Murray Missile 

I have an '86 Del Rey in 25" on the stand right now. Quad Butted Valite tubing, chain peg on the RH seat stay, pump peg on the back of the head tube, a pretty decent mid-range bike. I'm getting it ready to sell only because I have a nicer '86 Team FUJI to refurbish and I'm thinning the herd. If not for that it would be a keeper. Not sure how the '85 compares to the '86 but if it's close and you could find one of the taller ones I don't think you'd hate it. Even my old Supreme was a sweet rider with some upgrades.

ryansu 

I don't have your height RoS but I do have the legs of 5'8" man 30" inseam (like my two brothers) but am nearly 5'11'' due to a Looooong torso. I rode a 54cm Cannondale for a decade before realizing it was too small I ride a 58cm in vintage -stand-over be damned- and although I have tried 56cm and can ride them they just don't feel right.

Good luck with your new quest may you find many lovely bikes in a frame size that works for you.

RiddleOfSteel

This is the dilemma facing me with my '85 Allez SE. Lovely thing, with patiently-sourced Accushift Plus era Superbe Pro components. 63.5cm and not a mm more. Had a ton of saddle to brake hood drop before, and now another inch on top of that. Placing the saddle higher made it look ridiculous. I even changed to a taller stem and compact bars to get the drop to not be 4.4". While the lessening of the drop happened, the bike suffered greatly, aesthetically. So I'll either (put it back to original/"ideal" and) sell the whole thing for a princely sum or sell it as a frameset plus original crankset, stem, bars, and seat post.

ryansu 

Someone is going to get a damn fine Allez hope you got some miles on it RiddleOfSteel before the shift

RiddleOfSteel

I love the colors of that del Rey. It's 25" but my sentimental self would still buy one, even if that's what is a touch short now...I still like 25" bikes and always will because I like big bikes (because I fit them), but after recording tall bike geometry from a number of manufacturers (and having a night to think about it), 26" is likely the best frame size as it's nearly how far my saddle has bumped up while also not super duper high so as to look a touch funny. Still, 27" appeal, because they are even less desired and somebody has to love these tall things. Just look at this 1985 del Rey!



Since I've had a 27" frame before (1983 Nishiki Olympic 12), albeit a number of years ago, I know I can straddle it just fine. I reconfirmed yesterday by throwing a leg over the Paramount and "raising the top tube height" to see how much cleared or if I was going to be singing soprano. It all checked out.

jlaw

Having purchased my first vintage bike in 2018 and joined BF thereafter, I've had a couple years to stare at endless photos of classic and vintage rides posted all over the internet.

What I am realizing is that my next vintage bike will be in the 24" size. The three 22.5" bikes that I have are showing a bit more seat post and stem (using a threadless adapter and inclined stem) than is considered aesthetically ideal by the bikearazzi. I do appreciate a classic look like the photo below. Up until now I've been more about function over form.

Murray Missile 

I have one 26" frame, my 1975 Schwinn Varsity Deluxe, "Big Bird"...... it is a svelte 45 Lbs. LOL. Put later Schwinn wheels with a 6 speed freewheel on it and a set of Panaracer Paselas. This has gotten more thumbs ups, smiles and "neat old bike" comments than all my others put together. It's a tank but it rides oh so smooth, not much of a climber though. What it lacks in speed and agility it makes up for in "yellowness" and chromium overload.

RiddleOfSteel

I figured I should create some Photoshopped solutions to my problem here, and boy do they deliver! Execution is not flawless (aka you can see where I did it), but it's good enough to give the exact idea of how my Paramount (in this case) would look in various commercially available heights: 25", 26" and 27" All heights using the same top tube length of 60cm, because it was easier to do (and that's my max allowable TT length anyway).

Last night, I had an idea pop into my head. The rules may very well be different when analyzing smaller frames, but for large frames, I think the Golden Ratio of 1:1.618 plays a role in finding the ideal frame size with regard to saddle and stem height above the top tube, as well as the exposed seat post length vs. head tube length. Some ratio "rules" perhaps?

(Exposed Seat Post) 1 : 1.618 (Head Tube Length)

(Stem Height) 1 : 1.618 (Seat Post + Saddle Height)

Or put another way:

The stem height is either 38% of the total height of the seat post + saddle, or it is 62% of the total height of the seat post + saddle. The seat post + saddle height is "The Whole" and the stem height is at one of two Golden Ratio heights between the top level of the saddle and the top level of the top tube.

