Hobbiano 

On the verge?

beng1

I can be honest about how fast I can go on the Huffy, it is pretty easy for me to cruise along between 19 and 20mph with it in eighth gear. Once I get over 20mph in eight gear I am spinning too fast and I think the efficiency drops for me. The next cog on my 5-speed freewheel is a two-tooth jump and if I spin it up to where I am comfortable it is too fast, I am guessing 23mph, and I can't hold that speed against the wind for more than a few miles before I crash and have to go back down to eighth and recover, so for now I just use ninth when I have a little bit of a downhill or the wind at my back. If I can find a freewheel with an 18-tooth cog it would probably help me a lot, but for now all I can do is spin up the 19-tooth cog or jump onto the 17 a little when it is useful.

repechage

I was being polite.

be amusing for one to consult a gear development chart and better comprehend "8th" gear.

beng1

Moved the seat forward on the Fuji today and down a bit, it is also sporting some new 1 1/8" tires, so it will be interesting to give it a good ride on the next decent and free day and see how it goes. Took it around the block a few times and it gave a good impression. No matter what I would like to find a stem that will let the bars down another inch or more, the frame being taller than my favorite bike keeps them up higher than I am used to.

beng1

Most of the weight on a seat is on the wide part of the seat, that is where your pelvic bones, or sit-bones meet the seat. I certainly do not put any weight on the nose of a seat, because it would be on my genitals and I try to avoid that.

So if you look at the last photo of this thread of how I just moved the Fuji's seat, the most weight is concentrated as close to where the rails are clamped as possible, much closer than if the clamp is centered on the rails, so actually having the seat moved all the way forward as I do so the rails are clamped directly under the wide part of the seat is putting the least stress on the seat rails possible.

beng1

Most of the weight of any bike-rider combo is the rider, since I am over 200 pounds the bike is such a small percentage of the total weight package, less than 20%, it makes no difference if it weight 25 pounds or 35 pounds. The only steep acceleration curve in bicycle riding is starting from a dead stop, accelerating from 19mph to 20 or 21mph has such a slow acceleration curve that it would be hard to measure, and the difference dropping ten pounds of bike weight from a total bike/rider combo weighing 250 pounds would be so small it would never be worth worrying about. If I am not worried about riding a 250 pound bike/rider combo in a race, I am sure not going to be worrying about my acceleration at top speeds. As long as the bike is in great shape, the only thing worth worrying about is improving my riding position at speed. The science cycle-coach Dylan Johnson reviews for the public backs this all up.

beng1

\

The science says that the only real advantage to clips or clipless pedals/shoes, is on extreme acceleration or very steep climbing. For most normal riding there is almost no difference between flat/clips or clipless pedals to mention, this is what scientific research says. So yes, if you are a track racer on a velodrome, or in a mountainbike race on a course with very steep hills, then flat pedals might be a disadvantage, but they will never be a disadvantage for me on my road bikes in the relatively flat time-trials I would enter which are about 12-13 miles long, and they would be a waste for anyone riding any bike on the street unless they live in a town nested in large hills or mountains. My feet are so very comfortable on flat pedals, compared to having clips squeezing them or being in stiff cycling shoes. I love moving my feet around at will when I ride, and being able to wear a variety of comfortable shoes instead of just one pair of expensive cycle shoes. I had Shimano shoes back in the 90s with Time ATAC pedals and I felt they did help on steep climbs with the mountainbike, but not enough to give up all the comforts, convenience and advantages of my selection of normal shoes and flat pedals.

beng1

Whether or not the things a rider does are actually more efficient or not, the rider's comfort physical and mental are very important. I have really been enjoying the science research reviewed by Dylan Johnson in his YouTube videos, and much of the research he reviews says that a lot of the things people debate about bikes, such as crank-length, pedaling technique and some other factors end up being what feels good to the rider or what the rider is used to. In one scientific study top pro bicycle racers showed no increase in performance or power whether they used just the downstroke in pedaling or tried pedaling in circles to put force on the pedals for more of the pedaling cycle. Also crank length does not appear to be worth worrying about beyond what feels good to the rider, and flat pedals do not seem to be a disadvantage in power production in most all riding. So it seems except for seat height, which research does say can affect power significantly, we just don't have to worry about a lot of what our bicycle is or how we ride it.

smd4

So...you did the exact same thing I suggested, on the exact bike, and for which you gave me crap.

chip.hedler

Well, now--can anyone explain what happened to the recent posts featuring a very colorful, though very small-framed, machine of uncertain provenance? If removed in keeping with unspecified forum guidelines, specific feedback would be helpful in greater future compliance. As would someone stepping up and identifying themselves as the initiator of the decision to expurgate the posts. Part of what is puzzling about the decision is that for the most part in this thread, there has been a hands-off approach to the full range of remarks, whose intent often seems to conflate personality with point of view, nothing extraordinary in forum world. Anyone care to shed some light?

