Hotdegree Posted November 21, 2015 Author Posted November 21, 2015 A Big thanks to all you guys for all your help, especially Madbradd. It all was good information to me. I have decided to go mtb hardtail route and today my order for a brand new 2016 Giant XTC advanced 29er 2 was confirmed. I have not done any upgrades to the bike, since i am new to this sport, i will ride it as is till i know i am ready for better or faster. Because as it stands to me right now its a great ride already. I will continue to gather as much information as i can through this wonderful forum and hopefully get to meet some of you fine people on a trail or even the open road. Baby steps is whats needed here and thats where i will start. Going to pick the bike from cycle sphere (btw, great service from Ruphus) this Thursday or Friday. Will post some pics when i get it. Happy days ahead. Thanks Again to you all.
madbradd Posted November 21, 2015 Posted November 21, 2015 A Big thanks to all you guys for all your help, especially Madbradd. It all was good information to me. I have decided to go mtb hardtail route and today my order for a brand new 2016 Giant XTC advanced 29er 2 was confirmed. I have not done any upgrades to the bike, since i am new to this sport, i will ride it as is till i know i am ready for better or faster. Because as it stands to me right now its a great ride already. I will continue to gather as much information as i can through this wonderful forum and hopefully get to meet some of you fine people on a trail or even the open road. Baby steps is whats needed here and thats where i will start. Going to pick the bike from cycle sphere (btw, great service from Ruphus) this Thursday or Friday. Will post some pics when i get it. Happy days ahead. Thanks Again to you all. Great to hear! that's an awesome first bike! First up.... before you even take delivery..... Phone up Ruphus and ask him to sort out a tubeless conversion. You won't know to thank me until you ride with a friend who has tubes! Then optional, but not necessary is the below. You'll do this later on when you replace your worn tyres - so anywhere between 500 and 2000km depending on how much tar you ride. Note that MTB tyres HATE tar. If you're going to be riding lots of tar, then you definitely want to change tyres now. As far as tyres go, your's looks like it will come with the "standard" Schwalbe 2.1 Racing Ralphs. These are fairly low volume tyres meaning you need to run them at slightly higher pressures (your tyres are the first bit of suspension on your bike), and higher pressure with thinner tyres generally means slightly less grip. If you can... I'd recommend swapping those out off the bat, at least to something with a little more volume. 2.2 or 2.25 depending on the manufacturer - this will give you a little more shock absorption and more grip. Then the "standard" tyres tend to have less puncture and sidewall protection than is recommended for Cape Town (rocks) and Joburg (rocks and thorns). Not so sure about Durbs though. Doing just the tubeless conversion will probably be around R150 per wheel, and if you do tubeless and tyres you're probably looking at R1k total. Tubeless tyres below later on go for around R500 - R750 each depending on where and what you buy. Tyre combos: most common brands are Schwalbe, Continental, Vittoria, Maxxis. You'll hear loads of different options but the below are solid starting points (not necessarily the fastest, but good grip up front, good rolling on the rear, and decent puncture protection: Schwalbe: Racing Ralph Rear Nobby Nic Front (Make Sure they're SNAKESKIN)Continental: XKing Front and Rear, or swap the front for a Mountain King (Make Sure they're PROTECTION)Maxxis: Crossmark rear and Ardent Front (you're looking for the LUST range here)Vittoria: Saguro Rear and Barzo front (I only know of the TNT range which is solid) If you're riding lots of tar, then crossmark or saguro front and rear. otherwise you'll land up spending a fortune on tyres.
richardkzn Posted November 22, 2015 Posted November 22, 2015 Hi, when I got my bike from cycle sphere they did the tubeless conversion free of charge. Ride with the racing ralphs tires until they wear out, that will be quick on the road.If you are interested in going off road go to the EMBA web site and have a look at the tails. Some nice easy going trails in the sugarcane fields, plenty riders ride there. Enjoy the bike.
porqui Posted November 22, 2015 Posted November 22, 2015 Tubeless is over-rated - ride with the correct pressure. The myth that tyres wear out more quickly on tar has been busted. Start out with cleats if you want your face busted.Proper "flat" pedals are the way to go (might not be cool) If you can afford an extra set of wheels then get slick tyres for them (also not cool) for road use.