(Exposed Seat Post) =/= (Head Tube Length)

This rule of "not equal" is worsened with a visually bulky B17 saddle that looks like it has been stuck on a stick. In the picture of the Paramount below, as currently built, the overall height of exposed seat post and B17 saddle is greater than the head tube length. On this bike, with this seat-tube-to-top-tube proportion (and angling), it looks "off", if not a bit like the tall stem/bar/seat post/saddle assembly is squishing the top of the bike down. It is a proportion power struggle that was formerly in harmony when the saddle was an inch lower.

So let's get to photos to see what I'm all about here:

Paramount as she is now. Officially a 63.5cm frame that measures 64cm. Sometimes it looks fine enough, other times, in real life, it doesn't. And this doesn't even address the fact that the saddle-to-bar drop is still higher than before.


Paramount, as a hypothetical 66cm (26") bike. This is the Goldilox "solution" if ever one presented itself. You will see it when comparing the shorter and taller versions above and below. We see Golden Ratio at play between the various elements, and (crucially) the saddle-to-bar drop has been improved to what it was before the saddle height increase. I really like it. A lot.


Paramount, as a hypothetical 68.5cm (27") bike. It's so tall, that tire size and other components must work in harmony to allow the quite low (over the top tube) saddle and stem heights to not be a distraction. Overall, the 60cm top tube and original Schwinn geometry allow for a surprisingly handsome super tall bike. A saddle height increase here would be more visually "comfortable" or natural. Since I am no taller, that won't happen. But you see how proportions work throughout a bicycle composition. Crazy, and cool, eh?

merziac

So cool!

Fully agree with all points, save for the "surprisingly handsome" statement, I for one am not surprised.

Schwinn new exactly what they were doing and planned for this sort of thing knowing that they could have to build such a thing when a customer wanted and were fully prepared to do so.

They didn't mess around and would do just about anything you wanted.

RiddleOfSteel

And for the record, for those playing at home, I am well aware that Schwinn offered a 'stock' 26"/66cm size for this era of Paramount (per their literature and geometry specs). The top tube length jumped from a good 23.5" (59.7cm) to a whopping 24.5" (62.2cm). The net top tube increase is about 1.4cm, which, for a guy that pegs 60cm as his general max top tube length, is not something to trifle with. Part of me would consider it, so long as the paint was wrecked enough to justify not only a rear brake bridge drop and brake cable housing stops, but also dual bottle cage boss pairs and DT shifter braze-ons.

Vintage Panasonics were offered in the 26"/66cm frame size, which was great. What wasn't great was that, for many of those years, the colorways weren't all that attractive. Fuji and late-'70s/early-'80s Centurion did really well with paint and color. With two race bike slots taken by my Davidson and Land Shark, I'm looking for a lovely sport tourer or touring bike to fill that third slot. What will become of my now-too-short (for pretty proportions) frames has yet to be seen, but I am taking suggestions...

Paul J

I'm just short of 6'2" (187.5cm) with an inseam measurement of 37.4" (95cm) so long legs and short torso. I struggle to get a bike with a long enough seat tube with a short enough top tube. In my more limber days a significant amount of drop saddle to stem height was no problem. Now nearing 66 I need closer to level. this is my 63cm Merckx with a riser stem from Velo Orange. (I'm really struggling to go with the Nitto Technomic) I'm planning to go with a compact set of bars as I wasn't thinking when I purchased these deeper drop bars with the stem.

Dfrost 

Like many contributors to this thread, I share the long legs/short torso “affliction”. You might also want to try shorter reach bars. Another fit assist as aging torsos shrink (not something RiddleOfSteel has yet to worry about) is to raise the brake posts on the bars, and rotate the bars up a bit.

I suspect the days when Dan and I could swap bikes with just a little tweak to saddle height and bar rotation for ride comparisons are done. They were great rides. That Paramount is one awesome bike to ride!

jlaw

These might help - but they fit a 31.8mm stem clamp..

https://www.somafab.com/archives/pro...or-2-handlebar

RiddleOfSteel

The compact bars will naturally have decidedly shorter reach, which will be quite beneficial for your situation. I appreciate them as well.

@Dfrost appart from sourcing a CK headset piece (or simply replacing the headset to keep the thing a runner while sourcing said piece), if you have enough spare parts, the Paramount could become a, oh, I don't know, Zero Bike... I wonder how 650Bs would do on such a frame. This should probably be tested, and then shared here on BF.

polymorphself 

Chr0m0ly This is a response to an earlier post you made in this thread, but are all late 80s' Miyatas measured c-t, effectively making them smaller than stated? I ask because I have a 1985 Miyata 310 that is 23", before they switched to cm. I recently picked up a 57cm 1988 Miyata 615 that I am overhauling. I thought, "Ok, if they were both in cm this would only be a 1cm difference, and I like the fit of the 23" 310." I haven't really ridden it much yet, but I've done some stationary fooling around with the fit and for some reason it seems much smaller than anticipated. Perhaps the more touring geometry and lower bb are messing with my head? I definitely have more seat post showing to get it to feel like the 310. But if you're saying the late 80's 57cm is actually more like a 56 I guess this would make sense, and maybe I'll have to move this bike along once I'm done with it...

