Cyclist0108

Last day of a 15% off sale, so I decided to roll the dice and get a black H1 with Cu rivets.

We shall see.

My son has the red X1, which has been on a clearance sale for the last several years. It is the only saddle he has ever found to be comfortable.

bikeboy3326

Performance Bike is going out of business and I bough a Selle Italia SLR 3 for $88.00. check them out.

Wattsup

So how do these saddles do riding in mud with no fenders??

Cyclist0108

Different saddle company.

Cyclist0108

I try not to ride muddy trails so that I don't destroy them. Not destroying a leather saddle is a side-benefit.

ctpres

Just found new rubber version R2 scheduled for delivery about now. Should be interesting to follow early adopters. Interesting to me because my bike is basically outdoors all year behind our motorhome and not sure leather would like that.
Rubber version

Wattsup

I ride mostly on packed gravel. This time of year there's lots of muddy runoff, and riding does no damage.

Now that's the ticket.

tyrion

I'm waiting for some reviews on that one. Looks interesting.

Cyclist0108

If I like this one, I might go for that, too, for my steel rigid 27.5+ mountain bike. I found the Brooks C-series unpleasant.

mcgeggy

tyrion

Great. Love to hear your impressions.

Road Fan

Any idea where to find such a tool?

mrv 

Tandy Leather? https://www.tandyleather.com/en/cate...itters-skivers
I could use one for my S.A. NSX
I'm almost out of tension bolt as well.
And last year I had to replace the piece the bolt runs through to tension things. It was easy to do, but not that many miles on it. I think.
And I also became concerned when I was reading the online user manual and it said something about standing when you go over bumps when riding a S. A. saddle. Really - check it out yourself and don't make me google it for you unless you need me to.
I think I'll be sticking with Brooks(just bought a lightly used one from someone here on the boards - it looks great -- https://www.bikeforums.net/sale/1165...ks-b-17-a.html - that's it on my bike ).
Maybe I'll try Ideal or somebody else, that Taiwan company I can't think of and I'm too lazy to google.

bakerjw

The fact that I love leather saddles is well known. I have Rivets on my road, bikepacking and mountain bikes and we have Brooks B17 Imperials on our mountain tandem. Our new road tandem will be likely fitted with Brooks as well.
My first leather saddle was a SA saddle and it was very comfortable. A friend, much smaller than I, bought one and bent the rails the first weekend out bikepacking.He had some issues returning it, but they finally took it back.

Road Fan

Thanks for the idea to look at Tandy regarding leatherworking tools.

For the rest of it, I doubt this is your intent but you seem to be arguing with me about this stuff. If you are, I think you are shooting in the wrong direction. I don't believe I have disputed with you about anything here.

BTW, I don't need or want you to Google anything for me.

May I suggest: Is the company whose name you cannot think of Gyes? Another one: the company Ideal makes toys, not saddles. The ressurrected saddle company is called IDEALE. It's spelled that way because the company is French.

If you think there is a problem in the literature supplied by Selle AnAtomica, contact. Selle AnAtomica, NOT ME. They can help you. I cannot.

mrv 

I've screwed up again. Apologies. Everything after the Tandy link was just my experience with the SA saddle I bought. Not directed at anyone in particular.
Thank you for the Gyes reference. I blanked on it.
IDEALE is korrect. Bicycle Quarterly has a nice write up on them I have not finished yet (it's a quarterly, I have to savor it!).
The comment about the S.A. manual was just my surprise. I mean they are stating in the manual, a warning really, not to ride over bumps sitting down. How big of a bump? How heavy of a rider? How would you quantify that for the average shmo riding down a dirt road? (I am asking those rhetorically, I am not expecting an answer....)
I think that warning goes to their design - SA offers a long range of travel fore/aft. That's a nice feature, I think. But that feature drives flex in the rails. Things can only flex so many times so far before they fatigue and fail. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fatigue_(material)
And if you look at the SA website they offer heavy rider designs. I had assumed it was all related to leather thickness (and now the rubber saddles).
OK - that's all I have I think. Sorry to offend. If you're in the Detroit area we should meet for coffee so I can apologize with caffeine. (update - just notice you're in AA - we should for sure meet for coffee. you have a few places that are Mighty Good)
happy trails!
mrv

ps: wow! the wikipedia link has a broken crank arm!! i had that exact same failure of a crank arm last spring - sent me knee caps over coffee cups on to the pavement. still thankful i was not in traffic at the time.

Road Fan

Yes, we should get together - PM me!

I want to clarify my point about S-A: I have probably half a dozen of their saddles and have had questions and concerns galore. Sometimes they are my favorite and sometimes not. I also have a nearly-new original Ideale 92, a Brooks B17 Select, an 8 year old Toupe, a more recent Toupe, and a B15 Swallow Select. Goal is to have a great saddle on each bike.

