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Upgrade to what?!?!

929 views 15 replies 8 participants last post by  hardwarz 
#1 ·
So, I have a GT iDrive 4 4.0. The iDrive 4 is an XC bike with 4” of front and rear suspension. I bought as new old stock in Nov 2009. The bike has only been used on singletrack XC.

Upgrades include:
Fork: RockShox Recon Silver TK Solo Air (Replaced stock SR Suntour XCR-LO – added 2011)
Brakes: Avid BB7 mechanical disc brakes (Replaced Tektro Aquila mechanical disc brakes – added 2010)
Shifters: 2010 SRAM X.9 shifters (Replaced SRAM SX-5 – added 2011)
Rear Derailleur: 2010 SRAM X.9 (Replaced SRAM SX-5 – added 2011)
Bashguard: Large 44 tooth ring has been replaced by TruVativ bashguard. Large ring & chain ring bolts will be included – added 2010
Handlebars: RaceFace Dues 31.8mm (Replaced steel 25.4mm bar) – added 2010
Stem: GT 31.8mm +/- 7 degrees 90mm (Replaced stock 25.4mm +/- 7 degree 100mm GT Stem – added 2011)
Grips: Ergon GP1 SE - Large – added 2010
Wheelset: Mavic CrossRide UB (Replaced WTB SX-24 rims with mixed front and rear hubs – added 2011)

I've been thinking about selling it and getting something newer, I'm just not sure what to get. I get a discount on:

Mongoose
GT
Fuji
Diamondback
Focus

If I sell my bike, I can spend between $1500-$2000 (MSRP) on the discou. The issue is, many of the bikes in the $1500-$2000 (MSRP) range still come with Deore or SLX (X.5 or X.7) Heck, some bikes like the Fuji Outlander 29er 3.0 use Alivio drivetrain and cost $1900.00!

Is it even worth it for me to upgrade? If so, to what?
 
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#6 ·
I got the Recon at a great price at Performance Bike. It was on sale for $199.99 on the website. I went in and had them match the price to the website. That weekend, they also had 15% off, so I got it for $169.99.

The Recon its self is better than any fork I've used, but be forewarned that I haven't used many suspension forks. My iDrive originally came with a Suntour XCR-LO. The only other bike I had with a suspension fork was a 2002 Mongoose Sommet with a Manitou Answer Six Comp with 80mm or 100mm travel. Only other forks I have to compare it to is the RockShox Dart 3 on a 29er and a couple of generic single air that I got off e-bay.

As far as upgradeitus, Yup.... you're right... lol

Keep it. Keep saving up and get a 5 or 6 inch bike to fill the gap in your stable. In another year or less, you should be able to drop $3k on a better spec'd bike... no?
Yeah, with the discount I get, a $3k bike with 5 or 6 would be the exact bike I want. Issue is, I'm not sure how long I'll get the discount for.
 
#7 ·
You already have a pretty well-regarded FS bike. Get a motion control damper for your fork, maybe a nicer shock, and a road bike. Start working on the engine. Or promise yourself another day a week of trails, and work on the pilot.

Or, pay for a skills clinic. You've got stuff on that bike you bought this year - do you feel like it's really dialed in yet? If you get new bikes and shuffle parts around all the time, you'll never have one that really fits you right, or works as you'd like it to. Try to get things dialed enough that you can just ride for a season.

How's your 29er doing? Are you still alternating bikes on your rides? Could that build use some new toys?

What do you want to do with your riding, anyway?
 
#9 ·
You already have a pretty well-regarded FS bike. Get a motion control damper for your fork, maybe a nicer shock, and a road bike. Start working on the engine. Or promise yourself another day a week of trails, and work on the pilot.
Truthfully, I now work 2 jobs, have my rentals to deal with and also go to school. I barely am able to ride 2x a week.

Or, pay for a skills clinic. You've got stuff on that bike you bought this year - do you feel like it's really dialed in yet? If you get new bikes and shuffle parts around all the time, you'll never have one that really fits you right, or works as you'd like it to. Try to get things dialed enough that you can just ride for a season.
Skills clinic sounds good, but there are none in NE Ohio. You're right, I do have to dial in the new fork. When I shuffle parts around, it's not parts for my specific bike, it goes to several bikes that go to my kids and wife too, so if it doesn't fit me, it will fit someone or go on the spare bikes. :)

How's your 29er doing? Are you still alternating bikes on your rides? Could that build use some new toys?
29er is fine. With all the rain, I haven't been able to alternate between bikes. The 29er has been put into the spare/loaner bike arena now or for use on pavement/path (Ohio canal towpath.) when I'm towing the kids.

