So in my quest to find my first FS bike it’s been mentioned that 140mm might be too much for my type of riding.

So having never ridden FS before I’m interested to know what travel suits what kind of riding? I mean what happens if your rides are so varied you cover many different travel types?

For me I might be climbing, then going on bridle paths then on to single track red routes.

It’s such a variety of rides I have no idea what travel I should really be looking at.

My HT is 120mm and I use nearly all of that travel on the red routes but hardly any on the bridle paths and climbs.

I just have no idea what travel I should be looking at and I’m currently unable to test any bikes for a long period due to tailbone injury but so many sales on I don’t want to miss out!

Cannondale Slate.

Based on that type of riding….

I think people try to pigeon hole bikes to specific riding these days. Years ago you used to just pick a bike and ride it anywhere.

After getting back into riding via an ancient Kona Uhu (not a fully active full susser) I’ve now got a Boardman Pro Fs. I didn’t have much choice on what I got as it was on a bike to work scheme and I had to purchase from Halfords.

It’s 130mm travel at both ends and I ride it for anything. From flat ish trail centres like Ashton Court in Bristol to bigger stuff like Afan / Cwmcarn (for me huge hills to climb), and also been doing some rooty long natural bridleway riding. Even done an uplift day at Flyup 417 and got another booked at Bike Park Wales in a few weeks time.

I’m liking downhill stuff a bit recently so I had the forks extended to 150mm travel via a new air leg being put in. Love it now – although it’s a little harder to keep the front wheel down on steep climbs. Didn’t have that issue with 130mm travel. Worth it for the extra travel / plushness downhill.

One of my mates rides a Kona Process 134 for most of his riding and he does mega miles on it too.

Another friend has just got a Cube Stereo 120 Hpa which is 120mm travel at both ends – it’s better cross country than my boardman as it feels lighter / stiffer / the lockouts work better – although we go downhill and he drops back a fair bit.

I think modern full sus trail bikes generally pedal so well that 130mm travel is pretty much go anywhere.

100mm 29’er FS would cover all that if you want a full suss

So basically 100-130mm is the sweet spot – that kind of helps rule out a bunch of bikes which is a good thing.

As for the Boardman – pretty much all sold now!

Just realised I didn’t mention wheel size. All the bike’s I mentioned are 650b apart from the ancient Kona which was 26″. I found moving from 26″ to 650b a little odd – and found it harder to turn corners initially. Had a quick go on a 29er and didn’t like it. But I think you’d get used to it with time and with decent geometry any of the wheel sizes would be OK. On a recent natural bridleway sort of thing we had a guy along with us on a 29er hardtail and uphill it seemed to fly. Mind you he tied hI’m self in knots on the technical downhills. I’ve got no experience of 29er full sus though.

In terms of the Boardman it’s a great bike – but there are loads of decent circa 130mm bikes out there. The Kona Process my mate has is a little bit more ‘enduro’ in the geometry but he smashes uphill on it. Lots of people on here mention the Giant Trance as being a great bike too.

The guy who bought the Process did test ride a Whyte 29er but the wheels tipped him towards the process (on a test ride it just felt more lively and put a bigger grin on his face). However Whyte launched a 650b version if the bike just after – if he’d known he said he might have waited. His budget at the time was about £3k.

The T130s was on my shortlist but at £2200 its over budget.

Other than that, the Trek EX 8 29 comes in on budget and the Specialized Cambper Comp 29 is under budget (allowing funds for a dropper).

The Trance 2 (2016) is down to £1500 at the moment and comes with a dropper.

Will check out the Kona Process today too.

The general penalty for travel is weight. However if you have enough £ or credit facilities you can buy 160mm bikes which are well under 30lbs so money negates that. Also most bigger travel bikes are slacker so you need to move weight forward when climbing uphill. Your riding sounds a general mix on the less gnar side so 120 to 140mm would be what i would look at. If budget is a concern and you are happy to buy a bike in a box the rose mtbs might be worth looking at. Granite chief is 140mm and well specced for the cash.

I’ve a Camber 29er.

Brilliant bike, does everything from XC-ing thru to Enduro-type stuff and even managed the Fort William DH track this week.

My pennyworth, rather than focus on length of travel look for quality of travel and decent geometry. Mine’s got a Pike up front and a kashima Fox on the rear.

A good quality fork with adjustable rebound / compression is important.

