nochain

New poster here. My wife and I have a Santana Ariva. We have over 7000 miles on it in about 4 seasons of cycling now. We love our tandem, but have had 3 of the tamer trans x stoker seatposts Snap off in mid ride !! thank god we were not going too fast.. The last time was this Saturday during the hotter than hell 100 in wichita falls texas at mile 45. We are a heafty team 400+ lbs. We are thinking of abandoning the suspension style stoker seatpost and going to a regular one. Any suggestions **********?
....by the way. We were able to; by way of a masters degree in southern construction, bind the seat to the remaining stub of a seatpost by way of 4 of my spare tubes, leaving NO spares, and were able to finish the 100 mile ride !! death before sag !!!!!!
thanks for any suggestions !!

TandemGeek

Which seatpost brand / model is it and where did it fail, i.e., the post, the slider or pivot, or bolts at the seatpost clamp?

Tamer is Santana's normal supplier for suspension seatposts and there have been a few different models fitted as OEM for the past few years, the most recent being the parallelogram "pivot-plus" model (a knock-off of the Cane Creek Thudbuster), and then two other conventional "pogo-stick" posts, one that used a rubber sleeve to protect the sliding shaft from dirt (the Tricky-Dick) and one that didn't. Tamer's from the mid-90's were notorious for having bolts sheer-off and it was commonplace for anyone with a Santana that kept the tamer post to keep spare bolts in their seatpack (Note: We had a '95/96 model but Debbie had me remove the shockpost before our bolts had a chance to snap). The newer models see to fail at the pin and most folks get tired of sending them back to Tamer for warranty repair: a) because responsiveness is spotty and, b) because the post isn't all that great when it IS working correctly.

Trans-X is a different brand of shockpost sold as an aftermarket item. Haven't heard anything pro or con about them.

As for recommendations, have you reported your problem to Santana? Even if it's out of warranty, Santana usually does a pretty good job of helping out its customers. Not sure what they are recommending these days but I suspect they probably would ask you to contact Tamer for support.

As for just ditching the Tamer, if you have relatively smooth roads and run a 28mm or larger tire, your stoker may find that a solid seat post is more than adequate. As noted, Debbie had me change out her Tamer post a week after we took our first tandem home and she was not a cyclist before we bought the tandem. 7 years later and she's never wanted to change. However, if she does like the idea of having a back-up system for the captain's failure to either steer around or not call out obstacles OR If you live where expansion joints, chip-seal, or nasty roads are a fact of life I would suggest looking at either the RockShox telescoping model or the Cane Creek Thudbuster. They seem to be the models that give folks the least amount of trouble. The Thudbuster is probably the "better" design but it looks a bit ungainly.


P.S. "nochain" .... I've never been good enough to enjoy this sensation but you gotta love George H. for being imaginative enough to come up with that gag-line! If it wasn't for George, I'm not sure Lance would have any one-liners, e.g., "Anyone got any tape?" Why? "Because I'm ripped!".

SDS

Is that the one with the hexagonal inner shaft that has the head pinned on? I've broken one of those myself.

We broke a "Post Moderne" seatpost two weeks ago. A field repair got us home. The metallurgy or the design seemed to be lacking in strength.

So.....looking around the house, with ultra-strong clamp and shaft as requirements, I found two that seemed to have come from the same manufacturer, though they have different decals on them. I got one from Nashbar, and perhaps you should try that, in combination with a shim from Precision Tandems.

This seatpost has the typical cheap Asian head, with the mating serrations on matching curved surfaces, held together by the relatively massive 6mm bolt(!). Dissassembly on one occasion found a strong spring and an elastomer, all for a low, low, Nashbar price.....it seemed to work well with very low stiction and a tolerable preload, though I have considered pulling the elastomer out and replacing it with an appropriately sized piece of tubing and some washers, to get the preload way up to provide a stiffer pedaling platform. Tell us what works for you.....

Retro Grouch 

I hope that your family is complete.

phinney

Just remembered the Shallow Hal movie.

Brooks makes a nice sprung saddle, Champion Flyer S, that my wife rides on the back of our double. The bike came with a gel and a suspension post but she found it very uncomfortable. She loves the Brooks, it's on a conventional post.

nochain

The shaft is hexegonal in shape... it seems to be made of some type of "cast" aluminum material?? My stoker does prefer her seat set almost all of the way to the rear.. perhaps it put too much of a "angle strain" to the cheap material.. I say cheap ,, but they cost $250... The wife seems to be tougher than I am !!!! She is the one who demanded that we were going to finish the century ride NO MATTER WHAT !! And oh yea,, she had a case of bronchitis at the time too.. Geez its hard for me to complain about anything with her having that attitude ....
I think we are going to try the stationary seatpost and see how that works.. thanks for the help guys... I am glad I found this forum,, and will be posting more in the future... !!