Agreed.

My Bianchi Eros weights 19 lbs without peddals. It's not a tank and I doubt the Trek 1500 which uses the same frame as the 1000 is much lighter. I suspect it might be two pounds lighter at best but if my Bianchi had lighter wheels, it would match the Trek in weight.

I'll take Reynolds 631 any day over Aluminim.

When I tested several road bikes, I came across the same feeling during the test session. The only way you're going to feel the difference is to rent a couple of bikes from both alloys.

Wiping that steel owners will have to do to avoid corrosion********** I've cleaned my bikes up every now and then, as we all do to make them look good, but not to avoid corrosion. I've never given it a thought. My steel bikes are 20+ years old and don't have any corrosion, and they're stored in a damp basement, and they've seen their share of rain. I don't wipe them down after a wet ride. I'm usually just happy to be home.

There are lots of reasons to want/not want steel. Corrosion is not one of them.

Oh for <insert deity that you wish to disparage here>'s sake.

My training bike is an aluminium frame + carbon fork beasty and my previous training bike was a 1980's steelo, complete with fatigue. IMHO there is no (repeat NO) fargin difference between the two materials (yes, at the same bloody tyre pressure!) in terms of ride comfort if the build quality is satisfactory.

I'm sick of seeing wallys (who should know better) passing up one frame material against another without any credence and/or base knowledge. Subversive marketing doesn't belong on the forums. So here's how it is:

Steel is good
Titamium is good
Aluminium is good
Carbon Fibre is good

Spend what you like. Buy what you like. Just don't buy what you don't like: your arse will tell you.

I ride (constantly) a 1990 cromoly steel mtb designed and welded by Tom Ritchey.
The bike is so smoooooth I run the original cromo solid fork.

Have you ever ridden an Aluminium mtb with a solid fork?
It sucks BAD! The hits resonate through the frame.

Cromo frames are tensile, you can flex and have energy release from the tensile nature of the metal.

Alu is good for some builds....as a sweet frame metal, I put I put it under cromoly.
I have not found a 'use' for its properties. Except lots of my components are
Alu.

If you can't feel the difference = fine. Steel is a better frame metal as it can be repaired, bent back. It will not develope micro-fractures from flexing.

It's nice stuff if you have a dope frame. I do, cromoly is a prefered metal for bicycle frames by many riders.

Hanging with a friend who races Tri, all Alu, I showed him why steel rules.
I took a hammer and smacked my cromo frame (no paint, being rebuilt, has hits to the toptube already).
A good hit made a tiny dimple,1\4 the size of a pea.

Would have F'd a Alu tube.

Stop smackin poor innocent bikes, you complete bastard.

I kept my steelo for nearly 20 years. My LBS took his foot and pressed it against my bootom bracket. When I saw more than 3 inches of flex I decided it might be time to get rid of the fatigue ridden steel crapola. When he grabbed the handlebars and swayed them from side to side and the aluminium handlebar tubing was stronger than the forged steel gooseneck (which swayed in the breeze) I decided that the time might be very soon... like the same day.

Now I appreciate that different materials have different properties, so I'm careful about what I buy. I expect to replace my aluminium training bike frames within 25000km or 2 years. Big deal. I'll have replaced 105 or Ultegra drivetrain 5 times by then. I'll have replaced 7 rear tyres and 4 front tyres by then. I might even have changed beers by then....

the whole material debate is quite ridiculous really.
Design is what determines the ride characteristics and then construction. Material is the last factor in the equation.

However Steel seems to be the heaviest and flexiest of the lot.

If you haven't ridden a road bike much and you come to truely enjoy it, your idea of a "quick weekend ride" may very well be 50 miles. That will take you three hours to ride (well, it takes me 3 hours - it takes others less, but you get the idea). You will be unhappy if you start thinking about upgrading early b/c "you never thought you would ride a bide for 3 hours straight." Trust me on this - at the end of those three or more hours, you will think the difference matters a whole lot. Besides, what about the "longer weekend rides" of lots more miles? If you like the road bike, you will find yourself eyeing that first century in no time.

I'm beginning to think that comfort and "smoothness" is more about the type of fork and frame geometry than anything else.....but I dunno.

I think it's probably more about how you can dial your bike in terms of heights and angles.

It's funny because the biggest variable by far is the rider - no 2 riders are the same yet they'll argue forever about which type of frame is smoother

Excatly I ride a steel frame bike this is my personal choice, oh and I wear cycling shorts this is my personal choice. Oh I also have a co2 inflator & a hand pump this is my peronal choice.

I can think off at least 4 threads that this reply could be posted in

I rode my first century on a lemond tourmalet - 2003 steel bike. The only thing that hurt after that ride was the back of my neck.

I have an aluminum cervelo dual also. I've never ridden it more than 25 miles at one time.

I'm not sure I want to. I ride it to go fast.

I ride the lemond to go long.

is it all in my head?

well, outside of the tri position that i'm not used to riding for that long yet, maybe it is.