beng1

On May 15th, 2022;

DMC707

Interesting. If i were to guess, a moderator may have thought that was straying too far off the beaten path into "Troll-land" as the OP has some unusual cycling philosophies to be sure, but seems well-intentioned

The flip side would be almost any thread by another illustrious forum member, LarrySellerz, where those turn into free-for -alls and its widely speculated that that is Larry's intent

But just guessing - i thought the photoshop of the reversed post on the machine was a masterful touch myself - reminding me of my nephew's little Hoffman i saved from a life in an attic

chip.hedler

Maybe the visuals were too far from the middle of the bell-shaped curve for images of classic and vintage bicycles. They, and the various bits of accompanying text, were certainly less pointed than a lot of the remarks passed back and forth. Uh-oh, is this pic of your nephew's Hoffman with the reversed seat post clamp at risk?

I'm new to bikeforums.net so I'm still getting used to the implicit norms and no-nos. But on the face of it, if the OP's motive was simply to engage in dialogue about seat position, why not drop in on the lively, informed exchange of viewpoints in the thread on seat position in the "fitting-your-bike" forum? Not as ripe for provocatively-toned observations?

beng1

Took the Fuji out for a ride yesterday to test the seat position. After about ten miles I stopped, got the wrench out and lowered it about 5/8" and then it felt good for the rest of the ride. One thing I did not play with yet is this neat tensioner for the Fuji-branded saddle on this bike;

Road Fan

I love it! Scientific sanity!

Road Fan

Just a small point - I think rigidity is driven as much by frame structure as by geometry such as head and seat angles.

obrentharris 

Verge?
Brent

bamboobike4

I still miss my Mini-Mac

bamboobike4

Some people can post just about anything.
Some can't.
Simple as that.
No different than YouTube, Twitter, Facebook, other private sites.
Tongues must stay in the cheeks.

tomato coupe

Yes, it does.

DMC707

Like a lesbian orgy !

bamboobike4

Unless your bike shop has bikes that they think you'll buy, regardless of fit. The experts expect my money!

Sorry, but already having 17 bikes that don't fit is part of the negotiations! So is my pain threshold, unfortunately, but I completely understand.

Well, "ideal" is one way of putting it. What we can "make do with" kind of equates to "ideal" until we experience different.

There are plenty of "knowledgeable" riders who are riding just fine on bikes that they've fitted via trial and error, the fit of which are not "ideal," but they manage to ride thousands of miles in ignorance. (That is a ride-on sentence).

There's the catch-all. Satisfactory compromise is a lost art in much of our lives these days. If only my ex....

I agree with a lot of what you said, but the absolutism is debatable and will always be, because humans are notoriously independent and stubborn, adaptable and face it, blissfully ignorant.
If the bike is pretty enough, or rare, or has that crankset you just think is cool, or if the chicks dig it, or if it was your high school bike, or grandpa's Hour record bike, you know, we stray.

Thanks for putting it well, though. The idea of proper fit is being narrowed a bit, between theories and approaches, and hopefully, it all goes forward.

chip.hedler

Here's Ernesto Colnago in a screen shot from the very end of that video, after explaining how critical it was to make Eddy Merckx's bike as light as possible for him to break the hour record:

and here's a video clip from Oliver Bridgewood, an amateur who came close to breaking Merckx's 1972 record:
https://neoincunabula.org/video/hour...pt_960x540.mp4
Every one of the micro-breaks during, say, a normal time trial, that Oliver mentions affect one's final performance. What recommendations about equipment and technique would either of these riders make?

beng1

That you believe there is an "ideal crank length" shows what you have to say is not based on scientific research and data but on old wives tales. For decades researchers have shown that crank length has made no difference in power, it is simply a matter of personal taste. You also apparently know little about what affects the steering qualities of a two-wheeled vehicle. The major specifications which make a two-wheeled vehicle steer very quickly or "twitchy" or which make it steer very slowly or stable are head angle and what is called Trail, which is the distance from the front tires contact patch on the road to a spot on the road found with an imaginary line through the center of the steering head. Stem length does not alter either of these two specifications. In the late 1990s Gary Fisher introduced "Genesis" frames for mountainbikes which had very short stems and longer top-tubes to make up the difference, but it was to make the off-road riding safer by moving the rider's weight back so they would be less likely to flip the bike over going downhills while breaking or going over obstacles, makes sense, but is not an issue on a road bike.

All moving the seat forward on an old low-end road-bike frame with relaxed seat-tube and head angles is doing is giving a steeper effective seat-tube angle closer to that of a racing bike frame, and if a rider needs to put a shorter or longer stem on any old road bike to make it suit their personal tastes and comfort, that comfort will be what improves performance more than anything.

beng1

More real science supporting our old heavy road bikes; https://www.velonews.com/gear/bike-w...th-fast-bikes/