Tandem Cycling - FYI: Lightspeed tandem on craigslist (Salem, OR)

I'm not affiliated with the seller in any way, just ran across this and thought you'd be interested:

http://portland.craigslist.org/wsc/bik/1915073966.html

Sounds messy or sad. Nice looking bike. I wish he posted size.

Just looking at the frame and head tube in particular, it appears to be a small size frame.

Sounds messy or sad.

Seriously.. the shoes, the rack everything :(

Nice looking bike. I wish he posted size.

He didn't post the frame size, but he did the shoe sizes, 43 and 40.5 (presumably the 43 being the captain). There is a pretty good correlation (http://hypertextbook.com/facts/2007/shoesize.shtml) between shoe size and height, and thus frame size. The average shoe size (http://shine.yahoo.com/channel/beauty/the-average-shoe-size-is-on-the-rise-how-does-this-affect-shopping-979104/) is 10.5 and 8.5 for men and women respectively. Their shoes sizes of 11.5 and 9.5 (http://www.neoncollective.com/images/template/size_chart.jpg) suggest riders somewhat taller than average, and thus a frame size at least medium.

He did give a phone number. Wouldn't you just call him if you were interested and had any questions?

Don't know where you got your scale, but I wouldn't buy shoes from you.

I'm a 44 European, and 10 1/2 US. Which matches the chart at http://www.i18nguy.com/l10n/shoes.html#adult - but I wouldn't trust it without further checking either.

At any rate, I was with a guy this weekend who can't be over 5'10", and his feet are larger than mine. I'm 6'3". Back to the bike, I'd have to agree with TG that it's most likely a small - looking at the head tube. There's barely room for the lateral. Medium at the largest.

You can get a pretty good estimate of the geometry on that one by printing the image large, and then measuring it with a ruler and scaling it by the wheel diameter - which was stated. You have to guess the tire size, but it'll be close.

He did give a phone number. Wouldn't you just call him if you were interested and had any questions?

I did, he wasn't home.

Don't know where you got your scale, but I wouldn't buy shoes from you.

I'm a 44 European, and 10 1/2 US. Which matches the chart at http://www.i18nguy.com/l10n/shoes.html#adult - but I wouldn't trust it without further checking either.

Well, upon further review, the chart I posted (which I got from Google image search) is suspect, because it doesn't differentiate between men's and women's in US sizes. So, here is a chart from Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shoe_size), so it must be good!

According to this table, a European 40 could be a 8-9 in US female, and a 43 a 9.5-10 in US male. So, an average sized female and a slightly less than average male. So, the frame size might well be the small frame the photo suggests.


http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/f/f6/Shoesize-adult-en.svg/800px-Shoesize-adult-en.svg.png

I emailed the seller and heard back. I've asked more obvious questions, such as what year, but I've yet to hear back.


Hi Ritterview- It is a large. However my 5' 6" wife can captain and my 5' 2" daughter can stroker. Thanks for the interest.

This is a great thread. Not only have I learned how to infer relationship issues from a Craigslist ad, but I can now tell how tall someone is from their shoe size:rolleyes: I assume this is a loving couple who are completely dedicated to mountain biking, bought the tandem on a flyer (they are well-heeled) and didn't like it. Their loss is someone's gain.

The geometry of a Litespeed tandem, from Litespeed's 2000 catalog. (http://www.litespeed.com/archives/lscatalog2000.pdf) Looks like they had Large/Medium/Small sizes only, not separate sizes for Captain/Stoker.

http://img827.imageshack.us/img827/3221/litespeed.png (http://img827.imageshack.us/i/litespeed.png/)

Uploaded with ImageShack.us (http://imageshack.us)

Wow, a 28 lb ti tandem. That must be an incredible ride!

My shoe size is 43 EU and 9.5 US does that really mean I'm not 6'3" tall?

I'm 5'7" and wear a 10 1/2.

I ride with a team who have a Litespeed. They let me take a spin, solo. Very odd handling, in that it felt exactly like a single, totally different from our CoMo, which takes me a bit to get used to, solo. I wonder what exactly contributes to that?

I e-mailed. He's 6 ft. she's 5'7" . Ls is lg/md

I ride with a team who have a Litespeed. They let me take a spin, solo. Very odd handling, in that it felt exactly like a single, totally different from our CoMo, which takes me a bit to get used to, solo. I wonder what exactly contributes to that?

I rode my cdale solo , it feels odd also . feels "normal" w stoker.

A 58 frame is not quite what I would call large, but regardless, that frame looks like a small frame to me... time to get a new eye prescription.

I have ridden single a number of tandems and all felt odd... I would be weary of a tandem that feels normal with a single rider.

