Road suspension

[Sweep]

To be honest freddie, i wouldn't bother.

I have a very nice Cannondale silk warrior. Basically a fast city bike. Flat bars. Very nice.

It has a short travel (25mm???) Switchable in and out suspension.

Works very well.

But servicing is a pain.

In fact, strictly, it has been obsolete for a few years.

Too much hassle.

Change/swap tryres as and when you need to.

I now mostly ride an old Ridgeback hybrid with a quill stem - sometimes 28mm in town, 37 or 38 if on tour with it.

In short, i would only bother with suspension for a mountain bike being regularly used off road.

Other over complicated suspension on a road bike - the madness that was the suspension hub fitted to some Dahon Speed Pro sports bikes.

[531colin]

..........Am using the same ITM Europa bars I had on the 531 bike.

Probably not the bars that are stiffer than you are used to, then.
Interesting that Surly haven't found it necessary to make the disc Trucker forks any heavier than the rim brake version
http://surlybikes.com/uploads/downloads/Surly_Fork_Info.pdf
I have a couple of pairs of 631 forks in use which are really comfortable (compliant), I think because the taper starts high up the fork, just below the brake stud. I used to be able to find a list of tube sizes from Reynolds USA, but either its gone or the Google fairy has.....

[Merry_Wanderer]

Would it make any difference running wider tyres? I have 26 x 2 inch on my Surly Troll commuting bike. Don't suppose many folk would want to ride on a 700 wheel bike with 50mm tyres though

[Freddie]

50mm tyres would make a lot of sense, my current bike wouldn't accommodate them though.

These tyres look very interesting, 60mm wide and under 500g per tyre, providing you have the space to fit them:

http://www.schwalbe.com/gb/tour-reader/ ... g-one.html

[robc02]

Interesting that Surly haven't found it necessary to make the disc Trucker forks any heavier than the rim brake version
http://surlybikes.com/uploads/downloads ... k_Info.pdf

I'm sure they used to quote different weights for these. Since the DT forks have a disc caliper mount, they must either be heavier or have thinner fork blades, crown or steerer than the plain LHT model.

In fact I have found an old email from someone at Surly saying that the DT forks weigh "a touch more" than the LHT ones.

It seems likely that both use basically the same fork but with the addition of the caliper mount on the DT. Presumably the LHT forks, in order to cope with the touring loads they are designed for, do not require further strengthening to cope with disc braking loads.

[Brucey]

well they have either changed the frames or changed the numbers. From 2012;

LHT weights here
https://web.archive.org/web/20120914071225/http://surlybikes.com/uploads/downloads/SURLYLongHaul.pdf

58cm frame 2.34kg, uncut fork 1.02kg

LHDT weights here
https://web.archive.org/web/20120814115652/http://surlybikes.com/bikes/disc_trucker

58cm frame 2.58kg, uncut fork 1.13kg

Total difference 0.35kg

Current LHT or LHDT forks are claimed as 1.2kg....

cheers

[531colin]

Too many numbers!.......makes me question the whole business.
LHT fork 1.02 kg ....was that 2003?
cross check fork 1.1 kg....I think thats possibly current.
Disc trucker fork 1.13 kg..who knows when that was?
Disc and rim brake trucker both 1.2 kg, I think current.
Maybe when they introduced the disc Trucker, they decided to just build one fork, and fit either disc or rim brake studs, and it used to be a lighter fork before?
Still seems unlikely that the Trucker fork was ever lighter than the Cross check fork?

[Brucey]

weirdly on the current LHT page it gives the weight of a 26" wheeled LHT fork as different (lighter) vs the weights in the current .pdf too.

cheers

[al_yrpal]

I must say that riding my Cannondale Rush 2000 full suspension MTB on the road it certainly is a very smooth comfortable ride. http://www.bikepedia.com/QuickBike/Bike ... =Rush+2000 It has a carbon Lefty and a swing pivot rear end. The damping on each end is perfect and you never need to lock the suspension out even when climbing very bumpy suraced hills. All this on a bike with a very rugged frame with discs weighing about 12 kg. A road bike could use the same principles and it could weigh even less. Dont tell me it cant be done because it can! Take the massive tyres off, slim the rims down, how much will that save for a start? The problem is cyclists, a very conservative bunch who think suspension, flat bars and disc brakes are for the ignorant. One day…

Al

[Mick F]

I think the bars are more likely to offer flex than the stem. Those Cinelli 1A stems, for instance, were solid items. No amount of hand pressure would flex one of those.

Thinking about this yesterday on my ride, I did some experimenting.

