Originally Posted by
bdinger
Heh, I never offroad on the 7.3, but I beat the holy snot out of my Hardrock. Ironically, no issues there, but it's a Hardrock. Downside is what I remembered this morning.. street + Hardrock /= Trek FX + street
. By all accounts this really is/should be just a fluke, but I've pretty much lost faith/trust in the bike. Had this have been a catastrophic failure five minutes earlier, the best result is that I would have hit pavement at 20mph. Worst result is that I would have hit pavement, and the car behind me would have run me over.
I'm pretty stoked about the LHT, I've wanted one essentially since I started cycling. I'll do some minor customizations to the "LHT complete" build, but I'm sure it'll be a tank.
+1 on the LHT, I have one that I bought back in June or July. I wanted a steel road bike with a triple chainring, and the LHT looked like the best choice. Also I wanted to stay away from the "compact" frame geometry, as I feel that style frame too often leaves a lot of seat tube exposed above the clamp, which acts like a lever trying to pry the frame apart. Not too expensive, either, compared to some other bikes made out of old Fresca cans and frozen snot! I'm 6' - 2-1/2" tall with 24" wide shoulders and size 14 feet - no problems with toe-overlap even with the canoes I wear.
When I got on the scale this morning I was 265 lbs. A bike made to carry a load seemed like a good idea. I paid just under $1200 for mine. It was more or less "custom built" by my LBS,, who pretty much hit what I wanted right on the head. Here's a pic:
I intended to use mine as a road bike, not for touring, so it was built with 700 x 28 high-pressure tires instead of the 700 x 35's as usually used. I particularly like the bar-end shifters - shifts smooth and accurately every time. I really appreciate the ability to "tune" the front derailleur to eliminate the chain clicking on it as the chain angle changes across the rear cogs.
My experience with "indexing" shifters as used on most "modern" bikes is that they seem to be "fiddly" - they are always needing a 1/2 turn on a barrel adjuster to keep them shifting smooth. The bar-ends just work - every time.
I recently had the LHT back to the shop for it's first tune-up. The young lady - part owner of the shop, I think - working there, when I remarked how much I liked the bar-end shifters, admitted that she had never ridden a bike that had them. I guess we have a whole generation coming up that know nothing but brifters - their loss!