gugie 

Imma cheap bastard. Buying chains in bulk means having to choose.

scarlson 

I may regret this retrogrouchy rant tomorrow, but here goes. I realize I sound like a talk radio host.

• Disc brakes. Never could keep them from rubbing (and such annoying sounds they make!!), and I've always had a pair of cantilevers that work better than the best discs I've ever used.
• Threadless stems. So you want to throw your freedom of adjustment to the alter of stiffness? (stiffness: an old, dead god, vanquished by the current pope St. Jan)
• Carbon. I'll have my Vitus 979 buried with me. Confident it will still stay glued together, and that it will stay competitively light, even as the contemporary roadie goes through a carbon frame every couple years for the next decade. Bonus: metal will also survive baggage handling on international flights. For carbon, it appears to be a tossup.
• Indexed front shifting anywhere. Half-click to "trim" in the middle? Can't ride all crossed-up without making horrible noises? Seriously?
• Indexed rear shifting on a single bike. On a tandem, it can make sense to help tame an unruly stoker, but on a single bike, it just reduces reliability to the point of annoyance! If I can remember the last time I fiddled with the barrel adjuster, it is too soon.
• Electric shifting. Are there any advantages, aside from it allows idiots to change gears smoothly?

icemilkcoffee 

I am partial to 7 speed groups - I have 3 bikes (including wife's bike) with 126mm rear spacing, so 7 speed is my sweet spot.

However I have to say that 10 speed is also a good stopping place- mostly because of all the interchange possibilities and parts availability. Also- the Shimano 9 and 10 speed have better front chain ring ramps and better front shifting. You can say it's marginally better but better is better. Another plus for Shimano 10 speeds is the outboard bearing BB and hollow cranks. Availability of compact cranksets is yet another advantage over the 9 speeds.

vespasianus

No, for the most part, no lines. Had bikes with 7 speed triples to my current 11 speed. Prefer the 11 speed. Still have an old Italian steel bike and a new generic carbon bike made in the east. Like both. Have aluminum rims and carbon rims. Much prefer the carbon. Have tubed and tubeless tires. Love tubeless.

I am for everything being modified. Electronic and wireless drivetrains, bring it on. New cockpit designs and even changing the shape of the road handlebar, bring it. Dump the derailleurs and chain. Do it

Electric motors? Sure, but it is no longer a bi-cycle but a motor-bike!

RobbieTunes 

C’mon, man, be real. That’s not your gig or your rig.
For you, I envision a 65cm Fuji S12-S with eTap, turn signals, auto-lights and WiFi.

easyupbug 

This nicely covers it for me if you add topography. We travel with my bikes and the old UO-8 with a 5 freewheel is great for San Diego's Ocean Beach bike path but in the Big Horn Mountains foothills I want a compact crank and 11 cogs.

pastorbobnlnh 

Neal--- are you saying you only own three bikes at the moment? That seems impossible to believe.

Digger Goreman

Tricked myself into 9 speed (lightly used rim set at good price with attached cassette). Mostly good times, especially after installing slightly smaller triple....

Electronics happily limited to simple thrift store bike comp and lights....

Steel will last; rim brakes stopped me the other day within 6 ft, doing 20 mph....

Needs met....

RobbieTunes 

I completely understand, and a good rant is hard to find.
But....in this case, I'm sort of inclined to toss the dogma baby out with the pragma dishwater, maybe make a half-hearted grab for a dangling foot...

Discs get better with every version, and I do a lot of descending at speed here that makes me wish I had 'em. One descent of Thunder Ridge in the rain may chip away at that concrete cantilever position. I'm still with you, but right now, it's a kind of a race between making the move when the technology is better, or aging out of riding. Still with you on that one, for now.

Can't say as I agree totally on threadless stems. They are a lot more adjustable, just swap or flip or raise or lower.....but OTOH: you'd better not cut that steerer too short! The Innicycle is a game-changer...but there are aesthetics to consider. I'm in for threadless, but not with quill adapters. We're "even" on that one.

I'm with you, up to a point, on carbon. I preferred my steel Wraith over any of my carbons, and that included a Merckx, a Y-Foil, and even my carbon Colnago. (It's sluggishness compared to my Cipollini is directly relevant to my Super's sluggishness compared to my Fiorini or even an Ironman. Once I rode the Cipollini....hoy! hoy!) I agree with the tossup, because the carbon people, other than Merckx, seem dependent on disposability. My carbon Cinelli was a beautiful machete that aged way too fast, and it took 10 years to match it with the Cipollini. I could have saved all that time and trouble by getting an XCR.

