MTB 29" v 27.5" v 26"

josealdo

Hi

Just wondering is there anyone with an experience with MTB different wheels sizes . I am getting a new bike and the 26" seem to be on the way out . I like the look of the 29" . I ride road bike during the summer but the last few weekend have been out on my old TREK mountain bike hitting local trails , GREAT FUN .

I am told hydraulic brakes are the way to go . cable operated ones aren't great. as for group sets on MTB I know nothing about them . and is there much difference between suntour and rock shox suspension ?

cheers folks

currently its up between a cube aim 650 euro and a cannondale 590 euro

ford2600

figs666 wrote: »

Hi

Just wondering is there anyone with an experience with MTB different wheels sizes . I am getting a new bike and the 26" seem to be on the way out . I like the look of the 29" . I ride road bike during the summer but the last few weekend have been out on my old TREK mountain bike hitting local trails , GREAT FUN .

I am told hydraulic brakes are the way to go . cable operated ones aren't great. as for group sets on MTB I know nothing about them . and is there much difference between suntour and rock shox suspension ?

cheers folks

currently its up between a cube aim 650 euro and a cannondale 590 euro

If your 5 7 -5 5 10 buy the cube ltd pro for sale for 400.
Super fork, xt groupset decent frame and wheels.
Try mad and epic. Great value on second hand 26" at the moment

uberwolf

I went from 26 to 29 this year. The difference between the two is extraordinary in terms of the ability to hit the rough stuff and glide over it. Slower to spin up though. Coming from a load of road cycling I was comfortable the wheel size, fairly natural for me.

I would say try and get a ride on the different sizes but the best size for you may depend on your preferred riding.

Tenzor07

Decent hydraulic brakes and good tyres should be your main concern for around €500/600
Don't worry about wheelsize, you won't notice any "benefit" of the larger wheel, apart from the extra weight of the bigger wheel making it harder on climbs for you..

Main thing is to get a good price and enjoy your cycling..

Sagi

Try the different wheel sizes to see what suits you, very much depends on riding style and terrain. Not easy to find a good mtb on the budget. Shimanowise I'd try to get deore level, alivio at least
Or sram x5

There are good mechanic discs on the market, i'm very happy with my avid bb7 and dont want to go hydraulic anymore, have made bad experiences with entry level shimano mechanic discs.


The suntour xct on the cube aim is not a nice forek, I'd go rigid or increase the budget.

Are you planing to do mountainbiking or rather cruising on bad roads with a little of road. If you really want to get into mountainbiking you will very soon reach the limitf the cube and most probably also the cannondale ( which model) for a little off roading and comfy city riding a mtb might not be the best choice.

josealdo

trail forest riding .

Sagi

http://www.chainreactioncycles.com/ie/en/vitus-bikes-zircon-29vr-hardtail-bike-ex-demo-2013/rp-prod109006

That's pretty good value if it is your size

josealdo

lovely bike , thanks mate but not my size

Sagi

I'd keep on looking, over the winter there's a good chance to score a bargain, imho the better option then buying a much lower spec bike and investing a lot in upgrades

josealdo

good thinking sagi , thanks mate

JonDoe

Get a light hardtail 29er. One with a 100mm fork will go over ground that a 130mm Full Suspension 26er can barely manage. The type of riding you go for will be tyre dependant. I'm using a geared Kona big unit at present with a 2.1 knobbily muck shedder on the rear and a 2.4 Inch Continental Mountain King on the front. Climbing the rear sinks in and finds grip eventually. Coming down the front holds lines over rocks and roots then the rear skitters along after. For Dry XC it's 2.0 low resistance tyres. I've other bikes but keep going back to this setup. I've a 26er too, much slower descending and have to watch the front wheel going over every little thing. Traction climbing is limited too.

Tenzor07

29ers are so 2013!

rizzodun

I have a 29er Trek, as the others have said it's great for gliding over the rougher stuff, but I've found the 26" I had before easier to throw around, rock shox front fork is one of it's best qualities, but the hayes dyno brakes are one of it's weaker points, and can be a bit soft if you're caught unaware, absolutely loving the bike though.

I'm planning to build a 26" up from a frame I have lying about but I think I'd prefer the 29" for the most of my riding.

