Originally Posted by
RustyJames
Since MTBs aren’t my normal area, I’ll ask dumb question #1,341,757. Why do all early MTBs seem to be equipped with rear racks from new? BITD I thought of them as oversized BMX bikes. It’s entirely possible (100% chance) that I am way off base but I would appreciate enlightenment.
For the same reason(s) that most bikes don’t come with racks on them. It’s partly fashion…bikes look “sporty” in catalogs without racks…, partly snobbishness…”a rack makes me look like a nerd!”…,and partly giving the consumer the latitude to pick their own accessories. There are a few bikes that come with racks but, frankly, they don’t add much value. I’d rather pick my own rack than let some designer pick the cheapest one they can find.
Early mountain bikes had rack mounts but as the mountain bikes got more racy (and more toyish), the manufacturers left off the rack mounts. That’s largely due to the snobbishness and fashion aspect. I’ve also noticed an odd shift in the way that mountain bikes are used now vs how they were used at the beginning. I overheard a conversation a couple of years ago where a guy talked about going for a loooonnnngg mountain bike ride…of 12 miles! I’ve done numerous single day rides of up to 100 miles on my old rigid mountain bikes. Theoretically, a dual suspension bike should make it
easier to ride long distances but that doesn’t seem to be the case
I have a dual suspension mountain bike (two, actually…well, three) and I don’t ride the dually all that often. I can’t carry stuff on one of them so it’s strictly a “play bike” . The other one is in Tucson where it gets more mileage because it’s my only bike there. The other “dually” is a Moots soft tail that has a rack on it and I use it for my bikepacking bike.
2003 Specialized Epic. Owned 12 years. Has 630 miles on it.
Another Specialized Epic (the one in Tucson). Owned for 5 years. Has 270 miles on it.
1998 Moots YBBeat. Owned 14 years. 2300 miles.
It’s also one of my winter bikes. It’s the one I use with studded tires. The Moots, by the way, didn’t come with rack mounts. But the magic of titanium is that it is simple to add them. It cost $40 per mount and took about a month to get it done.
My old 1984 Miyata Ridge Runner. Owned for about 6 years. I only started keeping mileage in the last 2 years of ownership but I put 3100 miles on it in the last 2 years of its life.
