To lower my handlebar, would it be better to lower my stem, but leave it angled up, or flip it but not lower it all the way?

How would either affect handling?

Its one less step to leave it. Flip it if you cant go lower after slamming stem. Up angle also allows a shorter steerer tube (if you cut it) for the same position and thus less weight

Think about where you want the handlebars, then do what gets the bars there. Maybe sketch up what you have then you can see if flipping the stem or removing washers works best. The bike won't care which you do.

Ben

It's slightly less work to simply lower if by swapping spacers bottom to top, but that offers you limited adjustment. Depending on the angle, flipping it makes a far larger difference, and then you'd fine tune from there.

Neither makes any difference in handling other than the effect of the lower final height, which usually increases front end weight slightly. That shouldn't bother you. Do what's necessary to fit the bike to your needs and comfort. Everything else is secondary.

Flipping is going to increase your reach slightly. Lowering will also, but I believe by less. Otherwise, handling depends on where your hands are; in the same general place, the handling will feel the same.

Great question. The answer is different depending on the bike. On kids bikes and folding bikes it is normally an easy job to flip the stem, because the cables have extra length. However on most hybrid/road bikes you will need new housing & cables....which makes it a pain.

I love the option of flipping the stem and have used it on my kids bikes as they were growing up. I recall the steering responds much faster ( actually too fast ), because you need less force to turn. However, the learning curve is very fast, you should be able to adjust almost instantly.

Also keep in mind you can use bar ends and point them in any direction, that may help add the hand positions you want without surgery on the bike.

Thanks,
Yan

If it's a case where either method will get your bars where you want them, I think angled down with spacers looks better than angled up with no spacers. (or spacers on top *yuck*)

Plus, with the stem flipped you shouldn't have reason to cut the steerer tube... enabling you to go back at any time.

As I posted earlier, both produce similar results, with length and angle being key to what happens when you invert, while the effects of moving spacers is obvious.

Here's a nice little length & angle = rise and reach chart that shows it graphically. To see the effects of flipping the stem imagine the mirror image below and double the rise to get the change. Note, the chart is degrees above horizontal, for your purposes, consider it as above/below the roughly 17° angle of a 0/90° stem.

Reach will not be exactly as per the mirror image, but the difference isn't that big except with high angle stems. If you want to get more precise answers there are various stem angle calculators on the net, here's one of them, offered without endorsement.

I would recommend an angle adjustable stem, that way you can just experiment, without thinking too hard.

Thanks,
Yan

That's always handy for fitting before one buys a fixed stem. But in this case the OP has a fixed stem already, so he can experiment within the limits possible combining flipping and moving spacers.

Thanks, I have plenty of cable length to move things around easily....we'll see.