I agree on indexed front shifting. There's a lot of improvement in that area that simply never happened between friction FD's and YAW. Then, electronic made it all go away. That's a lot of time and money to cross a short bridge.

Re :indexed rear shifiting on a single bike, I disagree. Not everyone can play a trombone. DA 9-sp and 10-sp downtube shifters are reedless saxophones.

Electronic shifting...point taken, but a lot of idiots used to ride other stuff. I'll list what's now so much better: Front derailleur shifting. Rear derailleur shifting. Set and forget. Reliability (until the battery dies) The "double-shift" that can be programmed in is really nice. A smooth shift big-to-small up front, with a simultaneous smooth drop of 2 cogs on the rear is a sight to behold on any friction or indexed bike, but is routine on electric shifting. OK, not on Zap or Mektronic, but electric shifting is what will allow a chimp to win the TdF. Who would be against that?

For a Sunday ride on flats or mild rollers, there's nothing like a friction bike and tubulars. I rode a century not long ago on that setup and it was a pleasant day. But put me on Thunder Ridge in bad weather, and the clinic on shifting/braking/bike handling is underway. Almost every advantage of the newer stuff will rear up and make you glad that you are more capable of handling the challenges on the new stuff. I'll still take the tubulars, even on deep carbon rims. If I could get the tubeless tires I prefer (Mavic) on the rim I prefer (3T C35), that would be a moot point, too. Of all the classic things that are still very very good compared to modern, the great tubular on a light tight rim laced to a ball bearing hub = mmm mm good.

majmt 

It’s interesting to compare how much (or little) bikes changed from the ‘60s through the mid ‘90s vs the time frame from the mid ‘90s to the present. From mid century to the mid ‘90s, shifter position went from down-tube to bar-end to “brifter” type and pedals went from toe clips to clip-less cleats. Aero rims and bars began to show up and tire improvements evolved but other than some other minor changes, I don’t think that bike really changed all that much for 25 to 30 years. We used to call road bikes with 5 cog freewheels and two front rings “10-speeds.” I guess we’d say 5x2 now? My ‘96 De Rosa is an 8-speed and going from 5 to 8 sprockets didn’t really seem like big deal.

The changes from the mid the ‘90s to now seems pretty dizzying to me. The new bikes that have evolved may not be my cup of tea or anywhere near my budget but they are amazing. Even though I can understand the desire for 12 gears, electronic controls and on-board computers if a rider is into optimization of energy output and all, I still prefer grinding on my old steel “10-speed.” But really, it’s all good to me.

phenry24 

I'm in no rush to move on to electronic shifting or tubeless tires for road, maybe my personal experience of others' experience with those two is out of the norm, but I've seen too many mid-ride failures for both. I've seen Di2 and eTap systems die and leave the rider on a single speed, and as far as I know none of them were related to the battery not being charged. I've seen tubeless tires twice burp during hard corners in crits that resulted in plenty of skin left on the asphalt, maybe it was user error in installation, tires lacking pressure, who knows. But for now, cables, clinchers, and tubulars work fine for me. I don't have any hankering for disc brakes on a road bike either, but with the way things are moving now I don't think I'll have a choice on a new bike in a few years.

RiddleOfSteel

I am going to assume this was all tongue-in-cheek, for a lot of reasons.

To be a complete square and respond to your suggestions, I would say 1) I wish eTap had prettier shift levers but otherwise would actually still look decent on my Paramount, and not an S-12-S. 2) No insult to an S-12-S or any Fuji, as I am fond of them and think they ride better than their rank, but....there are a plethora of bikes I'd rather build/ride than that...

Mr. Iron Man not recommending me a Centurion? C'mon, man!

I'll take a 25.5" (65cm) 1979 Semi-Pro in that gorgeous pearlized cobalt blue with pinstriping. Stock. Or with Retrofriction shifters.

scarlson 

I've never tried tubulars, but your description is alluring.
As for the bad weather argument, I don't agree. I've never been up Thunder Ridge, but I toured for six months straight with friction shifting and caliper brakes, and although the sidepulls were mediocre, they never failed and the pads didn't wear out suddenly, and even on the punishing Soviet concrete roads of Hungary, over Gotthard Pass, and through the Black Forest in freezing rain, I wasn't unhappy with my shifting performance. I would've been unhappy if something had broke. Then I'd be stopped with frozen fingers on Gotthard Pass or in the sweltering heat and humidity of the floodplain below Tatabánya trying to do a repair, or else I'd be walking. I only broke things like rims and racks and spokes, and at the time these were unavoidable (Tubus and Nitto hadn't yet come into prominence) and easily reparable. I took the same bike out the year after, with a new wheel and racks, and did 3 more months.