RiddleOfSteel

Per the 1988 Miyata catalog, they were measuring things CTT. A 1988 615 did come in a 57cm. Sometimes there is variance. I know multiple 25.5" Trek models all sport different CTC measurements. I have no idea why, but there it is. Best to measure and see if the company was telling the truth or if there was some liberties taken.

********

As for the continuation of this thread, anything around 66cm is likely a functional and aesthetic ideal. I have my eye on a sorta-local 27"/68.5cm bike as well as a 65cm frame (not local to the NW at all).

polymorphself 

Gotcha, where does the catalog mention this? Also, now that I’m looking at the catalog again, I’m noticing that some of the models are measured in inches while some are in centimeters. What was the reasoning behind this?

RiddleOfSteel

If you're looking at the same Miyata catalog from 1988, I'm sure you can find it, but to expedite that process, it's at the beginning (first page after the cover page..). Miyata has always measured CTT in my experience. Why some numbers are cm and others inches is anybody's guess. My wild guess is that cm is a Euro/higher end sort of thing, while inches is more US market-oriented. We see this in Fuji and Panasonic etc catalogs where the performance bikes are in cm, and the cheaper offerings in inches. Schwinn kept inches for all their models except for the Paramount. I personally don't care which system is used so long as it fits me--I can do conversion math, and that's half the fun.

Andy_K 

Somehow I missed this thread the first couple of times around, but I've been seeing mentions of your fit revolution/revelation in other threads recently, so I was happy to finally find it and get the whole story.

I've had a long journey of figuring out what frame size is "right" for me, and I'm still not certain the oscillations are done. I had a professional fit about 12 years ago, which did wonders for my comfort on the bike, but it's taken me a while to translate that into a proper frame size idea. When I left the shop after the original fit I felt like I was driving a bus -- the fitter lowered my saddle about half an inch and raised the bars over an inch. It took a couple of weeks to get used to, but it's still the basis of how I setup every bike I buy. My case is slightly complicated by the fact that I had my fit done on a cyclocross bike with compact geometry (and that frame was too small -- 52cm).



One thing I learned from this was that you can make a bike "fit" even when it really doesn't fit. Like you, I tend to really dive in to (some might say "obsess over") topics like this, so I did a lot of reading on fit and geometry and figured out the math to make a spreadsheet that calculates stack and reach based on frame geometry, and I use that with new bikes I get to figure out three measurements -- bottom bracket-to-saddle height, headtube to handlebar height and handlebar to saddle top distance. These three dimensions put the feet, hands, and butt in the same relative position on all my bikes. If I can achieve these positions, I can make a bike work. I don't care about aesthetics as much as you do, but it is something I strive for, so that's been the focus of my fit evolution since the fitter did his job.

A few years later I got a 54cm Major Jake, which I thought was perfect. A few of my friends who were shorter than me were riding 56cm Kona CX bikes, but I chalked it up to differences in fit preferences. So I had in my mind that 54cm was the size I needed. Foolishly, I didn't account for differences between classic road bikes and cyclocross bikes, so when I dove into vintage road bikes I bought a 54 (and I think it was 54 ctt). The result was my Pinarello, which everyone but me immediately saw was the wrong size for me.



This was particularly dumb, because before I even bought the Pinarello I had a 55cm 2001 LeMond that for some reason that I don't even remember I had convinced myself was a little big for me.



Shortly after the Pinarello I went into my period of binge buying nearly every vintage bike I could get my hands on (opinions differ as to whether or not this period has ended). I honest am not even sure what order they came in, but the were mostly between 56 and 58. I was sure 56 was the right size for a while, and because of how comfortable it is I mentally designated my 56cm Sequoia as the "reference" fit.



Of course, some people still looked at that stem height and asked why I didn't get a bike that fits me. My rationale was always that a frame that would allow for a shorter stem wouldn't have enough standover and the top tube would be too long. Nevertheless, I tried a few bigger frames. I think I more-or-less found the upper limit with my Colnago. The seller had this listed as a 57, but it's really more like a 58.5 (ctc).



If I put a a Brooks saddle on this bike, the rails would be sitting on the top tube. The stack of spacers above the head tube makes it look like I have a normal sized stem, but it's really still taller than most people use, and it's stubby -- 80cm. The standover...let's just say it kind of works if I'm wearing shoes but would be uncomfortable in bare feet. Once I'm riding though, this bike feels great. I've got a few other bikes with 80mm stems and the handling doesn't quite feel right, but this one is perfect.

