New MTB: advice needed: what to buy?

[Actionman]

Help! I'm in the market for a new MTB and now that I have finally decided to go the full suspension route, I don't have the faintest idea of what bike to buy. I am a 40 year old rookie that hasn?t been on rides longer than an hour (?magic forest? for the CT hubbers) but it?s time for me to venture out, put my R3,500 hard-tail 'jobbie? out to farm, and spend some cash on a decent bike. Whatever I decide on, the bike must be good enough for me to be able to do long distance events, be it at the back of the pack?<?:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" />

 

Where to start? Well, the million dollar question is price. I started looking at bikes in the R12k to R14k region and for a little more you can get X, and then Y, and now Z. I am currently looking at the Merida Mission 2000 for R18k. I like the bike but I am not so keen on the components (not that I know much about it).

 

Ps After seeing comments about cracked frames etc ,  I?ll only consider new bikes.   

 

Does anyone have any comments or suggestions? Where to start, what to avoid etc?

 

Much appreciated?.      

Actionman2007-12-03 11:09:10

[mountain_lion]

First, have you decided on a budget?

You say R12k to R14k, but seem have fallen victim to budget creep already! 

If money is not tight, then that is fine, but is much easier to narrow down the search once you know what the budget is.

 

Other important question to answer is the type of riding you want to do.

By long distance events, do you mean XC / marathon type riding? i.e. do not require lots of travel in the shock?

Else you should be looking at a 'trail' type bike which has more travel and is thus more of a do everything bike.

 

I ride a Giant Anthem 2, which is a XC type bike (about R13k April 2007). Very happy with it.

R18k+ will buy you a higher spec bike components wise (like the Anthem1 or better, but this was out of my budget).

 

In the end you have to find the bike that is best for you.

 

The only way is to test ride as many as possible bikes, preferably not only in the car park.

 

Enjoy the search!

 

 

[Actionman]

The budget was initially around R15k but I?ll stretch it to R18k ? R20k if I?m getting much more.

 

As for test riding bikes, I could only find one supplier that gave me that option. I was given a Giant (not sure if it was the Anthem or Trance) to test ride last year and after I decided the bike was me, I was told the components on the bike were not standard and that I was looking at an extra R10k  if I wanted it as is. <?:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" />

 

Is there a ?try my bikes? supplier in the <?:namespace prefix = st1 ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags" />Western Cape that has demos (the 3 that I'd like to look at is Merida, Trek, and Giant)? I wouldn't think so as it must be quite costly...      

[dirtrider]

Go for the Giant !