Roland Owens

Here's our new Cannondale Road Tandem 3 that we picked up Saturday. We did a 38 mile ride on Sunday, then a quick 15 mile ride this evening. Tomorrow after school we're going to go up into Shenandoah National Park for a ~25 mile ride then a century on Saturday. Love the bike, so much nicer than the Raleigh SC it is replacing. The wheels were ones I had and swapped on.



Now a quiz and a question. Take a look at the picture below and see if you can tell what is wrong. The question is about attaching a rack. Anyone added one to this bike? How did you get the rack stays around the brakes on the left side?



Couple other notes. The bike is a size large/small and I'm really surprised that it fits me as well as it does. I only have a 32" cycling inseam and it really fits me well. The medium/small must be really small up front. I'm also very pleased at how well it fits my daughter. I was a bit worried about getting the handlebars set up for her but as you can see all we had to do is rotate them 180 degrees.

I also discussed the future of Cannondale in the tandem business with the owner of the shop. He said that Cannondale was going to continue producing tandems overseas like most of the rest of the frames but the prices were going up significantly. He said he had ordered as many of the 2010s as he could get his hands on and was selling them fast. He also said that Cannondale was going to continue to produce some single bikes in the US but they would go at a hefty premium. Of course he could of just been telling me all this to get me to buy the bike.

TandemGeek

No, that's the long and the short of it. C'dale will reduce it's tandem offerings to one model -- the high-end road tandem w/discs, etc -- and add a few hundred to the price tag for 2011. My guess is, they'll based their future 'tandem line' on the 2011 sales results. And, yes, he and at least one other tandem dealer in the East are snapping up as much of the C'dale inventory as they can get their hands on.

jnbrown

Are there rack mounts on the seat stays? I don't see any.
I used this on my Calfee:



https://www.treefortbikes.com/product...at-Collar.html

Normally it replaces the existing seatpost clamp, but Calfee uses a non standard size so I ended up putting on the seatpost above the clamp using a shim.

Also Old Man Mountain makes a rack that attaches directly to the V-Brake mounts.
I had one on my old Santana and it works great.

https://www.oldmanmountain.com/Pages/...ar_gallery.htm

Roland Owens

Yes, there are mounts on the seat stays but the one on the left is blocked by the Travel Agent. That Old Man Mountain rack may be the ticket.

Bent In El Paso

Nice bike. Black is a great color for tandems. Can I get info on the small bag hanging under the stoker's bars? My wife is looking for a bag for cell phone, cash, etc... That looks perfect.

Fred
El Paso

tredlodz

I've successfully used a blackburn rack on a Santana with V-brakes. I had a 3 point attachment using the screw designed for the rear fender under the bridge (clearly present on the photo. The only issue is you need to remove the wheel to mount the rack or take it off. It was plenty stable for a weekend tour.

Phantoj

You can buy standoffs (drilled out cylinders of nylon or stainless steel) at most hardware stores. I have used these for tricky rack/fender mounting.

mercury168

I had the same problem with my RT1000 and decided to just use the eyelet on the right side and not attach the left side at all. The rack is still plenty stable for securing a top-mounted bag, but I wouldn't recommend this for heavily loaded touring.

Roland Owens

Thanks for the rack suggestions. The problem is that the left seat stay mount is blocked by the Travel Agent. Either that Old Man Mountain rack or one that mounts to the brake bridge will work. There's no problem at the dropout.

Bent In El Paso, that bag is just a regular saddle bag but I use a shoelace to make a loop so it'll mount on the stoker stem. Take a look at the picture below:



And for the quiz answer...The shop I bought the bike from obviously does not sell as many tandems as they claim. If you look at the picture above of the rear brake notice how the Travel Agent isn't being used to gain the mechanical advantage as it should. It's basically just being used as a roller. When my daughter and I test rode the bike I notice the brakes were crappy, but I just figured they weren't adjusted right and I'd fix that when I got home and swapped on the Bontrager wheels. It wasn't until I started to make the swap that I noticed the problem. I had an extra brake cable to fix the front and a new cable is on its way to fix the rear. I've also got a call into the shop owner to one tell him that he needs to have a serious talk with the kids putting theses together and two asking for a store credit since I'm having to fix their screw up. The shop is 2 hours away so it really isn't worth my time to haul it back and have them fix it, and I'll know its right by doing it myself.

mercury168

Your travel agent isn't the kind that has the adjuster barrel on it. Are you able to adjust your brakes elsewhere?

Roland Owens

Yep...inline adjusters.

zonatandem

Amazing . . .
Build the tandems in China with much cheaper labor and then charge more $$$$$!
Dorel (owners) are very profit driven.
C'dale has not shown any of its tandems at Intertbike on years.