New Wheel Size Poll – Your NEXT bike

[MarkSubscriber]

Just to keep on poking the proverbial issue with a stick..

Poll

The new poll is about your next bike purchase. It’s deliberately restrictive in that it asks about buying a NEW MTB ie not 2nd hand and if your intention is to buy in the next 12 months.

There’s a catch all answer of ‘I’m not planning to buy a new bike in the next 12 months’.

So it will be interesting to compare the results of this with the data we got from the current bike wheel size survey we did a week or so back.

So this is about buying intent and may perhaps give us insight into how much the promotion/reality/hype has affected us all 🙂

Predictions?

The poll is on the front page BTW

[HounsMember]

There’s no option for “I want a 26″ but the bike I like most only comes with 27.5″ wheels”

[JunkyardMember]

nor 29 er but i will be keeping my 26 er

I assumed many of the 29 ers are just n + 1??
It is most likely i buy or try one of these tbh but i am not in a rush/hurry to do this

[ShackletonSubscriber]

I’m with Houns. I wanted to tick the “was going to buy a 26er but now I can’t because the frame only takes 650b sized wheels so I’m not buying anything” box.

[tomhowardSubscriber]

The bike I’ll be buying has 27.5″ wheels, as it happens. I care not one bit.

[Mostly BalancedMember]

Perhaps a better question to ask would have been:
“If all your current mountain bikes were stolen and you had to buy a new bike now, what size wheels would it have?”

Me — 29inch

[yossarianMember]

650b for me. Why not, it’s just some bits of metal.

[OnzadogSubscriber]

I’d like another 26er but as others have said, it’s only 650b now (turner). Therefore, I’m out until all this silliness has settled down and we know what’s in for the long haul.

[BlurboySubscriber]

F650b. R29. Actually who gives a 5h1t.. Love SC and they seem to be hell bent on 650b. Now waiting a year for dust to settle. 26 works where I ride but only while I can get wheels and tyres. Sack all marketeers. Rant over.

[cynic-alMember]

Where are teh 29er (26 x 4) and 31er (29 x 3) options?

😛

[Mad PierreSubscriber]

I wonder if all this wheel size stuff is actually preventing more sales than it’s creating?

I’m perfectly prepared to accept that different wheel sizes may offer different advantages but as I have 3 very nice 26 wheeled bikes + 3 good spare wheels + the usual tyre mountain I ain’t about to change.

[doug_basqueMTB.comSubscriber]

I’m riding 26 and 29 a lot, often a few different bikes a day just now. They’re all fun, different advantages and disadvantages. I will choose my next bike on lots of factors and wheel size is one but it doesn’t stand above the others.

[andytherocketeerSubscriber]

The box I wanted to check was “I was going to go buy a 26er but the bikes I most like are all 650b now, so sod it, I’ll buy a different brand instead”.

so 26er (with standard threaded BB, not PF/BB30 etc.), but I nearly chose “I’m not going to buy anything now”.

[spudnickMember]

building up a 650b at the moe 🙂

[LsDMember]

I FEAR CHANGE!!!!

[jambalayaSubscriber]

I’ll be building up another 26er, I have the new frame already bought a while ago.

I wonder what the lady riders are going to be buying if the industry moves away from 26 (excuse generalisation but as a group they tend to be shorter than the blokes)

[uwe-rMember]

I love my 26″ wheeled bike. Its ace. 😀

[nickcSubscriber]

I assumed many of the 29 ers are just n +1

If my sample of Swinley on a sunny Sunday was anything to go by, it’s mostly new riders to the sport

I wonder what the lady riders are going to be buying

The 2 I saw at Swinley seemed happy enough on them

[zokesMember]

Seriously, WTF?

It’s been quiet a while since I even browsed bikes (that’s what buying a Cotic Soul does to you – makes you no longer want for any other bike ever), but what’s up with the size of wheel MTBs have had for years. Have trails suddenly changed so that I can’t ride them on a 26″ wheeled bike any more?

Or… is it just that the bike industry saw a load of gullible muppets with too much money?

[ShackletonSubscriber]

The biggest problem for me is that money is tight and I can’t afford to spend big £ of a complete bike, so I buy bits as and when they are cheap/wear out. My 2003 Heckler is now a bit tired and showing wear in places where it can’t be repaired/replaced. But now it appears that I can’t even buy a decent frame to take my existing parts.

It’s not even like with 29ers where they co-existed with 26ers, the introduction of 650b smacks of revisionism. 26ers must be purged from the market. Soon the official line will be “26ers never existed” and only freedom fighting brands will do them (cotic, on-one….). Hyperbole? Maybe, but it doesn’t feel that far from the truth! 😕

Anyway, I’ve essentially been priced out of the market so I’m not going to be able to buy anything even if I did want to wear the emperors new clothes (yes I have tried one, no I couldn’t tell the difference in any way, shape or form whilst riding hard. If you are sensitive enough to notice you probably needed counselling after watching Bambi’s mum get shot).

So well done marketing morons and all those of feeble minds who flock to your banners to throw money at a wheel size whose only remarkable feature is the ability to grub even more money into your coffers. Bravo.

[munrobikerMember]

“I want a 26″ but the bike I like most only comes with 27.5″ wheels”

This.