Hotdegree Posted November 23, 2015 Author Posted November 23, 2015 Great to hear! that's an awesome first bike! First up.... before you even take delivery..... Phone up Ruphus and ask him to sort out a tubeless conversion. You won't know to thank me until you ride with a friend who has tubes! Then optional, but not necessary is the below. You'll do this later on when you replace your worn tyres - so anywhere between 500 and 2000km depending on how much tar you ride. Note that MTB tyres HATE tar. If you're going to be riding lots of tar, then you definitely want to change tyres now. As far as tyres go, your's looks like it will come with the "standard" Schwalbe 2.1 Racing Ralphs. These are fairly low volume tyres meaning you need to run them at slightly higher pressures (your tyres are the first bit of suspension on your bike), and higher pressure with thinner tyres generally means slightly less grip. If you can... I'd recommend swapping those out off the bat, at least to something with a little more volume. 2.2 or 2.25 depending on the manufacturer - this will give you a little more shock absorption and more grip. Then the "standard" tyres tend to have less puncture and sidewall protection than is recommended for Cape Town (rocks) and Joburg (rocks and thorns). Not so sure about Durbs though. Doing just the tubeless conversion will probably be around R150 per wheel, and if you do tubeless and tyres you're probably looking at R1k total. Tubeless tyres below later on go for around R500 - R750 each depending on where and what you buy. Tyre combos: most common brands are Schwalbe, Continental, Vittoria, Maxxis. You'll hear loads of different options but the below are solid starting points (not necessarily the fastest, but good grip up front, good rolling on the rear, and decent puncture protection: Schwalbe: Racing Ralph Rear Nobby Nic Front (Make Sure they're SNAKESKIN)Continental: XKing Front and Rear, or swap the front for a Mountain King (Make Sure they're PROTECTION)Maxxis: Crossmark rear and Ardent Front (you're looking for the LUST range here)Vittoria: Saguro Rear and Barzo front (I only know of the TNT range which is solid) If you're riding lots of tar, then crossmark or saguro front and rear. otherwise you'll land up spending a fortune on tyres. Fuuny you should say that, as Ruphus did offer that option to me and I told him I will think about it and let him know this morning. I went with the Maxxis crossmark tubeless option this morning. Thanks for that info though.
Hotdegree Posted November 23, 2015 Author Posted November 23, 2015 Tubeless is over-rated - ride with the correct pressure. The myth that tyres wear out more quickly on tar has been busted. Start out with cleats if you want your face busted.Proper "flat" pedals are the way to go (might not be cool) If you can afford an extra set of wheels then get slick tyres for them (also not cool) for road use. Def. no Cleats for me. lol. I did buy the proper good quality flat pedals. Extra set of wheels will be my Christmas present I suppose.
Hotdegree Posted December 4, 2015 Author Posted December 4, 2015 Ok, So Christmas might come a little early, How good are these rims Mavic Crossride UST Pulse 29er. Going to put it with slicks.
