I'm looking to buy an MTB and looking for a bit of advice. I'm limited to a selection available in Halfords and considering either Boardman or Voodoo bike, links below
Don't ever limit yourself to Halford it's not a specialised bike shop generally a place used for budget bike and children's bikes. You have a good budget call in to the lads in expert cycles Rathfarnham they will give you the advice you need and recommend some bikes for you.
The reason I am limited to Halfords is because I wanted to get a bike via 'Bike to work' scheme, and the company I work with is only doing business with Halfords :(
A lad in Epic had a Boardman and he left it out in the rain for someone to take for free! (it happened to be on a 3rd floor balcony at the time)
Excuse me, I had a cover on it!!
Cheeky bugger. I hope you never have a bike stolen. Liba wouldn't let me keep them indoors due to lack of space in the flat.
I'm sleeping with the trance now and Liba has been ousted to sleep on the balcony :)
I read the post about the stolen bike, sorry to hear that.
Regarding bike to work, the way it works is that I only get a letter confirming that my employer paid specified amount to Halfords. So unfortunately it is only limited to that place. I work in big corporation and I don't think they will change the rules for me, but I agree it's not really fair. I will call and make some further enquirers so we'll see how that goes.
In case I will have to go ahead with Halfords are those 2 bikes really that bad? I currently have a hard tail cross country bike (Carrera Fury) that is probably abused way too much, so in my view anything with rear suspension would be a blessing :)
Boardman is not bad for that price, the Pike is a good fork, easy to set and to service, brakes are not as good as Shimano, but they do their job at least until the pads are at their 50/40%. Geometry is maybe a bit steep for a trail bike, but if I had 15 hundreds for a bike and on top of save 20 or 40% due to bike to work scheme, I would consider it.
Thx Mntndoctor, apart from saving on tax I also don't need to pay upfront, I think around 30€ will be deducted from my gross pay each month so I will not feel any burden at all! I wish Halfords would take custom orders I would be keen to get something else, but apparently they don't :(
I still have a couple of days to make decision. any other comments?
I just watched videos of these 2 bikes on Halfords website... and if I was to make decision based on that it wouldn't be Boardman. My 10 year old daughter rides like this guy in video lol. I would expect it to survive more than that!
The new model Boardman that you are considering has a better spec than last year's. Pike are great forks, I got them for my trance.
The tyres that came with the boardman were shit, had really thin walls and I got punctures every spin. I changed them to High Roller II, the ones with extra tough walls and didn't get punctures anymore but they weighed a tonne and it was like dragging a donkey behind me every time I cycled up a hill!
I recently got a Magic Mary Trailstar up front and Hans Dampf Pacestar on the rear of my Giant Trance and the grip is fantastic and they are not too heavy.
I'd recommend you change the tyres on it sooner rather than later so that you give yourself the best chance to enjoy the ride.