where to shave weight?
 

I have a Cannondale R800 with an aluminum fork and shimano 600 components. The wheels are mavic with shimano 600 hubs. I was wondering if anyone knew where the best place to shave weight would be. I was thinking about doing the fork and headset. Currently it has a quill type stem. Anyway I am just looking for some opinions on the matter.:confused:

Your gut! I found that it was the cheapest and the most effective! Several years ago I calculated that I was spending something like $10 for every gram I saved on aftermarket and titanium parts.... wasn't worth it....
But component wise, shaving weight off spinning components...ie, wheels may be more effective than shaving off a few grams here and there on the frame.

i second George's comment about losing weight off your body first.

The BEST weight saving mod you can give yourself is a fast lightweight aero set of wheels. I increased my avg speed from 18mph to 20mph by switching from mavic open pro's to cane creek aerohead teams. The reason that wheels make such a huge difference is because rotating mass is more important than "dead" weight. And also the wheels are a significant factor in aero drag, because they have a relatively large frontal area

To add to what deliriou5 and George said, also consider your tires and tubes. And if your pedals are heavy, consider some light pedals, perhaps the Speedplay road pedals.

You might also check into the weight of your seatpost, since even a 600-equipped bike might come with a relatively heavy one. When considering a replacement post, keep in mind whether you'll want some setback, since many of today's fancy posts don't have much/any setback. One good + cheap post that I've liked is the older Kalloy Uno that looks like this one. Ample setback, very light even at 350mm (cut it to 250mm for road use), and it's under US$30. Check with your LBS's for one of these, if your present seatpost is a heavy thick one.

Lighter weight also means extra bucks and reduced longevity compared with what you have. Which means you'll end up paying out even more dollars in more frequent replacements, and more so if you're hard on your equipment.

Unless you're already down to 15% or less fat mass, I'm with the others on losing body weight first -- much cheaper (but maybe not easier) to drop three kilos off the bod, than try doing the same thing on the bike. Drop 5kg off your body weight, and you've probably exhausted the lightweight options to do the equivalent on the bike. Lighter wheels are a good starting point (given the longevity issues), but I believe they do more to improve acceleration than increase sustained speed. Acceleration still has an influence on average speed, of course, especially going uphill.

FWIW

R

Your bike is not overweight, so you will be paying a lot of money to lighten up. and weight is only critical on climbs.
For any components, work out the $/gramme saved. Start on the tyres and tubes.
The biggest advantage of a carbon fork compared to your Al one
will be comfort. You may not save much weight with a cheaper carbon fork.
A set of aero-profile wheels will help you to race faster, if you do time-trialling/solo riding, but in a pack they are of little advantage. Your current wheels are fine for general riding and training.

Tahoe,

why do you want to shave weight?
Are you racing or just feel like you need a lighter bike?
Wheels would be my suggestion, too many discussions
of rotating weight elsewhere to go into it here.


Marty

Anything you push,wheelsets,tires,chain,cassette,crank,pedals.

Shave your legs, if you haven't already!;)

Reed this thread

http://www.bikeforums.net/showthread...threadid=31180

and Flaneur's comments on the bike he loaned a tri competitor. Enlightening, so to speak.

Thank you guys for your ideas I am kind of crossing over from mountain biking so I am kind of new at this. I think I left some things out of my initial post. First I only weigh about 155 and have about 8% body fat so I can't really shed the weight there. Secondly I live in the mountain and climbing is a necessity so I want to give myself as much advantage as I can and I would like to get my bike under 20 lbs. I appreciate all of the ideas so please keep them coming.:)

Paul Sherwen, the Tour TV commentator rode 7 tours and completed 5. He always refused to put one of the then-new computers on his bike. Why? When he was racing for a win, he had other things on his mind; when grovelling in the grupetto (AKA, the Bus) the last thing he needed was to know exactly how slow he was going!!!!!

Dump any gadgets that don't help you go faster on a race bike, but for longer races, the benefits of comfort outweigh the notional penalty of extra grammes. Bike fit and comfort are much more important than getting the thing onto a scale at a certain weight. You wouldn't believe the number of guys I've seen lose races by fitting ultra light and fragile tyres on a rough course.......

Millar lost the Tour prologue last week because he unshipped his chain. He was using one chainring and to save weight, the front changer, which would have almost certainly prevented the problem, stayed in the mechanic's box.

Let the other guys obsess about trivia; train hard with purpose, learn the safe and correct techniques- and go forward.

One more story. I gave a kid a pair of wheels about 10-12 years back- Campy LF/ Mavic GP4. They were nice wheels he couldn't afford but his techno-weenie buddies thought he was a derelict, because he couldn't get a 7 speed freewheel on them (as they were set up). Of course, the happy ending was that this kid was still spanking the other guys at the races, right up to the time they both quit, excuses ringing in our ears........

Right theres a lot of posts which seem a bit anti weight loss. Thats all well and good and concerns with reliability are noted.

However modern componentry are very very reliable and the issue of weight loss = reduced reliability is not a concern any longer. Parts do still fial but that has more to do with quality than light weight.

These areas should be targeted for weight loss:

I assume your frame is a CAAD3 (still has an AL fork)

1)Change the fork for a Reynolds Ouzo pro Lite or Alpha Q sub 3
Cost about $350US Worth it asthey will lighten the front by allowing you to go to a A-Head set system.

2) Wheels. Mavic Open Pro Rims on DT Hugi 240 hubs. Super light, super strong, expensive.

3) Seat pillar. Go for a Thompson post. They're about the lightest and have the best seat clamp on the market bar none!

everything else can weight for now. These 3 upgrades will have the most noticable effect.

It may of course be worth while to simply save for another 6months andget a super dupa Cannondale CAAD5 or CAAD7 on a end of season slae , although I'm told Cannondale have got their stock managment so good that there will be very few bikes left at end of season.

And all of that might be a pound.Only the wheelset will really show.

Go here - http://weightweenies.starbike.com/ and start reading about what other people did, weight can be saved everywhere on a bike. Some places better than others obviously. Saving weight on anything rotational is better than something that doesn't rotate. So wheels, tires, tubes, cranks, freewheels, chains, etc will all be the best.

You to could have one of these -

http://weightweenies.starbike.com/im...tbike/bike.jpg

Weighing in at a nice 9.19lbs

Andrew