At £2 over budget, For an all-rounder I’d have one of these:
http://www.chainreactioncycles.com/ragley-piglet-2-hardtail-frame-2014/rp-prod90795
I had it’s big brother, the Blue Pig and it was an awesome bike :)

Please don’t ride the gardens on a sunny Sunday afternoon, place is full of walkers and riding on footpaths doesn’t do us any favours with United utilities (the landowners).
However if you’re there in quieter times, start at the back of the toilet block under the pike and explore from there.

My old blue pig:

An inbred at Rivington pike

40mm

The seatpost and seatclamp are not compatible, other than that, everything else should fit. As said above you’ll need a 34.9 to 28.6 shim for your front mech, some more headset spacers and new cables. The inbred has full length outers so you’ll need 3m of outer plus cables, outer caps and end crimps.

+1 for those havens from merlin. I’ve had a few sets of Easton bars over the years and always been very pleased with them.

Depends on the hammer ;)

And the other frame is ????

A 40mm peg does not fit in a 30mm hole.

Don’t know the reach but the ETT was 597mm if that’s any good to you.

Keep the Chunky Monkey on the front and swap the Smorg for an Ardent EXO 2.25 (which is what I run). I tried a Smorg on the back & couldn’t get along with it, didn’t feel particularly grippy and was draggy like you’ve said.

I have one, it’s very nicely made and gives a nice even spread of light, however as others have said it doesn’t offer much penetration. I suspect you may be disappointed if you’re after something as bright at the MJ880.

Hope pick n mix, no 2 upper and H lower.

Having owned a Blue Pig, I’ve regretted selling it and would have another in a heartbeat.

Number 3. Put the old chain back on, ride until it breaks then replace the whole lot.

Ragley piglet if you can stand the colour scheme. 18″ should be spot on for you.

Another +1 for the 2.3 butcher control. For a 20g weight penalty it is slightly better in every way than a 2.35 minion. The wider spaced tread ppattern clears mud better, the bigger volume copes better with rocks and the softer compound is better on roots. It’s probably the best front tyre I’ve ever used.

20″ Ragley Piglet is 10mm longer ETT than a large Soul.

All Maxxis tyres work well tubeless, I’ve run Minions & Ardents (and Chunky Monkey / Smorgasbord also made by Maxxis) for years without issue. You need to tape the rims first, Superstar do a 29mm yellow tape which should be spot-on for Flow EX (25mm is too narrow regardless of what it says on Stans website). A set of tubeless valves and some Stans goo and you’re good to go.

I’ve got a big head (63cm) and have always found large Giro helmets comfortable. If it’s XC style your after, check out the Phaze.

I’ve seen generic lights with 4.2v batteries (8.4 is the norm), therefore I’d check the voltage before interchanging. Should be printed on the battery somewhere.

A few weeks ago I blew up a generic 1200LM light by connecting a 4.2 light to an 8.4 battery.

I’ve run a deore 36t ring as 2×9 without any problems. The ramps & pins are designed to lift the chain onto a bigger ring so it should make no difference whether it was designed as a double & bash (SLX) or missle ring (Deore), it should be the same retention wise.

I’m pretty sure the SLX 36t ring is aluminium alloy.

To remove the shells I’d suggest warming them up in an oven set to 250 degrees, the alu freehub will expand more than the steel shells so they should come out easier. As for spacers, it sounds like what you’ve got is correct, there should be 2 bearings side by side at the pawl end of the freehub, then a spacer and a single larger bearing at the lockring end.

Here’s my old one, sold it a few weeks ago, regretting it :'(

Masturbatoreum

Minion DHF. Better than the HR in every way IMO.

6′ here on a large soul with 740 bars and 50mm stem. Feels spot-on to me. Demo’d a medium soul and if felt too small. Also demo’d medium and large rockets and whilst they felt quite similar, the large was more stable on the downs.

Also the gas is poisonous.

What he said ^^^
Li-ion cells should be silent in use. Any gassing noise indicates something is seriously wrong.

Link ?

I weighed my 26″ one on crappy kitchen scales, 810g. Lighter than I expected given the description on the website. Interestingly I weighed a 26″ smorgasbord at the same time and that was 820g.

OP, if you’re blaming the sealant, please explain how it has got to the other side of the rim tape to rot the rim, yet the air inside the tyre can’t escape?

I’ve been a couple of times and there isn’t a great lot around there. Brechfa trail centre is about 45 minutes drive away, Afan is about 90 mins. Alternatively if you get the Vertibrate guide book for Wales, there’s a route around the Preseli hills in there.
What date are you going? I’m thinking of going again next August.

Hope ‘H’ cup is what you need. You should find a shop here:
http://www.hopetech.com/page.aspx?itemID=SPG51

Stems are measured from the centre of the bars to the centre of the steerer clamp. Based on your previous bar and current stem, I’d say 60mm would be a good starting point. As Jairaj said above, it’s always worth buying a second hand or cheep stem such as one from carboncycles.cc to make sure it fits right before splashing out on a nice one.

It would help if you tell us what width your original bars were, how long the stem is and whether it was comfortable before.

As a general rule to keep the fit the same, whatever amount you increase the bars by, you should take half of it off the stem.

Search ebay for convertape. Used them a few times, always been good.

+1 to GHill & Northwind. I do a lot of work for friends, they keep me in beer after the weekly club ride.

Roval wheels keep breaking spokes? A mate of mine has a carbon stumpy evo and breaks on average one a month. I’d suggest hope hoops with either arch EX or flow EX rims.