oh be patient...in about another 6 or so years, threadless will probably have all kinds of great looking stems.

Thomson finally got a good looking steerer clamp on their Elite model...let's see who follows their lead and possibly works out a better looking front clamp? From there, they can then start on the styling.

The races are the smooth part inside the headset that the bearing rotate on and brinnelling occurs when the races are set too tight together, not allowing for the bearing to roll and causing indentations of the races.

The after affects of this is often referred to as "indexed steering" as when you turn your handlebars and your headset "clicks" into position

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Headset_(bicycle_part)

I like threadless because it's a lot more stiff when I get out of the seat to climb or sprint from a traffic stop. Far too many threaded stems seem "noodley."

I have threaded forks and threadless adapters on two of my bikes. I like that system a lot. What's best is I can adjust the reach by flipping the stem and raising or lowering the adapter to the same height it was before.

Threadless stems are far easier swap out than threaded. Very few threaded stems have removable faceplates, making it necessary to remove the brake levers and bar tape in order to change them.

Finally, it's a lot easier to find threadless stems in an array of lengths and sizes. Threaded stems tend to be short and low. Finding one that's longer than 100mm and taller than two inches above the headset is difficult. And if you do find a larger and longer one, you may very well sacrifice stiffness.

I've got an NOS '83 Dura Ace quill on my Rhygin, and it is a work of art. If I built a bike now, I might go threadless, but on this bike it fits.

"Brinnelling" is caused by loss of lubricant in the headset and not by misadjusted headset. Even if you hammer on the headset it will not create indentations. If you look at a bearing race that does have the indentations you'll notice each one is surrounded by rust. See Jobst Brandt.

Overhauling your headset once a year will prevent it or you can put fenders on the bike and overhaul it every five or ten years. Adjusting threaded headsets correctly is pretty easy for even the most casual of home bike mechanics.


So this eliminates one of the threadless headsets purported advantages.

Hmmm. It's been a long time that I've delt with the problem, but a couple of my former bikes had continuous headset problems even though there was sufficient lube and still had divots in the races.

Maybe it was because I had bought these bikes used, it was from the days where parts from bikes were interchanged more freely than they are now, and incompatible parts used in the headsets (ie, they didn't fit together). I know the adjustments never held. Sometimes the HS was too tight and later, it would loosen up.

Maybe it was because, I was new to fixing bikes and I didn't know what I was doing. At any rate, to my relief, I haven't had this problem for some time now

Aside from the aesthetics of the two kinds of stems/headsets (the old-fashioned quill stem is far more appealing, in my opinion), for some riders, including this one, the quill stem has one very major advantage. It's easy to make adjustments to handlebar height, even on the fly, in the course of a ride. If you have any kind of back trouble, the perfect setup one day may need to be half an inch higher the next. Threaded headsets make this very easy.

Yeah, but once you get it where you like it you've got a stiffer, more robust set-up.

I used to hate that flexing when I really cranked on my Cinelli stems, so much so that I jumped at the Ritchey (Nitto) steelies when they came out. Threadless eliminates that problem completely.

It also eliminates those rediculously fine threads in a critical yet high-vibration area. Just how tight is enough vs. too tight?

I'm an older guy but in this case I think the newer stuff rules.

Agree. How many people ever want to adjust their stem height anyway once you get it set? Some people say when you get older you lose flexibility and want a higher stem. If that's the case, flip it. Or get a different fork after all those years.

The other advantage is bars with a wider diameter which adds to stiffness.

If you play with used bikes, being able to adjust the stem height without purchasing a whole new fork setup is a major issue.

Aaron