Kona Fire 2004

The Fire Mountain is a pretty decent low-end MTB. Typical of most Konas, it's a little under-specced, but the frame makes up for this and is well worth future component upgrades.

The Marzocchi fork is nothing special, but about as good as anything else you're likely to find on a £350 MTB.

It only has an 8-speed gruppo, which may be problematic (or just costly) if you want to upgrade in the future.

The V-brakes are entirely sensible at this price as cheapie discs can be pretty useless.

Essentially, it's a "proper" MTB that had been built to a price, rather than a cheap bike that has been specced-up. This bodes well for longevity and its ability to withstand the treatment likely to be meted-out by an enthusiastic 15 year-old.

In the end though, whether or not the bike fits is more important than brand or spec level.

If the bike in question fits and is comfortable, at £350 it really isn't a bad buy.

If it doesn't fit, £3.50 would be too much.

M

Tim Hall said:

The son of a friend has his 15 year old heart set on one of these.
He's found somewhere selling them for around 350 quid (I think).
Sensibly he's avoiding rear suspension at this price range. I've
bneen asked for my opinion, but not knowing much about MTBs I thought
I'd pass on any info from here.

We'll assume he goes and tries one on before buying.

It has Mazarocchi (sp?) MZ Comp forks. Are these any good?

Drive train is Shimano Altus front mech, Acera-X rear mech and Alivio
shifters.

TruVativ crankset

Brakes are Tektro

Comments?

Tim

It's OK, and £350 is a good price, but I wonder if to some extent you're
paying for a name. I have a friend who owns a Giant Terrago, which for the
£50 less has hydraulic discs. It's a very, very good bike for what he paid
for it. Also look at the Claud Butler Cape Wrath - a lot of bike for the
money.

Let us know what he thinks.

Chris

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(') said:

The Fire Mountain is a pretty decent low-end MTB. Typical of most
Konas, it's a little under-specced, but the frame makes up for this
and is well worth future component upgrades.

I'd agree with all this: it's a reasonably specced bike on a reasonably
good frame, and if your fifteen year old is anything like the fifteen
year olds I know it will get a fairly brutal hammering over the next
year so the time to get him seriously good gear is once he's proved
that he can really use something like this.

I'd second the 'look at a Claud Butler Cape Wrath' advice, too, but with
a kid it's often a matter of backing rather than overruling his
judgement, because (among other things) you want to be building his
sense of competence and his ability to make his own choices.

--
[email hidden] (Simon Brooke) http://www.jasmine.org.uk/~simon/

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Quoted message said:

It's OK, and £350 is a good price, but I wonder if to some extent you're
paying for a name. I have a friend who owns a Giant Terrago, which for the
£50 less has hydraulic discs. It's a very, very good bike for what he paid
for it. Also look at the Claud Butler Cape Wrath - a lot of bike for the
money.

Let us know what he thinks.

Chris

Isn't it Giant that makes most of the lower to mid range Kona frames
anyway? Giant are huge suppliers and probably the best mass producer
of aluminium frames and certainly the biggest by volume so I'd be very
surprised if Kona weren't using them at least for the bottom end of
their range.

Tim Hall said:

The son of a friend has his 15 year old heart set on one of these.
He's found somewhere selling them for around 350 quid (I think).
Sensibly he's avoiding rear suspension at this price range. I've
bneen asked for my opinion, but not knowing much about MTBs I thought
I'd pass on any info from here.

We'll assume he goes and tries one on before buying.

It has Mazarocchi (sp?) MZ Comp forks. Are these any good?

Drive train is Shimano Altus front mech, Acera-X rear mech and Alivio
shifters.

TruVativ crankset

Brakes are Tektro

Comments?

Tim

I have one, owned for 6 months (450 quid then!) bought from Keswick
Mountain Bikes. It is an excellent bike for the money, more so for 350
quid. One important point - all sales literature says
Altus/Acera-X/Alivio, but mine came with all Deore. Last time I looked
at Konas website it said all Deore as well. With that spec it makes it a
real bargain. The forks are fine, but do need bedding in - mine got
sorted on the first free service - I can't remember what they did,
possibly cut down the elastomers. The only thing I would change would be
the stem.

Chris

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