What do you want to do with your riding, anyway?
I'd love to get better skills, but since my bike is an XC, I don't want to hit too many jumps, etc.
 
#10 ·
There's a lot more to consider than just what parts are on the bike when picking out a bike. First, what kind of riding are you going to go or what kind of riding would you like to do with a new bike? Are you looking for something in particular with a new bike? For example, if I was getting a new bike I would be shopping for something that could handle trips to Moab with rough rocks everywhere so a longer travel bike is what I would shop for. What are your requirements for a new bike?

Upgrading your bike, even to a similar travel bike will get you parts that might function better even though they carry a "lower" part model designation. The technology passes down the line as the years pass so you never know what might have made it down to a lower level.

Bigger changes will be had through geometry. If you are going to buy a new bike, here's your chance to change up the way it rides or fits. Want a bike that's more stable downhill? Well get a bike with a more slack head angle. Feeling cramped in the cockpit? How about a bike with a longer top tube? Lots of better ways to choose a new bike other than the parts hung from it.
 
#11 ·
I don't know what kind of pussified XC people are doing that they ride bikes they don't think they can take over jumps.

Just drop your seat post and do it. Granted, that works a little better on a 26" hardtail. So maybe that's your next bike - a 26" hardtail, or a dirt jump or trials bike.

And send me one of your jobs. I'm off school for the summer, and could use it. ;) Seriously, though, over on the XC racing/training forum, though, one of the things that comes up a lot is the return people can get by either moving their hours around or giving up a few hours so they can fit in another long ride mid-week. Supposed to be huge, and much bigger than any improvements that gear bought with the money they'd be making if they did work that afternoon can make. Certainly I'm strongest when I can work out about three times a week, with another two or three easy rides. Even when school's in session, though, I can usually sneak in a little over eight hours a week of riding. I drive a '93 Ranger, but I'd really rather be the annoying kid on the cheap hardtail who holds the record for one of my local climbs than the ******y guy in the Escalade who can't ride his Ibis.

You can sneak in some more saddle time at lower opportunity cost by commuting on a bike, or with a stationary trainer. So depending on what's feasible for you, those are some other upgrades to think about. That, and road bikes - unless you live right on top of trails, an extra road ride every week is a little easier to fit in.
 
#12 ·
I don't know what kind of pussified XC people are doing that they ride bikes they don't think they can take over jumps.
I've seen too many people with XC bikes snap frames trying to do more than the bike was designed to do, hence my hesitation...

Just drop your seat post and do it. Granted, that works a little better on a 26" hardtail. So maybe that's your next bike - a 26" hardtail, or a dirt jump or trials bike.
I'm building a light weight 26" race hardtail. Now I'm afraid that the frame is so light weight that it won't take a decent hit.

And send me one of your jobs. I'm off school for the summer, and could use it. ;) Seriously, though, over on the XC racing/training forum, though, one of the things that comes up a lot is the return people can get by either moving their hours around or giving up a few hours so they can fit in another long ride mid-week. Supposed to be huge, and much bigger than any improvements that gear bought with the money they'd be making if they did work that afternoon can make. Certainly I'm strongest when I can work out about three times a week, with another two or three easy rides. Even when school's in session, though, I can usually sneak in a little over eight hours a week of riding. I drive a '93 Ranger, but I'd really rather be the annoying kid on the cheap hardtail who holds the record for one of my local climbs than the ******y guy in the Escalade who can't ride his Ibis.
Can't I have both the Escalade and the record for the climb?? lol

You can sneak in some more saddle time at lower opportunity cost by commuting on a bike, or with a stationary trainer. So depending on what's feasible for you, those are some other upgrades to think about. That, and road bikes - unless you live right on top of trails, an extra road ride every week is a little easier to fit in.
Kids and school take up a lot of my free time. I'll figure something out. Everything is too spread out in NE Ohio so I have to drive everywhere before I can ride.
 
#13 ·
I hate the guy who rolls up to races in an Escalade and wins! I'll never be him in a literal sense, but hopefully in another few years I'll be rolling up in a car that's not falling apart and winning...

Anyway, here's what I'm seeing. You're getting two rides a week, you're not the rider you'd like to be, and at the moment, you're several hundred dollars or a little over a thousand dollars ahead.