Bearing in mind that I've been using the same bike for the past 19years and the stem and 'bars are the same, I had to experiment because my bike is "normal" and I tend not to think about it.

I have Cinelli 64 'bars and a Cinelli 1R stem.

Climbing a hill, I made sure I was gripping the hoods and flexed everything as I climbed.
The 'bars never flexed, but the stem flexed left and right as I rode.
Had the 'bars flexed, the left side wouldn't have gone down when the right side came up, but they "see-sawed" instead as I strained .......... meaning they pivoted on the stem.

Never used a 1A stem, so I cannot comment about them.

[Brucey]

I'd have to agree; by comparison with modern 1-1/8" Ahead stuff, 1A and 1R stems are pretty flexy. I don't think this is at all a bad thing in terms of comfort.

cheers

[531colin]

The roads round here are awful,..........

Actually, thats not new. I started work in the mid sixties, and bought my first decent wheels (Constrictor), having done all my earlier cycling on secondhand Dunlop steel rims. I wrote those Constrictor rims off in the dark right at the start of a CTC 24 hour reliability ride.....oh joy! a couple of hundred miles to do with the pranged rims trying to tug the brakes off! The rims that replaced those, I wrote off in the dark on my way home from night school, a journey I more often did by motor bike.

I must say that riding my Cannondale Rush 2000 full suspension MTB on the road it certainly is a very smooth comfortable ride............... The problem is cyclists, a very conservative bunch.........

Not all cyclists are conservative. This thread brings up 2 fairly recent things....
Firstly, people looking towards (new) engineering to get them out of an age-old problem....ie suspension to overcome bumpy roads....
Secondly, somebody suffering from at least one modern trend in bike design, that is the urge to over-engineer everything, so its "bombproof" just in case somebody wants to do something some day. Possibly also people suffering from the modern curse of steep angles, which tip your weight forward onto your hands, and make it difficult to "un-weight" the front wheel, so you feel every jolt much more than you need to.

To be honest freddie, i wouldn't bother...........

Now that I can relate to. My experience is that its only on unfamiliar roads in the dark that potholes are a real bind. If you commute a regular route, you will know all the potholes personally. In daylight, if you are reasonably observant and set your bike up so you can "ride" it, rather than sit on the saddle, you should be OK using tried and simple things like big wheels, sensible tyres and reasonably compliant frame and forks.
What do I mean by "ride" it?.....distribute your weight between the contact points....saddle, pedals, bars, so you can "un-weight" the wheels in turn, letting the bike move under you like a rocking horse. I have seen people bounced up off the saddle by a big bump.....if you don't want that to happen, don't have your weight on the saddle at that time!
Alex Moulton wanted to use small wheels, so he had to fit suspension to get reasonable ride quality. Budget "shopper" bikes of the time couldn't fit working suspension at the price, so they went for fat tyres.

[Brucey]

I scrapped off my favourite Fiamme rims in a (really rather small) pothole about 30 years ago. Not the only set I wrecked that way, either.

Both times the rear rim suffered about twice the damage vs the front.

cheers

[pwa]

I think the bars are more likely to offer flex than the stem. Those Cinelli 1A stems, for instance, were solid items. No amount of hand pressure would flex one of those.

Thinking about this yesterday on my ride, I did some experimenting.

Bearing in mind that I've been using the same bike for the past 19years and the stem and 'bars are the same, I had to experiment because my bike is "normal" and I tend not to think about it.

I have Cinelli 64 'bars and a Cinelli 1R stem.

Climbing a hill, I made sure I was gripping the hoods and flexed everything as I climbed.
The 'bars never flexed, but the stem flexed left and right as I rode.
Had the 'bars flexed, the left side wouldn't have gone down when the right side came up, but they "see-sawed" instead as I strained .......... meaning they pivoted on the stem.

Never used a 1A stem, so I cannot comment about them.

I stand corrected.

But I still recommend drop bars with a flattened profile on the top section to anyone wanting a little "suspension" in the bars. It's not a dramatic and worrying movement, just a subtle little bit of give on bumpy surfaces. If you want very stiff bars you would choose ones with a circular profile, which is what most of us have as default.

[jessand]

I have a Cannondale Sport Road Headshok, a development on the silk road, which is very good at absorbing the vibrations from poor surfaces and even modest potholes. The travel is 25mm and unlike mtb suspension it is quite subtle - a bit like driving a car in that you're not really aware of the suspension doing its job. Servicing has to be done by an approved dealer and I used to take it in once a year (cost about £60) until the mechanic asked why I'd brought it in when it was working OK! "Bring it back when it starts to feel a bit notchy" he said - that was about 3 years ago! It certainly makes a huge difference if you have problems with your hands/wrists.