As for the difference between shock, I'd say it'd have to depend on what type of shock in particular you're going for, you might get good comparisons online and maybe you might get more bang for your buck buying second-hand if it's an option.

Don't rule out 27.5" completely either, I have never rode one but I'm hearing they're a good choice if you'd prefer a wheel size over 26" but don't like the size of a 29er.

Not sure how right it was but I heard a comparison somewhere of 29" & 100mm fork is like 27.5 & 120mm fork or 26" & 130mm fork, could be horses**t though, I'm no expert!

FirstinLastout

figs666 wrote: »

Hi
I am told hydraulic brakes are the way to go . cable operated ones aren't great.

If they are cheap crap mechanical disc brakes then they're gonna perform crap too.
Good quality well designed mechanicals will perform brilliantly but only if they are set up correctly.
I've always found the Shimano mechanicals that I'd tried to be pretty poor and had detered me from mechanical discs but the Avid BB7's I now use were great out of the box and fantastic once I set them up right.
Incidentally over hydraulics advantages include their simplicty, reliablity & ease of set-up.

Don't worry about wheelsize, you won't notice any "benefit" of the larger wheel, apart from the extra weight of the bigger wheel making it harder on climbs for you..

Completely wrong in everyway.

Tenzor07

29er wheels are heavier and take a slight bit longer to get up to speed, i.e. slower to accelerate...
But.. at the same time will smooth things out on rough climbs etc...

29er was an "interesting" experiment by the bike company's, however.. if you start to see Specialized bring out 27.5" wheel bikes then that will be the nail in the coffin for the big wheels..

FirstinLastout

Tenzor07 wrote: »

29er wheels are heavier and take a slight bit longer to get up to speed, i.e. slower to accelerate...
But.. at the same time will smooth things out on rough climbs etc...

29er was an "interesting" experiment by the bike company's, however.. if you start to see Specialized bring out 27.5" wheel bikes then that will be the nail in the coffin for the big wheels..

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WPVRU7jSYkQ

Skip to 2:57 :rolleyes:

C3PO

Tenzor07 wrote: »

29er was an "interesting" experiment by the bike company's, however.. if you start to see Specialized bring out 27.5" wheel bikes then that will be the nail in the coffin for the big wheels..

Can't see 29" wheels disappearing any time soon for XC race bikes particularly for larger sizes!

Tenzor07

C3PO wrote: »

Can't see 29" wheels disappearing any time soon for XC race bikes particularly for larger sizes!

There does seem to be one or two still left who like them C3PO!

josealdo

looking at the 2014 cube catalogue , the 29" look as popular as ever

easygoing39

Not wanting to offend Cube bikes,but their more off a follower than a leader in the MTB world.I'd see Giant,Scott or Specialized as the leaders,with the 1st 2 named producing 650b bikes.When Specialized start selling them that will be the deathnail of the 29er and it will happen sooner than later.

seamus

I can see this being a further split in the XC/DH disciplines. DH will stick with the 29ers for the control and comfort of the ride, XC will move to 27.5 because it gives the best of both worlds between the 26ers and 29ers.

rab!dmonkey

The whole wheel size issue is hugely over-hyped - it's just one of many parts that make a given bicycle ride the way it does. What you should really be considering is the type of riding you want to do and getting a bike that will facilitate that. After you've made a shortlist of bikes that appeal to you and test-ridden a few, consider their differentiators. Wheel size may or may not be one of those differentiators.

The only nuggets of advice I'm going to offer re wheel sizes are the following:

• 29ers (especially cheap ones with heavy wheels and tyres) are going to be harder to accelerate than smaller-wheeled bikes
• 650b gear is going to hold its value better than 26" stuff
• Whether or not you enjoy riding a given bike trumps all wheel size attributes

easygoing39 wrote: »

When Specialized start selling them that will be the deathnail of the 29er and it will happen sooner than later.

You're missing the forest for the trees here. None of the other brands you have mentioned have dropped their 29ers. Giant has made noises about doing so, but that's going to be a way off, if it ever happens at all.

shaka

Ride a 26er and have ridden 29 , 29 glides better over rough stuff but considerably less control on the bendy stuff.

