Cyccommute says:
JeremyZ quantified how much slower a mountain bike is than a road
bike...10 mph which I consider to be a bit of a fish tale. From personal
experience, my commute along the same route by mountain bike is, roughly, 2 mph slower than my commuter bike. And often, that difference is due to me riding on the trails...i.e. dirt surfaces like Eugene_B is going to ride...rather than riding on the pavement.
Slower is slower....Roughly speaking or not.
All this kerfufflage about speed is somewhat superfluous for Eugene_B's needs anyway. It's a 4.5 mile commute. If he rides at 15 mph (road bike speed), he'll cover the distance in 18 minutes. If he rides at 12 mph (mountain bike speed) he'll cover the distance in 22 minutes. Is 4 minutes really all that important?
The loss of velocity becomes a greater concern with increasing distance. The OP desires weekend tours. A suspended mountain bike could quite seriously delay the OP at the expense of unnecessarily wasting his energy, while touring.
That's the very purpose of the touring traditionally chromoly steel road bike. To avoid such nonsense, by using it, as the most efficient vehicle on two wheels, while touring on pavement!
Dual suspension bikes don't necessarily need to be slower than hardtail mountain bikes nor are they necessarily heavier. How slow they are and how much energy is lost to pedaling is influenced by the suspension. I have an Epic that acts as a hardtail and, with a lockout shock, is rigid until it hits a bump of
sufficient force to overcome the inertial valve on the rear shock. Then the
rear shock unlocks and is active. But that is only transitory. The shock locks
back down shortly after becoming active. And the bike's weight is comparable to my hardtail mountain bike or my YBB. While I wouldn't get into any
races...well, too many races...with roadies, all three bikes are
perfectly adequate for long range rides. I purchased the YBB for the specific
purpose of mountain bike touring.
Agreed! You're just reinforcing my original point. The more engaged suspension, the slower the MTB.
You could possibly use your MTN bikes for touring, but they won't be as efficient as the traditional touring road bike.
It's not the 'facts' that you state but the incorrect conclusions that you draw from them that is the problem. Mixing myth with facts doesn't make the facts better.
What myth? My drawn conclusion is simply logical. That being that if aluminum has a fatigue life much shorter than steel, then steel must last longer than aluminum. That statement goes for all applications of aluminum and steel, when used similarly. It doesn't mean that aluminum is going to suddenly explode or disintegrate. However, it does mean, that the probability of an extended life for aluminum diminishes with each individual event of use.