Longer travel forks tend to be fitted to bikes with slacker head angles. As mentioned above 120-140 would be fine in your situation. But don’t skimp on the suspension.

I ride XC and trail centres on my Scott which has 120.

Leaving the DH stuff and extra knarly pixie built stuff for my 160 YT.

My pennyworth, rather than focus on length of travel look for quality of travel and decent geometry

Wot he said. 140mm, in a decent bike is just fine for everything.
Bikes are so good and shocks are so good these days that it’d be relatively hard to find something that wasn’t pretty capable imho.

I was also looking at the Remedy 8 2015 (Pike Front/Fox Performance Float EVOL) rear but was basically told that 140mm would be too much.

Over budget again, but the fuel ex 9 looked to fit the bill:

https://www.evanscycles.com/trek-fuel-ex-9-27-5-2016-mountain-bike-EV251300?esvt=886-GOUKE1046518&esvq=&esvadt=999999-0-126384-1&esvcrea=63402922496&esvplace=&esvd=c&esvo=EV251300-18.5-GRN&esvaid=50080&gclid=CPGXvuCP3M4CFcHNGwodIVoDvA

Or EX 8 29:

https://www.evanscycles.com/trek-fuel-ex-8-29-2016-mountain-bike-EV251297

I’d be inclined to stick with less travel (120-130mm). Because climbing on a big bike is never fun, it’s purgatory. No amount of clever shock tuning, fitness, or anything else is going to make it as involving as being able to attack a climb on a short travel bike. But descending on a 5″ travel bike is 99% of the speed and fun of a bigger bike, there’s probably only a few times on a ride you’d ever actually be faster on a bigger bike.

Simply put more travel makes climbing on smoother trails slower, no two ways about it. And simply put more travel makes downhill faster, BUT not by anywhere near as much as you lose on the climbs, which is why XC racers still swap between HT’s for 95% of courses and 80-100mm FS bikes for those with rougher ones. And why Enduro and DH bikes are 160-200mm travel, because the times taken to get to the top are an irreverence.

Big wheels go some way to mitigating shorter suspension because they don’t have such a sharp aproach/departure angle over bumps so lose less momentum.

The old “29ers cant go round corners” trope is down to a few early models having long chainstays which gives the feeling that the back of the bike is pushing the front round corners. Shorter stays from more innovative stay/BB/pivot arrangements (and 1x drivechains), along with longer front centres have balanced this out.

Fastest round a loop – XC hardtail or 100mm FS bike in some occasions.

Fastest from top to bottom – as much travel as the track needs (less travel if the track needs some pedalling).

Anything else is a compromise, 120mm, 140mm, the former will climb a bit too slow for XC, but make downhills a bit quicker and more fun, the latter will almost keep up with 160mm bikes on the way down, but will do more than just survive on the climbs like Enduro bikes.

All that said, if you’re not fit then a fit person on a big bike will out climb you on a hardtail, and if you’re not technical then a downhill or enduro bike won’t save you on the downhills against someone on a hardtail who knows what they’re doing.

What’s your drug of choice; Adrenaline or Endorphins.

If it’s the former, a new full-sus bike might open up the beast in you and you start enjoying big rough technical scary trails, big drops and jumps, where more travel is better. If you buy a short travel bike, you’ll just be left wanting more. If your a learner rider, more travel adds confidence and a safety factor to big moves.

If your more on the side of a endorphin addiction, less travel will be better. Why carry that extra weight for travel you don’t use. Pick a bike that zips along and lets you push harder. You only need a short bit of travel for comfort on those long epic rides.

You’re probably in the middle. But be true to yourself in what you want the bike for and there’s loads of great bikes out there to give you what you want.

Top tips people – as for the above, I am planted right in the middle!

I’m starting to explore the more techinal trails my way (still avoided some of the drops for now) and am finding it quite a lot of fun, but on the flip side there are no massive drops or jumps so a lot of it is more twisty and fast stuff.

In an ideal world I want a bike that climbs quite well, but is fun on the twisty fun stuff, but can handle the occasional bit of rough!

FWIW my old bike was 120mm front/100mm rear and new bike is 150mm front/rear. New bike climbs just as well as the old bike and descends much better (well, old bike was better at switchbacks, but that’s because it was steeper and shorter).

Six years made a big difference to how suspension and shocks work!