In the 'old days' when Litespeed first introduced the Taliani they used a bi-oval, oversized downtube... It was big, but not massive. As a result, on the small frames the internal and down tube merged together at the head tube into a single mitered joint with the top tube mitered-in tight as well. On the Medium, you could still see three distinct tubes at the head tube, but no daylight between any of the tubes. On the Large, there was a gap between the internal and top tube at the head tube.

In re-looking at the fuzzy photo on the Craigslist ad, that Taliani looks like one of the more recent models with the larger, Ultimate-like aero downtube. The larger downtube alters those traditional visual cues on Litespeed Taliani frame sizing since even the large ends up with all three tubes merging together at the headtube, hence the illusion of being a smaller frame, e.g., a small or medium.

Riding a tandem solo is interesting, but meaningless when it comes to handling impressions; the CG is all screwed up without a stoker on-board and that alters just about everything in terms of handling, stability, etc.

I e-mailed. He's 6 ft. she's 5'7" . Ls is lg/md

That's funny, my email has him and her an inch taller and shorter respectively.


Hi Ritterview - I'm 6' 1" and my wife is 5' 6" both of us can captain the tandem. My wife and 5' 2" daughter are the only stoker. The tandem was built in the summer of 2008. I would say it is a large / medium.

In either case they are tall enough to not have a small frame, and my much-maligned shoe size analysis was predictive! :p

You have to go back to 2000 in the Litespeed catalog archive (http://www.litespeed.com/current/catalog.aspx) to find their tandems listed, in more recent years they've been only custom (http://www.thetandemlink.com/tandems.html#anchor1145574). If this is a 2008, therefore, it would have been a special order, and may had different sizing than the three standard sizes from 2000 posted above. Matt, however, doesn't seem sure of the exact size.

Wow, a 28 lb ti tandem. That must be an incredible ride!

I wouldn't be so sure of that. There's a reason that you don't see a lot of Ti tandems.

Lateral stiffness is a very good thing in a tandem. Ti is not known for its stiffness.

While there are certainly some nice tandems made of Ti, all else equal Ti is not the ideal choice of material for a tandem.

My bet is you put a 350lb team on that bike putting out 2000 watts or so out of the saddle, and it would get interesting.

We rode a Co-Motion ti in 2001. The design was different than what is used today. There was a long, small dia. tube running from the rear dropouts to the capt. seat tube. Out riding style didn't get along with the bike and was quite whippy. We are a bit more polished and would like to try another. The fella who designed the bike moved on to build ti bikes for Moots.

Looks like a great bike. We would buy it if we didn't already have Litespeed tandem. We have been beating up our bike for 10+ years now and have broken or worn out everything on it except the frame. No worries about lateral stiffness for our 290 pound team. Much stiffer than our previous Ibis steel tandem.

The sizing still seem a bit odd. The frame looks much smaller than ours even though I am close to the same height as that bike's captain. It appears in the fuzzy picture that the stem is very long and has a lot of rise. The seat also appears to be pushed well back on the rails. Could it be that they managed to get a frame that is a bit too small and tried to compensate?

The frame looks much smaller than ours

Is yours a Medium or a Large; I've forgotten and you blew away your web content that had most of the history, specs., etc... I want to say it was a Medium.

P.S. I found your Blog last night... much more fun than just looking at the Flickr updates.

Our Litespeed was a custom that was built for Jonathan Boyer. It seems to be closest to the large stock size from that era but not all of the measurements match. The stoker compartment is a touch shorter and the captain's a touch longer.

Here is ours in a similar pose to the one for sale.

http://farm1.static.flickr.com/39/84385650_b5be018f70.jpg

That's funny, my email has him and her an inch taller and shorter respectively.



In either case they are tall enough to not have a small frame, and my much-maligned shoe size analysis was predictive! :p

You have to go back to 2000 in the Litespeed catalog archive (http://www.litespeed.com/current/catalog.aspx) to find their tandems listed, in more recent years they've been only custom (http://www.thetandemlink.com/tandems.html#anchor1145574). If this is a 2008, therefore, it would have been a special order, and may had different sizing than the three standard sizes from 2000 posted above. Matt, however, doesn't seem sure of the exact size.

hhmmmm , this was the e-mail i received
"Tandem is a large. Captain 6' 2" to 5' 5" , Stroker 5' 9" to my daughter 5' 2". I'm 6 foot , wife 5' 7" a perfect fit. Seat posts are titanium. Thanks."

What rear wheel spacing do they have on the Litespeed frames?

What rear wheel spacing do they have on the Litespeed frames?

Default is 145mm, but it varies. I've seen Litespeeds with 130mm, 132.5mm, 135mm, 145mm and 160mm.

Frankly, if anyone was serious about this tandem (and just about any high-end tandem from Litespeed, Calfee, Seven, Erickson, etc.) they would do well to obtain the serial number and then contact Litespeed to verify the build specs.

Anyone still have the phone number or email of the guy who was selling the Litespeed tandem? I noticed the Craigslist ad had been removed. Thanks!