Originally Posted by rpenmanparker

When I am wrong, I am wrong and not afraid to admit it. I have been posting on and off that I have three bikes, custom steel, Ti, and CF and as far as I can tell they feel pretty much the same. Not enough difference to talk about. Well in the last three days I have discovered that is BS. I rode the Ti bike on Friday and Sunday and the CF bike on Saturday. Essentially the same wheels, same tires, same inflation, very similar carbon bars, identical Al stems and CF seatposts (except for 27.2 on the CF and 31.8 on the Ti), and exactly the same saddle brand and model. The bikes are set up just as close to each other as I can manage in saddle setback, reach and drop. The route I rode was the same and featured some broken road and most importantly, several sets of railroad tracks. No comparison. Usually I stand over road irregularities, but this time I stayed seated over the tracks at about 17 mph. The Ti bike banged over the tracks and sent a strong shock right through to me. The CF bike was completely different. It nearly silently thump, thumped over the tracks and barely transmitted any shock at all. I was floored.

How could I have been so wrong? Well all I can figure is tend to stay on one bike for several weeks, many consecutive rides. When that bike needs some maintenance, I switch to the other one and keep riding it until it needs work. (I only ride the steelie rarely on special occasions.) And there may be a couple of days of downtime between the rides on the two different bikes. Also I have several routes and may not ride the same route on consecutive days when the bikes have been exchanged in between. So I would rarely get a head-to-head comparison. This just happened this time due to needing to true the wheels on both bikes in succession. So I rode them one after another. When I felt the difference after the first two rides, I switched back to the Ti bike to confirm. Yep!

Whatever the reason, I was wrong. It is plain as day. I don't think it was about the seat post difference. The behavior of the entire bikes on the railroad tracks and also on the broken streets was different.

FYI, the Ti bike is an Everti Falcon, a very stiff general-purpose racing model. The CF bike is a 2009 Giant TCR Advanced, just about their top frame at the time it was made. Both are plenty stiff for pedaling and handling purposes. I still love them both, but wow, have my eyes been opened!

Originally Posted by bruce19

I have never ridden CF but now have an AL w/cf fork and rear Masi and a steel Guru w/cf fork. I, like you, have not felt a big difference. But, having ridden the Guru exclusively for the past season I think I'll take the Masi out and see if there is a difference I can feel.