I can tell you that my 853 reynolds steel road bike feels like a barcolounger after riding the tri bike though.

At this point in time I would like to add that any bike that isn't steel sucks

Heh.

Actually, yeah - if I only had 1100 bucks, I'd go 2nd hand, especially with a road bike. Do you have any idea how many fat lazy guys think "I might pretend I'm Lance and buy a really expensive road bike", only to realise that riding actually involves getting off the couch, then realising they're stuck with something that has the resale value of a turd?

Smoothness of ride is affected most by:

1-Tire choice
2-wheel choice
3-saddle choice
4-geometry-especially chain stay length
5-fork choice

Frames that are well designed don't flex very much, while the other items do.

That's why I don't mess around with crap like set-back seatposts and short stems. With my forward seatpost and long ass stem I'm approximating the geometry of your tri bike......and yeah I agree it's faster than this upright touring position crap.

To borrow a cliche (supposedly said by old pros in regards to seat position for better climbing).....setback seat, low saddle, low gears.

I say screw that......forward seat, high saddle, high gears!!!!

Don't do this at home kids...

The bike had impact to the frame many times,( rocks, trees etc ) it has dents, many.
I know how much force it takes to mark the metal.
I was showing this specific metal = Tange Ritchey Logic supertubing.
It was not used as a frame tubing, intended for collars, forks, cable stops. 4mm chromoly.
The whole bikes made of the stuff- pre larger diameter Logic Prestige tubing by Tange.
My tubes are roughly half the diameter of big-size Aluminium tubes.
The bike has hit trees with enough force to have caused a failure of most large lightweight Aluminium tubings.
It makes a hell of a noise though = BOING!!!
Being a 14 yr old racing mtb frame it has been through a lot.
It will have gussets welded to it as it noodles and i'll run it downhill 'till it breaks.

It runs a chromoly fork, stem, seatpost, and braced DH bars, BIG tires for xc, it's 7spd mono-ring and weighs a MASSIVE

21 pounds. He.

Bike has hit me a few times, maybe it was payback time.
Love=hate relationship. And it's a boy, names Ritchey.
Not like I was slapping a carbon fibre boutique ***** bike.

If I had cared I could have sanded, surfaced the tubes before paint, but the paint is simply black flat stove, as being a mtb, it'll continue to get marked. I mask the scratch and spray some more black.

In the pic, behind the top tube cable stay is a dent that seemed to suggest pre-factory paint.
Biggest hit, like 10 times the force I used. The bike is a prototype P-project series that featured metal type and 140mm rear drop frame spacing that rendered it non-production and it was mis-decalled. Worthless to collectors, it is a bike to be ridden, a test frame.

I test it a lot. (test pilot).

You are absolutely correct. But, if two bikes were "identical" on the five factors you have listed, there remains a key factor: tube diameter.

Top quality steel tubes can obtain an almost infinite lifespan while stilling using the smaller tube diameters popular in the 1960's and 1970's. Those smaller tube diameters are a factor in providing a comfortable ride on rough surfaces, as they allow some horizontal flexing of the fork and chainstays.

Aluminum bikes frames using such small diameter tubes will flex, and then fail rapidly. The two ways to obtain long life with aluminum is to make the tube walls thicker, ending up with a heavy frame, or make the tube diameters so large that the frame is totally rigid, and immune to flex. Cannondale pioneered the "large diameter tube" solution to making a light aluminum frame that also has a long life. But, many riders (and I am one) don't like the "feel" of a super rigid frame.

A bike that is MUCH more comfortable than the norm is likely to obtain that comfort using the five NON-frame factors listed, but will also use small diameter steel tubing, to allow some flexing in the fork and chainstays will add an additional degree of comfort. That same "flexing" will be unpopular with folks who think they can ride faster on a totally rigid frame and fork.

Well added, though sometimes I wish people would stop beating around the bush and just say what they are thinking.

I can 'soak' a small hits vibration, and I can lessen the hit by using the recoil of the frame by flexing\ leaping potholes.
A 'hard' frame tends to rattle, like the vibration through the frame and the wheels bounce.
The steel flexes and conforms making a softer re-road contact not bouncing\ adding more energy into the waves.

This flex can be slightly dangerous, on downhill = a kick that will bounce you off the saddle.

I just lost the allen key for my seat.....

Originally Posted by ThylacineAt this point in time I would like to add that any bike that isn't steel sucks

Heh.


https://www.firstflightbikes.com/_bor...arbonfront.jpg
https://www.firstflightbikes.com/_borders/ibiscarbon.jpg

Ti lugged carbon frame, 1988.

(most do.. , kinda like this though..sniff. It be O.K.. )

It's amazing how often these things are overlooked

Funny, I always thought that ride smoothness was attributed to the sales pitch alone.

What were your thought on the Lemonds? Ride quality? Light, heavy? Details please, I'm a big guy as well and looking at the '05 Buenos Aires.

Thanks in advance.