[Shambla]

Quote:

Originally Posted by bangraman /img/forum/go_quote.gif I just bought one of these: SCOTT | Bike | Bikes | Road | Sportster | Sportster P1 I shall streak like the wind across the mean streets of the city. Yeah right

Sweet - I have a 2008 P4 and even that is great to ride (though I am thinking of replacing the v-brakes with discs). I imagine the P1 will be awesome.

 

[Othello3]

Being new I'd like to add my two cents. I ride and race a Cannondale CAAD9. I built up the frame myself with Ultegra components. The wheels are custom laced 30 mm niobium rims with Ultegra hubs and stainless spokes. I scrapped together some Ritchey aluminum bars, stem and post and a great leather saddle I've been using forever. I love that bike more than anything (ok, except for my dog

)

 

[shigzeo]

CAAD9 is aluminium frame right? I don't know much about canondale but I see them here quite often (south Korea). Sounds like a fast ride.

 

[bangraman]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Shambla /img/forum/go_quote.gif Sweet - I have a 2008 P4 and even that is great to ride (though I am thinking of replacing the v-brakes with discs). I imagine the P1 will be awesome.

Ever since discs became an option, I cannot deal with rim brakes even if I'm speccing / buying a beater like the Scott... road or MTB. Even my first drop road bike was retrofitted with an STI-pulled master cylinder, and redesigned frame / forks to accommodate disc tabs.


However, it's not like these days I can ride at speed, so off the shelf does me fine, and since I do practically zero MTBing (or any other riding apart from the odd commute) these days this will be my main bike.

 

[Mayzei]

I'm a dirtjumper.

I've got a Kona Shred, '04 maybe. Also a custom built DMR frame with lots of good stuff on it. Bombproof.

Grown up with some pro's throughout my life so im really into it.

Anyone here buy MBUK, my mate was on the front cover this month.

xx

 

[singular]

Quote:

Originally Posted by shigzeo the only real problem with disc brakes is that they are not good outside of mountain/touring applications. i need to shed mud and weight and the discs are heavier. they do stop amazingly well though! but for cyclocross, stopping is not really an option!

I disagree. Good braking is a benefit no matter what the discipline. I'm sure within the next 5 years we will start to see ultra light small discs for road bikes. Quite a number of more utilitarian road bikes are now being specced with discs as standard. They are cleaner, stronger braking, make for stronger wheels, lighter rims and on. My cross bike uses disc brakes and I find it a great advantage - no cantis getting gunked up with mud - e.g....

Quote:

Originally Posted by ricksome Chain vs Belt vs Drive Shaft Steel Frame vs Carbon Fiber vs Chromium Aluminum vs Other Compositions Anyone care to comment and educate me and others reading this thread about different bicycle technologies?

Chains are here to stay - belt drives have seen a bit of a resurgence in interest in developing the design but I don't think it's going anywhere, too few real world benefits over a chain drive and a lot of disadvantages.

Materials - I don't know what 'chromium aluminium' is but all the common frame building materials have their relative merits. For my own purposes (and I think those of most people who are not purely seeking the absolute ultimate in performance - i.e. pros) steel is hard to go past - light, strong, durable, resiliant, comfortable, cheap. Ti does all of that but doubles up on the light and resiliant bits, and misses out on the cheap. Read Scot Nicol's Metallurgy for cyclists an excellent primer even though written over 15 years ago.

I posted a few of my bikes over in the MTB thread, here are a couple of my more road-going jobs...

Sorry to ramble - I'm much more in to bikes than headphones...

Sam

 

[ricksome]

Singular: Thank you for the info. You seem quite knowledgeable. Does your name indicate a single speed in your bicycle collection? I have one bicycle and it is a single speed. Scwhinn Cutter/ 25 lbs/ steel frame/ low end. I like it though.

 

[singular]

Quote:

Originally Posted by ricksome /img/forum/go_quote.gif Singular: Thank you for the info. You seem quite knowledgeable. Does your name indicate a single speed in your bicycle collection? I have one bicycle and it is a single speed. Scwhinn Cutter/ 25 lbs/ steel frame/ low end. I like it though.

Hey Rick - Singular is actually the name of my company which is a small bike manufacturer based in the UK. I don't want to use these boards to get too commercial, but we do produce singlespeed capable bikes. In fact the touring build posted above has an ebb to allow singlespeed/internal geared hub use. I posted a few more of my mtbs (all singlespeeds) in the mtb-fi thread and if you want to see more still just check out our website. Happy to answer any other bike related questions I can!