rudi-h Posted December 4, 2015 Posted December 4, 2015 something to consider... in the long run you will want two bikes (or maybe more). for what it's worth, I have the following golden rules for buying bikes. 1) Never buy crap bikes. You will end up selling a crap bike at a significant loss just to end up buying the bike that you wanted in the first place. then you will want to kick yourself for a) the time that you had to spend riding a crap bike and b) for the amount of money you wasted, which could have gone towards your future upgrade) 2) Money spent on a bike is money well spent... way better than any car or piece of clothing you can think of. 3) Road bikes don't have to be expensive. as hot and droolworthy as matt black carbon steeds are, they're not much faster than a reasonably priced aluminium jobbie. road bikes are fast because of your position on the bike and those skinny wheels, not so much because of the bike weight and aero-ness, unless you start to hit the mid to high 30 figures for your average riding pace. 4) Good MTB's are expensive and they're worth it. suspension, weight, geometry, ride comfort etc. just gets better the more cash you throw at it. Sad, but true! And then as a side note... don't let your perception of your own riding ability dictate your riding style and what you "should" be riding. To say that you should be riding easy trails for 6 months before you start doing something more challenging is almost like a runner saying that he'll start walking around the block for 6 months before considering running. If you want to "run" in the same analogy, start by equipping yourself with for running and practice to do it from day one. There is no reason why you can't become a better bike rider than many seasoned cyclists within 2 months if you put the effort into learning how to ride a bike well. A few skills lessons upfront and a couple of weekends worth of practice will take your riding to a whole new level and will give you confidence and enjoyment from the start. I have been riding bikes for 25 years when I one day realized that i'm not as good as I want to be. In order to correct that, I had to go back to flat pedals, basic lessons to help me with balance, track stands, bunny hops (with flats), drops, jumps etc. and only a year after putting in some serious effort into my riding I'd be willing to say that i'm quite a capable rider. Although I was never bad, those skills never magically happened in all 25 previous years of riding. It still had to be practiced
Hotdegree Posted December 4, 2015 Author Posted December 4, 2015 Well this is what I picked up last week Friday. Not used to riding Bicycles so I do have a trainer at home.I want to put it on that so I could get used to the gears and how they work. 20 Years ago my BMX was just peddle and go and this is all new to me. However the bike won't work with the crossmark tyres that I have as its too thick and catches on the trainer. So 1 of the reasons is to put new wheels with slicks is for that. The other is in my estate I can use slicks and be comfortable there too. Still very early for me to go on trails etc as I am still very shaky on the bike itself. I don't want to go wasting tyre tread if I don't need to. That is why I am looking at a 2nd set of wheels with slicks and I don't think it can ever go to waste. Maybe in a years time I might go road bike route, but till that time I rather get what I can now and enjoy it. Anycase for me its also to help with loosing weight and have fun.
Rouxenator Posted December 4, 2015 Posted December 4, 2015 Interesting read, especially considering the topic is a MTB for a newbie - yet the budget is R15k to R25k. As a newbie I went for an R5k bike and it was great. Right now I ride what I consider an expensive bike, a Giant Talon that cost R14k. Got it in Feb and currently it has close to 8,000km on the ODO.
Hotdegree Posted December 4, 2015 Author Posted December 4, 2015 Well, I had an Elliptigo before this which I sold, so the funds from that paid for this bike. If I had to buy with new funds I am sure my budget would have been much lower. I did not buy a top end bike, I think I bought a good quality bike that would give many years of happiness. and to be honest, I just really like this bike. I had so many options to choose from and yet my heart was for this bike. I truly love it.
Rouxenator Posted December 4, 2015 Posted December 4, 2015 You did indeed buy a solid bike. If I could I would buy a XTC too, however for now I have to make do with my Talon.
droenn Posted December 4, 2015 Posted December 4, 2015 If I was going to start over, I'd also go for 15k as a good starting point for a hard tail. I "out grew" my 5k 29er HT in a matter of months.
Tubehunter Posted December 4, 2015 Posted December 4, 2015 Nice bike!!!! Hotdegree are you a guy or a girl? Sorry, seems a loaded question, cause it is. Need to consider the seat and you putting your body weight on that for extended periods of time. Standard seat option works OKish for most males as one starts to spend more time on the bike, but if you're of the fairer sex, you'll want to chat to Rufus and make sure they have some ladies demo seats available for you to test to work out which has the most comfortable size and feel for you and your make up! Get some decent cycling shorts too! The value of these cannot be overemphasised when you start to do anything more than balancing laps in your complex!
Hotdegree Posted December 4, 2015 Author Posted December 4, 2015 A guy here. I did pick up some cycling shorts. Not use to these padded things but i guess in the long run this is whats needed
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