The other bike I have that pushes the upper limits is my 23" Competition.



There's something unusual about the geometry of this bike -- slack angles and Raleigh's insistence at the time on giving everything a 57cm top tube combine to give this about 20cm more stack height than the Sequoia, but 10cm less reach. That let's me use a more normal 100cm stem without a lot of neck showing. My only complaint is that I can't get a clamp on the seatpost to put this in my workstand.

So what size do I need? Hell if I know! Right now, I'm thinking 57, but it depends on the geometry.

Anyway, I don't think I have a point in all this. Just comparing notes. If anything, I would suggest that you not be too hasty in selling off frames you love before you see how things evolve in your post-fitting world.

RiddleOfSteel

Thanks, @Andy_K for your thoughts. Part of me thinks, "If he bought a modern bike, Trek's 'H2' [taller headtube vs. H1/race fit] frames would be perfect. Plenty of head tube to mitigate any potential awkward mega-stacked stems, with plenty of seat post showing to place in the work stand."

In the last two weeks, I've had plenty of time to temper my initial reaction and calm the mental 'fish-tailing' that happens with something like this. I knew it would happen, but even then the reality remains: a 1" saddle height gain on frames that were aesthetically 'balanced' and fit comfortably enough is significant. I have the most incredible luck of finding touring/touring-oriented frames for long distance use (which I would like to get to..), only to find that they like to go fast as well. As that is part of their spirit, I wish to build up that frame in such a way so as to accommodate that. With a larger saddle to hood drop, the needle moves too much to the "race bike" side of the gauge. With a super tall stem, the needle moves perhaps too much to the "touring only" side of things, and that includes an aesthetic shift in the wrong direction.

Competing factors and making them all happy. They were happy before, but now there is a disturbance in the Force. I will not have my Paramount try to be my Davidson in fit and purpose, nor will my fast frames be built into 'slower' looking bikes than they were designed to be. I have fitted my Allez SE with a taller stem and compact bars to get the saddle-to-hood drop reasonable. It's not there and it's likely not going to get there.

This is what I'm trying to avoid: Regular bottom/below top tube, super tall top/above top tube


This is a bit closer (for the sake of illustration) to the 'architecture' I'm going for: Regular top/above the top tube, taller bottom/below the top tube.


I think swinging to a 27"/68.5cm frame is a lot, and there is certainly contact between the top tube and my humanity. I did it before on a 1983 Nishiki Olympic 12, and I'd be happy to do it again so long as the top tube isn't a mile long. To have a bike that is exclusively in touring/not racy mode would be a lot of fun. I do enjoy driving big cars and land yachts, so I'm excited for the novelty and experience. I have my eye on a gorgeous 27" Fuji presently (ok, and a 65cm Davidson Signature frameset...), but many things depend on Sunday's Warehouse Sale at Bike Works. There may be a gem there.

Andy_K 

Pro tip: adding a bell makes your stem look less tall.

ofajen

So, Andy_K, what is your saddle height? I’m sure you know that is useful in looking at frame size.

My PBH is 36.5” and my saddle height is 32.5”. I’ve been using a 25” frame (ctt) for more than 40 years and that size still seems about right. These days I’m running the bars about level with the saddle. I’ve run much lower at times, but having the saddle level seems the most versatile way for my riding.

So, I’m running a frame 7.5” or 19 cm less than my seat height. That ends up also being about “a fistful of seatpost” exposed with a leather saddle (and about 20mm more while I’m using a modern plastic saddle).

Otto

Andy_K 

I'm not sure about my PBH. I set my saddle 725mm from the bottom bracket (center to top) as measured more or less along the axis of a 73 degree seat tube. And I have the bars just about 5mm below the saddle on most bikes. On a couple of bikes they ended up slightly higher than the saddle somehow and I haven't bothered to fix it.

I'm much less concerned about a tall stem and how much seat post is showing than most people on this forum. I actually like the look of a slightly tall stem like I've got on the Sequoia. The Pinarello turned out to be beyond the bounds of what even I could live with (for purely aesthetic reasons),

I'm OK with anything from a fistful of seatpost to two fists. The Colnago and Competition are closer to three fingers. Even that only bothers me because of the workstand issue.

ofajen

That makes sense. 72.5 cm saddle height. An old rule of thumb was subtract 15 cm, which gives you 57.5 cm as a starting point for a frame size that should fit reasonably well.

With a classic round bar and what people now consider a deep drop (140mm) I’m liking to have my bar top about 1/2” above the saddle and thus the hoods about 1/2” below. That puts the drops just high enough for me to use most of the time and for long periods if the terrain suits, but low enough to get reasonably aero with the appropriate contortions!

Otto