27.5 is the future supposedly , best of both worlds

Tenzor07

seamus wrote: »

I can see this being a further split in the XC/DH disciplines. DH will stick with the 29ers for the control and comfort of the ride, XC will move to 27.5 because it gives the best of both worlds between the 26ers and 29ers.

You mean XCO will stick with 29ers?

DH will stick with 26ers mostly..

It's where the big growth market is for MTB's... i.e. Enduro, that the 27.5 will take over...

Tenzor07

rab!dmonkey wrote: »

You're missing the forest for the trees here. None of the other brands you have mentioned have dropped their 29ers. Giant has made noises about doing so, but that's going to be a way off, if it ever happens at all.

Au contraire Mr. Monkey!

Giant are phasing out the 29ers. They only offer the wheel-size in a few models. So if they record a slump in sales of the 29er then they will be gone by the 2016 model year..

The big S may/will replace there 26er models with 27.5 next model year..

C3PO

Tenzor07 wrote: »

Au contraire Mr. Monkey!

Giant are phasing out the 29ers. They only offer the wheel-size in a few models. So if they record a slump in sales of the 29er then they will be gone by the 2016 model year..

The big S may/will replace there 26er models with 27.5 next model year..

As far as I can see Giant are still producing 29ers in all of their top ranges - Anthem, XTC and Trance? As are Specialized and Scott! As I said earlier I would be very surprised if the big brands stop making 29ers in their XC ranges where they still appear to have an advantage!
On the other hand I agree that 27.5 will take over in DH/Enduro/All Mountain where the smaller wheels are more manoeuvrable!

Tenzor07

C3PO wrote: »

As far as I can see Giant are still producing 29ers in all of their top ranges - Anthem, XTC and Trance? As are Specialized and Scott! As I said earlier I would be very surprised if the big brands stop making 29ers in their XC ranges where they still appear to have an advantage!

They are for now, and I would say that the 29er will remain as long as there is market demand out there, however if that changes then expect to see them phased out... with the possible exception of some Large or XL size hardtails...

quozl

Tenzor07 wrote: »

They are for now, and I would say that the 29er will remain as long as there is market demand out there, however if that changes then expect to see them phased out...

Is that not the case with everything? If market demand went then they'd phase out the 2 wheel bicycle

Tenzor07

quozl wrote: »

Is that not the case with everything? If market demand went then they'd phase out the 2 wheel bicycle

And if no one logged onto boards.ie that would be gone also! :rolleyes:

Popoutman

The mountain bike club in UL found over the years that the Shimano Deore groupsets provided the best reliability for least cost. Quite a few of the more experienced riders in the club don't use anything more than Deore components on their personal bikes.
The same has been seen for Shimano Deore hydraulic disk brakes - not that expensive and are fantastic to own and use. If you are getting a bike and are fairly sure of keeping up the sport and doing half-decent mileage on a bike, try to get one that has a Deore groupset and Deore hydraulic disk brakes.

Between Suntour and RockShox forks, I'd generally go for the RockShox but the budget items aren't great in either range, but the RockShox are less crappy for the cost.

As for the wheelsizes, 26" is the current most common, with forks, tyres and wheels all at a pretty good state of the art. 29" wheels are harder to get rolling, harder to turn, and carry more rotational inertia than the equivalent 26" wheel/tyre combination. A lot of the difficulty has been in lightening the components to minimise the effect of having more mass farther away from the axle. The supposed increase in ease of getting over things is mostly a function of the extra momentum in the 29" wheels. Personally I am not a fan of the 29" bike I tried. The 27.5" wheelsize appears to be a fair compromise, as most of the fork manufacturers need much less work to get their headline forks to fit.

It'll be a little while before the tyre manufacturers get their ducks in a row and offering the same range of tyre carcasses on the 27.5" wheels.

At the moment, there is more choice and more mature technology with the 26" wheels, but I expect that the 27.5" will be more in use over the next year or two. Still, I find it interesting that pretty much all of the manufacturers have stuck with the 26" wheelsize for the proper DH and AM market segments - e.g. Giant are gone completely to 27.5" for the 2014 line except the ReignX and the Glory.

You may get a great clearance deal on a 26" bike with decent components with the market being pushed to the 27.5" wheels, and there is nothing inherently wrong with the 26" wheel size.