Originally Posted by
TiHabanero
Looking through pictures of very old bikes I noticed the saddles, all of them leather like a Brooks, were pushed forward on the rails. This got me thinking about why the Brooks saddles have a reputation of using short rails and many people cannot get them back far enough. This got me thinking about seat tube angle and how it affects placement of the saddle and where on the rails it is clamped.
It dawned on me that the really old bikes used slacker frame angles than today's bikes. The rails on Brooks saddles reflects this design as the saddles can be pushed very forward, but do have a limited rearward position. With this in mind I built a touring frame with a 72 seat tube angle and it allows the saddle to be supported in the middle of the rails. Using a 73 or 74 seat tube angle forces the saddle all the way back.
Has anyone else come to the conclusion that Brooks saddles are better suited on frames with less than 73 degree seat tube angle? Or is this just a bunch of hooey?
That's always been my understanding -- the Brooks design was frozen in amber before frame angles steepened to ~73°, and the switch-over to plastic saddles among performance cyclists took away any evolutionary pressure on Brooks to keep up with the times.
Quite frankly, as much as I like the Brooks shape, I'd use something else (maybe Berthoud) if I had any frames that had seat tubes steeper than 73°. Even that is pushing it for me!