In an ideal world I want a bike that climbs quite well, but is fun on the twisty fun stuff, but can handle the occasional bit of rough!

I’d err on the side of the shortest travel you can get away with on the roughest track you actually ride then. You can do huge (relatively) drops on a hardtail, just with less margin for error, so you’re unlikely to want a bigger bike than that Trek Fuel-EX to progress on.

The alternative compromise is something like the new Bird Aeris 120, ‘only’ 120mm of travel, but the geometry is a lot more extreme than a lot of 140mm bikes. Maybe an ideal compromise for trail centres where the manufactured surface rarely needs more travel.

Travel itself isn’t necessarily “too much” for anything. Just firm up the shock. It’s just you may not use a lot of the travel.

Suspension design makes a difference. Big travel on a single pivot bike will be a pain to pedal and you’ll need to firm it up a lot and use climb switches and lock outs. On something like a VPP, you can sail up a hill on big travel with ease and I find generally don’t need to fiddle with shock settings.

The main thing with pedalability is bike weight and geometry in my opinion.

If I were you I’d go for the middle of the range then, most full sus are 100mm – 160mm, 130(ish) makes a lot of sense for a bit of everything I think.

If you get a reasonably light build you should have a bike you can pedal all day and chuck at some bigger stuff too, do uplift days etc.

Unless you’re really fit the difference climbing compared to a shorter travel or hardtail bike won’t be as pronounced, for me, I find the grip and being able to stay seated on more technical climbs almost outweighs the weight/travel disadvantage.

There’s a thread running about 130mm full sus bikes. Get in there.

I made the switch from a 26 steel hardtail to my first ever 650b FS. I hated it to start with. Really thought I’d made a huge mistake. Just didn’t feel right, hated the way it turned etc etc.
But I kept at it, changed my riding style, wider bars, shorter stem and tyres made a HUGE difference.
Love it now. Never really had the “It’ll make the trails too easy” thing. Its allowed me to look at and ride stuff that I just wouldn’t of considered before.
Plus your back will thank you for it.

Have joined the 130mm thread!

Just another thought – if you’re getting z bikecwith air surprising at both ends then you can tailor it to what you’re riding if it bothers you. Mines got adjustable air shock at both ends and adjustable rebound. I’ve got a couple of compression setting’s at the front (rudimentary though) and a kind of lockout setting on the back. I usually leave the suspension pretty plush as I like downhill and just ‘survive’ uphills. But I could run a few psi more and it would be quicker on the ups for sure – and the rebound could be tweaked to control it. On road sections between bridleways I normally lockout both ends and it climbs well.

That said my mates cube stereo 120 climbs like a bullet in comparison – but he runs his suspension really hard and the lockout really feel completely locked out. I’m heavier than him and it feels to me like it just takes the edge off bumps rather than fully absorbing them.

So whatever you get, just make sure it’s got some adjustment at each end.

For me I might be climbing, then going on bridle paths then on to single track red routes

Sounds like a decent XC bike to me.

I train on bridleways/double track and ride singletrack with the odd visit to Wales/FOD etc. Ride the odd drop off etc but generally wheels on the ground type of thing.

Alternate between a 100mm 26″ Flux and a 80mm 29er Spearfish. Set up quite firm so the rear just absorbs big stuff. Not felt under biked and climbing remains fun.

I’d not get hung up on 20-30mm (it’s one inch!) but concentrate more on type of bike/quality of suspension.

You don’t need lots of travel for jumps and drops, though a little to take the edge off helps – longer travel is far more beneficial on rougher trails, so lots of rocks and big roots.

My 140mm full-sus pedals very well, has a 160mm fork and adjustable geometry so it covers a lot of ground in terms of what it’s good at, but it’s still quite a lot of bike for around here.

Agreed, you don’t need a lot of travel for drops and jumps. But it really does help with confidence in hitting them.

The day I got my SC Bullit years back, was the days I started hitting ‘big’ things. I’d now be happy hitting them on my hardtail, but at the time doing these things was new to me and I needed the extra confidence offered by the 6″ beast.

Once you gained the confidence and the skills, riding the same stuff on short travel bike is way more exciting!

A modern 130mm bike is, in the UK, really all you need. It’l cope with any of our trails.

What a modern 160mm or 180mm bike does is allow one to “get away with” messing things up due to a lack of skill……..