If you call them or email they are generally very responsive when you are clear and civil. Nobody really knows how to respond to ranters, and often the most peaceful thing is just to walk the other way and hope the guy comes back when he calms down. My exposure to them began when their founder, Tom Miller, was alive and had created some very funky but highly informative web pages about his product, his concept exploration, and the actual product. My actual order came just after he passed away and I had to press the company to actually get my saddle - high disarray due to his sudden death. Since then his successors have rebuilt and refined slowly but surely. If you need a big discussion, you could end up with the Pres or Veep on the phone. To actually engineer solutions to problems users find, which includes actually verifying that the suggested solution ("Dude! Just use better steel on my rails, man!") IS an effective solution, takes time and costs money. But they have developed solutions and put them into the market, and same for sag, stretch, weight rating, et cetera.

They're still not good at making sure all of the documentation and promotional materials match in terms of message and setting consumer expectations. But that takes time and money as well. They are NOT a car company, and they've been doing a ton of new product design, as well.

Andrey

The original Titanico SA is my choice of a long distance saddle, I use on rides that is longer than 300-400 km brevets. Never had issue with rails, had to move the bolt out to tune in the firmness of the saddle .
So far it has been the most comfortable saddle for me. I tried Brooks B17 and Gyes leather saddles and they have only one position to sit on and that is why not comfortable enough for me for long distance.

Second most comfortable saddles for me are Selle Italia Flite or Terry Fly because they are also long with several positions to sit on. I do not use SA all the time, only on very long brevets. That is probably I never had problems with it with rails or leather stretching too much. I also will be waiting patiently for the reviews of the new rubber SA saddles, mcgeggy .

Cyclist0108

My H1 just arrived, and I have put it on a bike that had a B17 that wasn't comfortable. (Why they vary is beyond me).

One thing I immediately noticed is there is no play in the adjustment thingie in the nose of saddle. It is as solid as my Brooks. When my son's red X1 arrived, it was very loose, and even though I have tightened the bolt, the nose end of the leather still moves around, leading me to believe the red one is not adjusted right. Is there any trick to making it more solid (like the new one)? I thought it was weird that it had so much play in it, but thought it was just a design difference until the H1 arrived.

Wattsup

Andrey, I'm having a problem finding a saddle that works for me, and it occurs to me that I too probably need a saddle that allows several positions. So I have a question... Would you say the Selle Anatomica H1 is equivalent to the Titanico SA in that it allows multiple positions? From looking at the photos of each, they look to be the same shape.

Andrey

I do not know since I never had an H1 saddle. Seems like an H1 has the same shape as the original SA saddle. I thought with the H1 saddle SA improved the stretching problem of the original Titanico saddle, but I may be wrong. I would ask SA directly.

Wattsup

Thanks, I did just that. All of the saddles are the same shape and size per SA.

Road Fan

I read here (I think from Don Buska) and somewhere in the S-A literature is that the slot width should be set to 6 mm at the narrowest point without you sitting on it. I think this helps, though I haven't been on it lately. I'm using my trainer time to try out my Rivet. Haven't been on an S-A since mid-Autumn. I use a 6 mm Allen hex key like a feeler gauge to check the gap. The wrench should be 6 mm across the flat sides, and I slide it between the edges so it just has a slight bit of resistance and zero wiggle room between the leather edges. If you have to push the wrench through the gap it's too tight, and if it has lateral play, it's too loose. The two sides of the leather move independently as you pedal (one with each hip), and you don't want the edges to rub while you're on the saddle sitting or pedaling. For a new saddle the screw does not have to be turned very much to make this gap.

For your two SA saddles, I'd not adjust them unless there is a problem. If the H1 is satisfactory, I would check the gap to see if it is the 6 mm, but only adjust it if there is discomfort. I'd expect it to narrow slowly over time. If you can find out which Allen wrench does fit, maybe that should be your working setting. On your son's red X1, I'd tighten it until it just gets solid, then see if he likes it. Try the 6 mm setting but if he doesn't like it go back to "just solid." When the leather stretches, you actually sit lower on the saddle, and your leg does not extend as far as perhaps it should. So if you let it sag you should raise the saddle the same amount to compensate and get the healthy knee bend we need.

If the nose plate feels loose again after a few rides, the leather has stretched a bit and should be tensed up to 6 mm before the next ride. You may have to touch up the tension pretty often before it stops stretching. If you just tighten it up to 6 mm gap and don't go farther, you won't be over-tightening it.

There's no similar spec for Brooks adjustment. I try to go just an 1/8 of a turn at a time on a Brooks. I also don't see any clear guideline for when it's needed. Since it's possible to ruin a Brooks with over-tightening, I always think that while you can adjust the tension, you shouldn't. I know Brooks gives you a free wrench, but we are not monkees who need to use every tool we see just because it's new.

I have a pair of B17 Selects and a B15 Swallow Select, which somehow seem to have firmer leather than today's norm for Brooks. They were also premium priced when on the market, and are now hard to find since they are discontinued. Mrs. Road Fan has claimed one of the 17's and I won't touch the screw unless she complains. After more than a year she says she never thinks about the saddle. To me that means, leave it alone!

Cyclist0108

Thanks!

Wattsup

Just pulled the trigger on an H2, and used a new 15% discount code. I hope my posterior finds this expensive saddle soothing. The SQ-Labs saddle just isn't working out for me. Anyone interested in a very lightly used Sq-labs saddle, (about 100 miles), please message me.