And I'm plenty comfortable and safe on these long brevet-type rides on gravel, possibly in bad weather, on my fake René Herse Trek, which has a Simplex friction barcon shifting a 9-speed cassette with an XTR rear mech, cantilevers, and a suicide front derailleur. In my group, I'm the guy that doesn't mechanical. And there's always someone in the group with a modern gadget that mechanically fails (and I end up fixing) on these rides. Whether it's some crazy STI cable routing causing a cable failure and then I have to fish the cable head out of the lever body before the cable can be replaced, or someone bends a derailleur hanger and can't stay in gear and I have to bend it back, or disc pads worn through (who knew they wore so fast!) these things comprise my day-to-day experience with the modern equipment. Maybe it's user-error, or maybe it's the low-end, or maybe it's early-adopters - I don't know. It's my experience as the guy that deals with it. I'd rather have my fellow riders deal with the mild inconvenience of friction shifting and rim brakes day-to-day and stop the incessant mechanicals that fall to me to repair.

nlerner

It depends on what you mean by “three.”

Salamandrine 

I don't do ugly giant NASCAR style graphics and logos and branding. That's my line in the sand I suppose. Other than that, I'd ride anything. In practice I still ride only steel, but for mostly practical reasons.

WRT gears, I like my 11 speed cassette. Back in the 5/6 speed days, there was always some compromises you had to make with gearing. If you wanted a low gear (say a 24!), you'd have to give up one of the close ratio go fast cogs. There was always a sense of robbing Peter to pay Paul. Of course for my current age and fitness level, it's kind of irrelevant. Vintage gears are fine. I do enjoy always having an ideal gear on my 'modern' bike.

BradH

I'm not sure I'll ever need a cassette that starts with 11 teeth. Even the 12 seems somewhat useless. I've resorted to cutting things apart and playing mix & match with my cassettes. A 14-28 10 speed with a 53/39 crankset has been a favorite for a couple years on all but the steepest rides.

USAZorro

Tubeless tires. I could see an attraction if I lived where there are goatheads, but I don't. Very intentionally.
Electronic shifting. I fantasize about having a unit that effectively jams every unit and either puts everyone in the highest possible gear on a steep climb, or the absolute lowest where it's flat with a headwind. But more realistically, why solve something that doesn't require a solution, with something that introduces more opportunities for failure?
Carbon. I get that they're more durable now, but when they fail, they can do so suddenly, spectacularly and with almost no warning. If I'm going to check out while cycling, I'd rather it be more like Simpson and less like Casartelli.
Aluminum frames. 99% of them are just freakin' ugly.
Sloping top tubes. While I am on the lookout for a mixte to plop on my trainer (convenience and ease of mounting/dismounting), newer, sloping top tube frames just look wrong.

I've never tried anything x 11. Not opposed to it, but If I'm in a mood where I'm concerned about gearing, I'll pull out my 81 speed Super Course.

nlerner

Got a flat on today’s ride with a tubeless setup, my second in a week. In both cases (two different bikes), the sealant had pretty well dried up, defeating the purpose of tubeless in the first place. Guess I should be topping off the fluid every month or so. On today’s bike, I’m actually running a tube in the rear tire after a similar mishap over the summer. Hmmm.

noglider 

Disc brakes? I don't object, but I don't see myself buying a new bike in the next few years, as I don't have any income for the time being. (I'm back in college.)

Sloping top tube? I had one; I didn't mind.

Electronic gears? Too expensive, but I tried them, and they're nice. Maybe they'll be cheap one day. I understand they're reliable enough, though the failure modes are annoying. I'm pretty good at keeping batteries charged, as I already have dozens of gadgets that run on rechargeable batteries.

rccardr 

Agreed. You may rant a tad from time to time, but eventually you always get to the nub of the matter.
Remember descending the back side of TR a couple years ago with me on the Merckx?
(Still waiting to see that video)
You don’t want to ride Thunder Ridge with me on the disc/CF Canyon.
That would be a whole ‘nuther life experience.