I’d suggest test riding a decent 29er (like the camber mentioned earlier) on your typical trails and seeing how it feels! 29ers go round corners fine these days, but do require their rider to change their style a bit, which can feel odd at first, but is soon forgotten. If the 29er feels too sluggish, then a 130m 650b is the answer, with plenty of choice now in this segment to pick the colour one you like best

“What a modern 160mm or 180mm bike does is allow one to……..”

Go faster when racing!

A modern 130mm bike is, in the UK, really all you need. It’l cope with any of our trails.

What a modern 160mm or 180mm bike does is allow one to “get away with” messing things up due to a lack of skill……..

What a crock…

Ok – looking at the best colours now lol! Should have got the Boardman before they literally all sold out.

I think I can go try the Camber and the Fuel EX8 29. Both get pretty good reviews!

I really wanted a Kili Flyer last year… wondering how much it would cost to build one up – frame and rear shock now £599 at Evans!

https://www.evanscycles.com/saracen-kili-flyer-x-2015-mountain-bike-frame-EV279226

chiefgrooveguru – Member 
You don’t need lots of travel for jumps and drops, though a little to take the edge off helps – longer travel is far more beneficial on rougher trails, so lots of rocks and big roots.

^^^ This. At speed. A lot of people go on about big travel for the jumps and drops, but unless you’re landing them to flat you just don’t need it. BMX’s do jumps with no travel after all 😉

Like with my big bouncy bike. I’m expected to be “hitting big stuff” with it, but I don’t, mainly because I’m wimp on that stuff 😀 , but where I find the bike comes alive is hammering down fast on sh’t loads of rocks and roots, with the odd drop here and there maybe. It just lets me go faster in comfort.

The bike itself though is a little bit of a drag for blasting round general trails/singletrack, paths, whatever. Hence I got a lighter 130 rig. It’s still nice and plush on a lot of things, just a bit rougher when I hit rough stuff at speed. Even then though, I suspect if I stick a DB Air on the back like my big bouncer it will feel much nicer. It’s just that’s a heavy shock and want to keep it light.

As others have said, there’s no easy answer. Within certain limitations, you can’t dismiss a bike based purely on the suspension travel available, the geometry is the most important factor IMHO. Even then, there are a number of short travel bikes (<120mm) which are rewarding and have aggressive riding in mind.

The best advice anyone can give you is to book bikes and ride them on your local trails – 29ers, 150mm bikes, 120mm bikes…try as many sub-niches as possible until you have a favourite.

Ok, well bikes I can try near me…

Camber 29er (£1500)
Trek EX 8 29er (£1850)
Giant Trance 2 2016 (£1599)

Whyte T130s (out of price range… shame!)

Camber 29er (£1500)
Trek EX 8 29er (£1850)
Giant Trance 2 2016 (£1599)

Whyte T130s (out of price range… shame!)

At this time of year you’re more likely than not going to be able to ‘bargain’ with folk, although you’ll need to temper that with having limited sizes/models to try.

Wait a few weeks and Pauls will be flogging Canondales at half price. I bought a Jekyll last year that I ride much of the time in 95mm mode and then switch up to 160mm front and rear when I need to.
I have a 29er Trigger too and that gets mainly used at 85mm but has the option of 130 when needed.
Ace.

It’l cope with any of our trails.

Whereabouts are your trails? Some of the trails i ride are fine on a hardtail – others need a DH bike or at the very least 150mm or you end up practically stopping in the holes/rocks.

I find suspension a hindrance for jumping. I might make jumping easier for some (not me personally) but you’ll learn how to jump better with none, or possibly a hardtail with 80-100mm firm forks. It doesn’t sound like you want a jump bike though 😀

if you’re able to try a Trance, I suggest you also try an Anthem SX – bit more sprightly.

South Downs & Friston Forest – I need FS due to my tail bone needing a break and my physio said it would really help!

If it’s not too late, i think i do similar rides to you, nothing extreme down hill, no extreme climbs, I think my normal route is maybe 300ft max above sea level and I live right by the sea. So i get the off road along the cliffs and then woodland trails, twisty with natural lumps and bumps.

I’ve just made the step to a boardman FS pro from a bitsa HT that I have had, like triggers broom, since 1995.

So for me, I have leapt light years ahead so I doubt I would notice the difference if I was to spend another £1k. In a few years perhaps but not right now.

Just remember, that bikes can only be for Christmas, you can always move it on.