agentnomad

Experiances of Pinarello Maat and Cervelo T4

Does anyone have any experiance of either of these bikes as I maybe in the position of haveing a little more money than sence and buy one, not rearly because I have the ability to get the most out of the bike but because I can and I like them.

Team GB have just swopped bikes from Pinarello to Cervelo so I am also hoping the get to the track one Friday early enough to ask a few riders on the squad what there thoughts are, although I may get a politicaly correct answer saying the new bikes are loads faster etc.

I have sat on a 47cm Maat and it is vary aggressive (low) and short compared to my Pinarello Xtrack (they measure it in a non standard position) just to make getting the right size a little bit harder.

I am fully aware that there are faster riders on cheapper bikes and also slower riders on more expensive bikes.

Thanks.

taras0000

Sit on a T4 and find out. Those are two bikes that don't have much of a market share in the track world, so knowledgeable opinions are going to be few and far between. Both bikes are more oriented to the endurance side of track, and being a sprinter, I can't really say which one I would take. Probably the T4 just on looks alone. I don' like the way Pinarello styles their bikes. I want a bike that goes, not one that shows.

agentnomad

Thank you for your comments
Bradley Wiggins was riding a Maat on sat night and had a raiser stem due to it being very low at the front, my impression was that the Maat was more aimed at the sprint side of track cycling.

When I sat on the Maat (47cm with the eat set to my hight) it felt ok until I got out the saddle and I was way over the front end.

Hope I can find a squad rider with a T4 in my size to sit on.

700wheel

I thought the GB track team rode very high cost custom bikes (I heard made in conjunction with a formula one race car manufacturer). I recall team Sky uses Pinarello bikes. British track bikes available for sale: Price tbc - Cycling Weekly

taras0000

This was the case initially. Then certain enduros were getting the Pinarellos to ride (sometime early last year, or near the end of the previous year), while the sprinters were still on the UKSI MkIII bikes.

I've also never seen any of the sprinters on a Maat before. I've seen some of the enduros on them. Like I said above, I think the Pinarello's build is influenced more on marketing styling than anything else, and ends up making for a less than ideal bike.

brawlo

In the end, you need to go for whatever floats your boat. If you don't like the look of it then it won't be a joy to have between your legs. Having said that, more importantly, you need whatever fits best.

Now, the MAAT is aimed at the sprinters. The Xtrack is for the enduros. There were a couple of excellent reports that were less than glowing for the MAAT on a FB page, that have since been removed. I had a friend looking at them at the time, and tried to go back to them about 6mths ago and they were gone. I believe the person was tied up in GB cycling.

Go with whichever bike you like as long as it fits. They're two very different frame orientations though, so you'd be better to look further afield for comparisons

dunderhi

No experience with the MAAT, but I also like bikes that are faster than me.

One of my teammates & I both ride Xtracks because of the taller head-tube. The MAAT's HT is 5-6cm shorter in our Xtracks. So, I can relate to Sir Wiggins need for a riser stem.

Here's some other high cost track frames you might want to look at: Cipollini Speed (tall & short HT options), BMC TR01, TIME ZXRS Piste, and Look L96.

carleton

I really don't know why they went with a really short head tube. It really only benefits the TT riders who get really low on their aero bars. Everyone else has to improvise.

agentnomad

Thanks for the imput so far..

I had a look at the cipollini and the cost was a littl more than I MAYBE able to get a Maat for, not keen on the look as the head set arangment and the crank seam to be unique to Look, I have a SRM power meter to go into whatever new frame I may end up with.

A freind has a BMC so will have a better look at it new week when I see him.

Thanks.

gtrob

Out of the expensive bikes, I like the BMC (and is actually a decent price compared to some others). Or the Felt.

The T4 should be dropped any day now and replaced with a new bike before Rio, I really would suggest waiting before buying one. In fact, Ive heard they are no longer making the bike, and its just old stock left until it sells out.

agentnomad

I did wonder when British cycling swopped over if there was going to be a new super bike coming from Cervelo, but it could be they wanted an aero road bike and they had to take all the bikes road, track etc. Also the UCI are, or are thinking about changing the tube ratio from 3:1 to 4:1 and the speed they do things just how long can one wait for the next generation of frame designs.

I am in no great hurry and can wait for the best deal on the right bike. Unless I come over all hot and flustered and buy one on impulse.

Impreza_aL

#slamthatstem

queerpunk

i feel like that's been really common over the past, i dunno, 10 years or so. maybe even more - the era of 'modern' track frames is kind of long.

but it seems that every since different-sized wheels went out of favor (and were banned, and everybody decided to abandon dreams of 650c wheels), a lot of high-end track frames have had low TTs so that somebody can use one frame for both drop bars and TT bars.

carleton

The Cipollini is absurdly overpriced. Like, silly how much they are asking.

When the T4s came out, the T3s were selling for close to $1,000 new at some shops (like Richardson Bike Mart in TX).

