HillRider

So what part of: "Hello, I'm a newbie, and I need to replace my seat post" did you not understand?

I understood all of it. He said he was offered an alloy seatpost and didn't know what it meant. I offered the information that in this context, alloy meant aluminum. What is so hard to accept about that?

You are fighting an uphill, against the wind battle and you will lose. You will never achieve the precision in language and terminology you seek.

Brian

See what happens when I go to sleep for a bit? We had this whole thread all sorted out, and some guys start the "Alloy" discussion all over again. HR, don't bother responding to them, they already look foolish going over what we just went over. They should have read the whole thread.

genericbikedude

So, I have this aluminum seatpost--not alloy. Should I grease it?

3...2...1...

Retro Grouch 

Good idea. I think that I'll start with you because you know enough of what you're talking about that you can make a choice. Are you going to choose correct usage or are you going to be just another one of those mindless lemmings who are contributing to the misconception?

raleigh_fan

I'm going to use terms which will communicate clearly and succinctly the meaning I intend to convey. As the term "alloy" has been used for aluminum alloy in the bicycling community for at least fifty years (check out the brochures at https://www.retroraleighs.com for examples), I think it will do nicely. Good day.

froze

Titanium is also an alloy.

Having said that; Retro Grouch made a interesting statement about greasing the seat tube rather then the seat post...I never heard or thought of that before, and after about a minute of thinking about it, he indeed made an excellent bit of advice...advice that I will follow from now on!

Brian

Not much grease on our tandem. Mostly anti-seize on nuts/bolts and seatposts, as it is titanium, my favorite alloy.

Retro Grouch 

So is steel. In fact, alloy would be a more appropriate term for steel because, unlike aluminum, you can't have steel that isn't an alloy.

Retro Grouch 

That would be the mindless lemming choice.

raleigh_fan

And that would be the expected reaction. We're done here. See ya! Do keep us posted on the whole "change the way people speak" thing.... Looks like you're 0 for 1 currently.

sydney

Certainly it's more keyboard strokes and bandwidh to do aluminum rather than 'alloy'. Sometimes more is better!

Retro Grouch 

Wrong again. Besides the aluminum vs alloy thing I also didn't vote for Bush either time. That makes me 0 for either 2 or 3 depending on how you count them and I've been proven right all three times.

raleigh_fan

We do agree on something! ;-)

Brian

Worse than that, I've had to spell it "Aluminium", which we transport by the tonne.

spleck

You provided some fantastic, correct information. But if you notice that after the discussion, the response was basically, "Okay, so alloy means aluminum?"

Thank you for the condescending, alpha-male, morale-degrading remark. You have won simply by telling me I will lose.

Yeah, and how long did they think the sun revolved around the earth?

I was just trying to say that alloy only "implies" aluminum (in the bike context, since its a common material). Since he was a self-proclaimed newbie, I thought it would be more beneficial if you didn't work with absolutes ("alloy means aluminum"). Yes, there had been a discussion on it, but I didn't think it was resolved. Apparently I am mistaken, and everyone knows that alloy doesn't mean aluminium, only that most alloys dealing with a bicycle are primarily aluminium.

I for one just wish you and your holy bicycle manufacturer could use the alloy designations. But I guess since they've been doing it for 50 years, they must be right. Seems to me, they might as well just sell "metal" bicycles.

spleck

Being in the country I am, I have to ask: "Does a tonne way N-E more than a ton?"

Yeah, its stupid, but I'm trying to be lighthearted and forget about alloys for a while.

Brian

Yes, a tonne is 110% of a ton. 2,200 American pounds. And we rail about 1,400 tonnes on your average day.

International Freight Logistics Coordinator will sound so good on my resume.

Raiyn

Try this next time. It works so much better than copy / pasting and people will actually know who the **** you're replying to without having to backtrack

Brian

Raiyn's back, with a vengeance.

HillRider

It works better only if you want to reply to the entire posting. Selecting a specific item to reproduce reduces the amount of space you need and avoids unnecessary topics.

Brian

Indeed.

HillRider

Point taken.

bullfrog

Just because everyone uses the incorrect term allow doesn't mean you have to use it too. But it's very valuable to know what people are talking about when they do use it. Some people are just always gonna use it and others not. So if you're one of those who do not use it just teach newbies the right terms and let them know of the terms others might use. There is nothing more you can do, this is just one of those issues that will never be resolved. Some might also fuss about using these terms to save keystrokes, when actually fighting about it is wasting the most keystrokes. So just let others have their opinions and you can have your own, this is the most respect you can have for other people.

Just my 2c

spleck

You can also use the QUOTE tag manually instead of the Bold tag. That way you can quote multiple sources and snippets. Start with QUOTE=username and finish with /QUOTE. With the brackets of course.

ie: (quote=GenericUsername)I didn't say that!(/quote) with brackets is:

HillRider

OK.OK, I get it. Now let it alone.