Sam

 

[ricksome]

Nice Website. When do you plan to have a retailer in the USA? I see that you are in other parts of the world.

 

[singular]

Quote:

Originally Posted by ricksome /img/forum/go_quote.gif Nice Website. When do you plan to have a retailer in the USA? I see that you are in other parts of the world.

Very shortly - Marty at The Prairie Peddler will be taking delivery of his first batch of frames in less than a month - ready to ship nationwide.

 

[nvkid909]

with regards to disc brakes, most of the mud is at the tyre / rim. the thing with discs is you can pop the pads out quickly & poke a bottle brush in the caliper. i find them easier to clean than say, v-brakes.

i found that discs helped cure my phobia of wheel truing:

i found myself being to anxious / critical when truing wheels inside brake-blocks. recently i had a buckled disc wheel with some loosened spokes on one side. well i just went for it & did it by sight / feel. managed to eradicate even minute wobbles, got it tensioned & centred right, & there was no eliptical bobbing. just like i'd expect from a shop repair & was actually dead easy.

i'm not sure any bike that avoids mud would benefit from discs, their main advantage is to take brakes away from the rim in case you need to fix a bent wheel out on the trail quickly.

 

[iriverdude]

You really don't need discs on roadies, I've rode in the rain with long reach calipers, braking is poorer but that's to be expected. I think if the brakes were more powerful likely to skid. After all you've only got a little bit of rubber on the road. although the appeal of no rim wear is appealing but I've never worn in rims, and even after a few thousand miles what's so expensive about a new wheel build?

 

[singular]

Quote:

Originally Posted by iriverdude /img/forum/go_quote.gif You really don't need discs on roadies, I've rode in the rain with long reach calipers, braking is poorer but that's to be expected. I think if the brakes were more powerful likely to skid. After all you've only got a little bit of rubber on the road. although the appeal of no rim wear is appealing but I've never worn in rims, and even after a few thousand miles what's so expensive about a new wheel build?

I agree you can ride in the rain with rim brakes - it's just that discs are better. I'll outline what I think are the potential benefits for two groups of road cyclists - utility/recreational cyclists, and elite racing.

For general around town cycling in foul condiditons disc (or even drum) brakes are a no brainer. They work consistently no matter what the conditions, they don't wear out rims, the don't get outrageously messy as soon as there is some rain about. The argument of 'once you hit a certain amount of power you're skidding anyway' doesn't hold much water. It's not about pure power, it's about modulation. A rim brake set up to be powerful enough in wet weather will have very poor modulation - basically on or off. A disc will work consistently. Going down a steep hill in the wet, especially with a load on, disc brakes are a god-send. If you only tend to ride irregularly and primarily in dry conditions then rim brakes will be fine - after all the first 100 years of bicycles managed on primarily rim brakes. However for people who ride regularly in poor conditions I think the benefits are obvious. The poster above makes a good point about wheel truing as well - a bit of a knock to the wheel doesn't need to end your journey, not everyone has the tools or the capability to straighten a wheel mid ride. I finished a mountain bike race a while back with a wheel so buckled it only barely made it through the fork legs. On a rim braked bike it would have been race over for sure.

For top level road racing it gets a bit more interesting. Of course we don't see disc brakes for this application yet, but I think it's coming. There are a few possible benefits in addition to the all-weather performance mentioned above. Elite road cyclists use tubular tyres - the tube and the carcass are all one piece and glue to the rim. On long descents in hot conditions great care must be taken not to overheat the rim, soften the glue, and have a tyre peel off (remember Joseba Beloki's career ending crash in the Tour a few years back? that's why it happened). This problem is only worsened with the common use of carbon rims these days. And don't even start talking about braking on carbon rims in wet weather - sketchy indeed. Use of a disc brake obviously would avoid this problem all together. I'm thinking of a much smaller, lighter weight rotor here, refined caliper design, I don't think there'd be much if any weight penalty. In fact rims could even be lighter (though we're possibly already reaching the limits in a structural sense with some of the ~250g carbon rims these days) if they don't have to deal with sidewall wear and the compressive forces of a rim brake.

Sorry for the lengthy reply - you can see I'm a big proponent of disc brakes...

 

[Enthusia]

I didn't want to interrupt the discussion going on here but I just saw this amazing biking video on youtube and wanted to share it.

+ YouTube Video​

ERROR: If you can see this, then YouTube is down or you don't have Flash installed.

 

[ottoyu34]

Wow!! that is amazing. I like his style