Agent, I advise you to actually ride a T4 before buying. The angles are very different. I think they are designed as TT bikes first that people choose to ride in other events. Racing them in aerobars may feel great and really weird in drop bars, like racing a road TT bike in a crit.

carleton

Yeah, you are right. Some have resisted it like Dolan. But, even the custom British superbikes pulled double-duty with low head tubes.

queerpunk

yeah, the dolans are more traditionl for sure.

yeah, the British super bikes are; a lot of superbikes that have proprietary headtube/stem situations are basically designed to have effectively lower headtubes (or be able to get a stem lower - like whatever the fancy look is these days; felts, BMCs too, etc).

i'd say it's most common on superbikes, and then increasingly common on high-end but not-quite-superbikes, and then less common on some of the midrange consumer-level bikes. which is too bad, cause that's the stuff that a lot of us would really go for, i think.

dunderhi

I think a major factor in the cost is that the Cipollini frame is made in Italy instead of China like most other carbon bikes.

8bits

major cost must be Cipo's hair gel and expensive clothes, no $1000 bike will generate the kind of cash that his style demands

Dalai

Really? Surprised the UCI would change to a deeper aspect ratio...

Annoying as I had to swap out my Vision tech road TT bars when they introduced the 3:1 aspect ratio for handlebars. If they make this change my bars are legal again**********?

carleton

(Not attacking you, just replying in general)

I could have carbon frames made by rich kids in Beverly Hills and they would cost a lot of money to produce That doesn't mean that they would be worth an even higher retail price.

I think it's really arrogant of them to show up with a new offering out of the blue with no new engineering or anything else to justify the crazy price. I know this happens a lot in the bike world, but geeze. They went overboard.

Even if they made it in Italy and paying the builders a living wage, that bike should retail $2,500-3,000 tops.

Remember, carbon fiber isn't an exotic material anymore. They aren't doing anything crazy with the frame (bayonet head tube, proproietary stems, new seatpost system, propretary cranks, etc..) that LOOK and Felt are doing. I can't see any new engineering whose cost would have to be recouped.

It's just a carbon track frame with a fancy paint job.

dunderhi

Last winter, when I was thinking about getting a Cipollini Speed, my wife said I would need to get a Mario special edition tiger stripe skinsuit to match the bike. Since I still have a "few" pounds to lose, I decided it would be best to pass on that option and find a more conservative bike.




No offense taken, but let me offer up that the list of frames I supplied to the OP had an average cost $7,160. At $6,500 the Cipollini is below average.

I really like that fact that the low volume Cipollini Speed provides a choice of HT length, choice in BB height, and integrated rear fork dial adjusters. I swap out wheels frequently, so those adjusters would be worth their weight in gold offering up the perfect amount of chain-slack every time. Anyway, my made in Taiwan Pinarello Xtrack with lower grade CF and simple tube shapes carries a $2,500 MSRP. The previous Xtrack retailed $3,500. It still had simple tubes, but had higher modulus woven carbon versus mine with unidirectional carbon. With today's unidirectional CF, a lower modulus results in a similar strength & weight. Looking at the Xtracks, I would definitely say the Cipollini should cost more, but how much? Well the Taiwan-made MAAT costs $8,500, but comes with even higher modulus CF and a single-size integrated bar(42cm o-o) & stem(70,85,120mm based on frame size) which will likely need to swapped out by the owner. Looking at the Cipo Speed's design & materials I think that $6,000 is about right, thus Mario's hair expenses account for maybe $500 of the total cost. I've yet to see one discounted, so maybe the price is about right.

Anyway, I made a deal with Mrs D that I won't get a new track bike this off-season, so Mario will need to wait another year before he gets my money. Instead, I will go all out with the new TACX NEO trainer plus all of the extras. I'm hoping to find waterproof virtual reality glasses. If she likes it, we'll get another set-up and ride down the virtual road together. I understand there's even options for virtual six day races. The virtual madison throws will probably look hilarious in the real world.

gtrob

One of these days I will have to throw a post together on composites. There's a lot of broad assumptions out there in regards to build up, mostly because marketing > engineering.

Sometimes an expensive bike costs a lot to make. Not just R&D but actual material costs, not all CF is equal (ranges from $40/yard to $1000/yard), and 'high modulus' fiber is not always better depending on the type of stress its going to experience. There of course are R&D costs rolled into a bike, but I bet they spend just as much on marketing and sales than anything else (most bikes companies have 3 or 4 engineers, and like 50+ sales guys Im sure).

700wheel

Two other factors that go into the price of a frame:
(1) If the frame is vacuum processed then autoclaved the tooling is expensive. I've heard around $100K which is possible because the invar tooling for a product I was involved with cost $250K.
(2) Bike companies that support a professional team have to recoup the costs somewhere.

wiliam07

awesome ridrs bicycle very fast

taras0000

Invar is cool stuff.