Russ Roth

I get that 8 speed was nice when it came out but I can't possibly imagine taking 105 off to install claris, that's the worst crap out there, at least use microshift which works far better.
Right now I guess my tough line is carbon rims which I would only build into disc rims. But I build all the wheels my family uses and while I've had aluminum rims fail they always gave fair notice and safety wasn't an issue. I'd feel really bad if one of them got hurt due to a carbon failure. Enve's claim that certain tires were unsafe with their rims didn't inspire any more confidence. But if I weighed 50lbs less and they were from a brand I had confidence in I'd be willing to ride them.
I love my 1x11 xt mtb parts, I really like my 2x12 campy equipped, slopped top tube, hydraulic disc, carbon threadless fork, steel frame cross bike and I think my full carbon road bike is lovely to ride. I think the slightly wide 38s on my gravel bike are good, the 27c road tires are fun on my 20mm rims for the cross but still just as happy with the 23s on the road bike that I don't feel any need to upgrade.
I've ridden electronic shifting from testing after building the bikes, but until they sell it at a reasonable cost I can't be bothered and I don't believe for one minute that the price difference for electronic isn't a 90% luxury tax markup that shimano and sram just get away with.
Only real modern dislike is the whole tubeless movement. Set up my mtb for an entire year, couldn't figure out a single reason people liked them. Yes I could bounce my tires off roots at lower pressures without a pinch flat but I was constantly paranoid about denting my rim, the tire at more then 4psi less then where I keep it with a tube felt squirrelly when cornering and getting through rock beds burped the tire a couple times. All that just to make it harder to install tires in general from the stampede to make everything tubeless ready. I like my tubes.

Wildwood

I don't have any lines, but I refuse to buy stuff I don't need.
So, i may need an e-bike with hydraulic discs - some day.
But I'll never need 11 speed cassettes or electronic shifting, or a built-in Bento box.
Or handlebars full of electronic gadgets.


Given the right gearing for the terrain, a nice steel race bike from the 70/80s probably has more performance capabili5y that my 70yo engine and reflexes can deliver. Just give me good lightweight tires.

70sSanO

Don’t you ever tell me what to buy and build.

I didn’t want to copy the rest of your ramblings, but why would you post disc carbon rims on a C&V subforum. There’s never been a C&V thru axle frame. None of it is applicable here.

I guess you are so enamored with yourself that you didn’t stop and think about it.

John

Russ Roth

How old do you consider C&V to start with? Disc brakes are over 20 years old now and yes I've tried to adapt it to my 84 tandem. I'm hoping to order a replacement fork soon just for that purpose. I've seen plenty of early 90s frames adapted to modern use and that includes carbon rims. Another 5 years and I'll have absolutely no issue taking a "classic" frame and adapting it to whatever is new.
​​​​​​While I wouldn't strip apart an original 70s/80s/90s classic, hand me a frameset and I'll happily build it, make it one in need of a repaint or repair and I'll happily braze on tabs and toss a modern fork on and have fun. Think of people who take a 30s roadster, chop the top, drop it, toss on modern brakes a big new engine and a modern transmission and that is my view on how far I'd go with a classis bike. Why not?

John E

Toeclips and straps have served me well since 1968, and I have no plans to change. I wear Giro Rumble or similar shoes that work for both cycling and walking, handy on my frequent shopping trips and other utility rides.

I really like the look of a lugged (plain or fancy) steel frame with a horizontal top tube.

Short of electronic, I detest any form of indexing on the front derailleur. I want that ability to trim the front cage position to avoid chain rub.

I have yet to see the point of rear derailleur indexing. (Been there ... done that, have always operated my SunTour XCD thumb shifter on my mountain bike in friction mode. Now that I run an 8-speed cassette on a 7-speed shifter, with a 6-speed in reserve for when the 7-speed wears out, I am forced to friction, anyway -- no big deal whatsoever.)

I love being able to select the right gear for the job, and I cannot get by on fewer than 12 (2x6 half-step or 1.5-step) gears on a road bike (14 is better), and I like the 24-speed (3x8 1.5-step-plus-granny) on my mountain bike, with gives me 15 usable gears on the two outer rings and 3 lower ratios on the granny before I reach overlap and redundancy, so 18 nicely-spaced ratios in all, covering a 4:1 range from 26 to 104 gear-inches. I do not see a crying need for 9 to 12 cogs on the rear axle, and I have heard too many stories about rapid wear of driveline components beyond 8 speeds in back.