the Stanton with the Forge, but i’ve been impressed with the quality of the Stanton frame. I got the Taiwanese frame (there’s apparently no discernible difference in ride quality from the UK version). It’s not light, but it takes the hits pretty well. The CNC’ed yoke is quality and combined with the short chainstays gives a pretty firm ride, which you might not like if you’re a full-sus rider. The paintwork and customisation options are outstanding – i’ve yet to really scratch it and where I ride it pretty much gets sandblasted on every outing.

Now that is a tough decision.

If it were just between those two bikes I’d pick the Forge, mainly due to it having a few more frame features (two bottle cage mounts and srams UDH) and having a bit more aggressive geo. And can’t got wrong with their service.

However as an accompaniment to your bird that changes things a bit. Having an agressive hard tail that’s just as capable as your full suspension bike might be a bit too much overlap between the bikes.

I’ve got a bird AM9 and a Stanton switchback and I went for the switchback because it isn’t quite as aggro as some frames like the forge, tival, moxie, hello Dave etc.

I’m less conflicted about which bike to take on a ride as a result, and take the bird for rougher stuff but have the switchback for back up or for rides where a longer travel bike is overkill.