Short of a major lifestyle change, and you wouldn't be here asking about equipment if that's what you wanted, I think the best return on the money, in terms of what you can do with a mountain bike, would be figuring out how it can facilitate shoehorning in some more riding. Even if it's road or on a trainer - improve the engine, and you can devote more attention to technical aspects of riding on the trail rides you do get.

Good lights can add many usable hours to your day, and even extend your season, especially the part of the season in which a midweek ride is feasible.

What about a back yard pump track? At least take advantage of being somewhere crazy spread out...

When you've got the 26" race hardtail built, assuming both it and the 29er take disc brakes and the same type of cassette, you can have a road training bike for the cost of some road tires to go on the 29er wheels. That'll make them about the right size for all but the tightest 26" frames.

I still don't think replacing the i-Drive is a great approach, if you like the bike. It seems you don't either, or you'd be posting a thread saying, "Look at my new xxx," not "???"
 
#14 ·
Actually, I love my iDrive but I'm not sure how long I'll be able to get discounts. I'm just trying to take advantage of the situation.

26" race hardtail is not disc compatible since it's an older frame.

When I say that everything is spread out, I mean that everything you need to get to is not convenient to get to. Houses are still crammed together where I live. The closest singletrack is a 30 minute drive away. You know, I live 30-40 minutes away from Ray's Indoor Mountain Bike Park and I've never been there.
 
#15 ·
A deal is only a deal if you get money off something you were going to buy anyway. Otherwise, it's just smart marketing. I don't know what your source of discounts is, but unless you're currently a member of an organization, like a team, and you're planning to quit, these things always become available again.

From what I've read about Ray's, it sounds tailor-made to address the skill-building stuff you mentioned earlier on. Although it seems a little silly to ride mountain bikes inside, now that the weather doesn't suck.

I'm about a half hour from my nearest singletrack too. I was getting a little bit of roadie-itis in 2009 - I had a pretty good power output for my class, but I kept making costly mistakes. Problem was that it felt silly to me to get in my car for half an hour each way in order to ride my bike for two hours, and there's some overhead in mountain biking that's not present, at least as much, in road riding - the maintenance after every ride, time spent loading and unloading the car, etc. So I got in the habit of just throwing a leg over the road bike and cranking out some miles.

An entire road workout can fit inside an hour, straight from my front door. Some people sneak in rides during their lunch breaks. If your trip to your riding spots doesn't involve the freeway, you can probably do it in about the same time, once you factor in all the screwing around with cars and bike racks and whatnot, going out the front door on your MTB. If your commute is not too long, that's another great place to sneak in a ride. Road and trainer time have to be the lowest opportunity cost going in a cycling workout, and the only thing that can substitute is one of those little motor things that goes in your seat tube.

I keep coming back to road riding because I think even though fitness doesn't have a direct bearing on skill on a MTB, it's really important in an indirect way. The better my fitness level, the faster I can ride my mountain bike before I start making those anaerobic mistakes that used to mess me up. I can also ride actively for a lot longer and I feel a lot flowier, even in sections that used to really pull my speed down. I'm more comfortable being on bikes in general. A ton of the things that matter on a MTB matter on a road bike too - weight placement, line selection, pedaling technique, pacing, etc. etc. etc. Now and then, I even find an excuse to do a bunnyhop, manual or pedal-up.

I rode the same area twice in two weeks on my 'cross bike recently. Once in the middle of a longer ride - rode an hour to get there, rode around for an hour, rode an hour back, with stops to refill my water bottle only - and once with a friend, and driving to get to that park. They were very different experiences - I'm a bit faster than my friend, so I did a fair amount of waiting. I ended up having a really good time. I felt strong and flowy when I was riding, and the week before, I'd felt awkward and the bike felt twitchy. I think that what was going on is that I run out of gears on that bike. Its lowest ratio is 30/26, and the wheels are a little bigger than on my hardtail, once the rubber's included. So I was doing a ton of riding out of the saddle, and much as I hate to admit it, I don't have the fitness level to spend an entire ride charging like that, and having no choice but to attack every climb. The point is, doing it under a circumstance in which when I was riding I was effectively more in shape was a great object lesson in the value of fitness to a mountain biker.
 
#16 ·
Discount? Summer help at a bike store. :)

Ray's is closed for the summer... They'll open again in Oct.

The 30 minute drive is via highway. I can't even think of a way to get there without getting on the highway. I'll have to look into that...

For a while now, I've been trying to think of a way to "tow" a bike... it would be great to use my hybrid or my 29er to tow my iDrive to the singletrack... humm... I have an idea now... lol
 
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