m0hammad0sman

Hello.
I know there is a ridiculously large amount of material on the web at this topic. But that does not answer my question.
First of all, I live in Pakistan. Here, there are no bike vendors or bike stores(except for crappy worse-than-departmental-store-bike shops). The only way to buy a bike (as far as I know) is to import it from another country or to buy a used bike(which is what I plan to do). There are very few people who use bikes and therefore, it is also hard to find individual parts.
My ride will mostly be paved roads but there will also be bumps, broken and unpaved roads. I rode Trek 4500 MTB of a friend for a ~30km commute. I found it a little bit heavy but it is strong. I WANT A BIKE THAT CAN STAND BUMPS AND UNPAVED ROADS. I am willing to buy a road bike but am worried it will be very fragile. Experienced riders, what do you say. Will I have to go to that heavy MTB for strength or the road bikes will do. I am less than 50kg. I want a bike that will stay for like 10 years and I don't want to worry about bumps while riding.

P.S I learned that replacing knobby tires of MTB with slicks can do but as I mentioned, I cannot buy them here so I will have to go with knobby tires if I choose to go with MTB.

Forgive my noobness if the question was too stupid

jrossbeck

m0hammad - given what you are describing for road conditions, you might want to look at Cyclocross style bikes. They will be lighter than a MTB and ride smoother on roads, but they will ride a bit better on rough roads and trails than a road bike. The downfall of this theory is since Cyclocross is a fairly new genre, you would almost have to buy online, I doubt you will find many used Cyclocross bikes in Pakistan.

Your other choice is to buy a decent road bike, and then you would have to order parts to give it a wider wheel and tire profile to smooth out some of those roads. Best of luck in whatever you do!

rms13

Cyclocross bike or just a bike that accepts wider tires. A steel frame bike is probably a good idea and there are plenty of good steel road bikes that are not too heavy. The question is what you will have access to. EBay is always a good option but a lot of sellers might not sell to buyers in Pakistan and I don't know if it would be cost prohibitive with shipping and if there is any kind of tax and tarrif for importing it

chil2makefun

You can also take a look at the cobble specific bikes like the trek domane.

bonz50

there is a big trend with gravel road bikes these days like the Trek CrossRip or Specialized Diverge, among others of course.