Re: New to cycling
 

specialized are good frames, but they don't represent good value for the social rider.

Re: New to cycling
 

Very nice, how much is that going for?

Re: New to cycling
 

I can see where you are coming from. For me personally I would seriously consider a Specialized but I will never even consider a Trek. It annoys me no end that Trek supported shops call themselves Yellow Jersey when in fact Trek have never legitimately won a yellow jersey. Not only that Trek is forever linked to that fraud Lance Armstrong and made their name supporting that drug cheat. For them to claim they were not aware of his drug use is utter BS and we all know it. That added to Trek acting as Lance Armstrong's heavies in the destruction of Greg Lemond when Greg dare criticise Lance, that was unacceptable. Trek are good frames but very over priced and I have seen a lot crack. By the way how much mileage can they get out of the name Madone, Domane and Emonda which are the same letters reorganised?

Anyway end of my rant about Trek.

Re: New to cycling
 

@4k

So if I have a chance to offload or trade my current bike, I'll consider.
My current ride is an all carbon GIANT OCR comp with older generation ULTEGRA running gear. Has MAVIC Ksyrium wheels and carbon stem and bars.

I'd like to upgrade the running gear, but its almost worth getting a whole new bike.

I hate my expensive hobbies..performance cars , exotic bikes...damn it. :lol

Re: New to cycling
 

I used to think this too. However, I have fallen head over heels for the Giant Propel.. I think that will be my next bike..

Re: New to cycling
 

That is a damn good price, just the Dura Ace mechanical groups would cost $1800 on line.

Fondriest are a very nice frame, probably Taiwanese made now at that price point but everything at that level is and the quality now is excellent. European manufactured frames are very rare now, even from European manufacturers such as Eddy Merckx, Colnago and Bianchi etc on anything but their top end frames so don't be put off by that.

Re: New to cycling
 

They do the same bike but with the campy chorus running gear...same price @4k. Being a TF 2 it most certainly is a Taiwanese sourced carbon frame. Only their TF1 is hand made in Italy, as you suggested. But you pay mega dollars for that.
The only weird thing with this bike is the reverse fork design.....
I'd be looking for a more "relaxed geometry" frame and nothing aggressive as my riding is casual and not full competition. I like to do things at my own pace...hence 110klm ride will take me 5 hours...lol.
Guess I need to see this bike in the flesh.

Re: New to cycling
 

I know that feeling . I am currently deciding whether I should update my Colnago C59 with Zipp 440 and full Campagnolo 11 to the new Colnago C60 with Zipp 303 disk and Shimano Di2 ... Demo the disk Colnago with Ultegra Di2 , yesterday , on a 50k ride and I must say ...me likes ...likes a lot ...
I don't know whether I am happy to bend over letting the C59 go, and then again on the purchase of the C60 disk
Has anyone gone down the disk route on their road bike ?

Re: New to cycling
 

Personally I would take the Campagnolo Chorus 11 over Dura Ace but that is probably because I am a Campag fan. I just found in group sets I have owned the Campag seems to last better and I like the layout of their shifters. I would not worry too much about the design of the forks, they look like they have been inspired by the Pinarello Dogma which is a design tailor for shock absorption. The geometry looks to be reasonably relaxed but I would have to look at the spec sheet.

Re: New to cycling
 

Is that as in a disk rear wheel?

Re: New to cycling
 

So I've been having a creak for god knows how long. Happens when I put more effort in, and happens baaaaaaaaaaad when off the seat.

Was pretty certain it was the bottom bracket, so no biggy, I bought a replacement.

But before I put it in, my boss suggested dropping the front wheel out, giving the drop outs a clean and put a tiny bit of grease in there, then put the wheel back..

Well bugger me, absolutely perfect. Whisper quiet..

Least now I have a spare BB at home :)

Re: New to cycling
 

It's little bits of advice like that that can save a lot of unnecessary coin spent.

Re: New to cycling
 

He means disc brakes.
Seen a lot of the new specialized models with them now.

Re: New to cycling
 

Next bike I get will have disc brakes.

Re: New to cycling
 

this is first time this has ever happened to me but has anyone ever had a rear derailleur hangar snap off?? its done no damage that i know of?? I'm guessing it might be because when it happened i was only going slow. I was riding on flat surface and all of a sudden my rear wheel locked up!! got off bike and that's when i noticed it.... certainly a new one for me.

Re: New to cycling
 

You're lucky it didn't happen on a fast descent!!!

I'm still not sold on the disc brake thing..

Sure, for a commuter, 100%, cos there is nothing worse than it raining heavily, and you go to grab the brakes and just keep on going...

Does mean you'll need new wheels, or just have the 1 set, but that's just first world problems at its finest I guess.

Re: New to cycling
 

Well if you are a fast descender like I am you will be happier knowing you have killer brakes to pull u up. I like to go full pelt down hills myself and just find the rim brakes dont allow me to hit the later braking markers like I want.

Re: New to cycling
 

i was chasing a creak in mine for quite a while and had a similar breakthrough. with the bike stationary i was putting sideways pressure through the pedal (standing next to the bike) to get the frame to try to flex at the BB point, and managed to replicate the noise and it came from the rear.

same thing, removed rear wheel, made sure all points of contact were clean, reinstalled, and voila, creak gone.

not sure if its similar with carbon frames, but aluminium frames can make small noises appear quite big, and make it difficult to pinpoint exactly where they are coming from.

Re: New to cycling
 

Yeah I had this happen to me about 6-7 years ago. Pretty much exactly the same on the flat, rear wheel lock up. No injury but a broken bike. From memory it was like the limits in the derailleur were not set correctly and whilst changing gears it allowed it to move right over into the wheel. Don't know if thats possible but that was the only explanation I could come up with.

Re: New to cycling
 

while we are speaking of creaks and noises and weird stuff...

at xmas time, i noticed that my rear wheel had some slight play in the hub. i was advised to tighten the locking collar (i have campag zonda wheels) to remove the play, being careful to only just tighten it, and to also tighten it with the wheel clamped in the frame.

i did this, and believe it also contributed to the creaks going away. however, over the ensuing months, i have noticed a feeling of something dragging, like the brakes are rubbing, most times when i stand up, mainly going up an incline. this gradually became worse to the point that i had to do something about it. took it to a local shop and he only had time for a short ride but couldn't replicate the problem. after much searching online, i noticed similar complaints from others with similar rims, and apparently they found that the wheel performed better when there was some slight play in the hub.

i pulled the hub apart, cleaned up the cones, added some grease etc and put humpty back together. firstly i did the collar up as before, hoping that a bit of a clean up and grease may have fixed the issue, but no. the hub felt solid and nice and quiet, but when standing going up a hill (i believe it just has something to do with taking the weight off the hub making the issue reveal itself) it still felt like someone was pulling me backward.

so i undid the locking collar to allow the slightest play.... and you know what, the problem is about 90% fixed. i think i can still feel a slight drag sensation every now and then, but overall its much better. the downside is, its noisy again. not to bad in general, but when you put some pressure on, it gets a bit noisy (creaking). i found that clamping the wheel nice and tight improves it to the point of almost quiet.

thats where i'm at with it at the moment. next step would be to try new bearings. funds are an issue (aren't they always) so can't just keep working at it until fixed. just have to do things when i can.

sorry for rant. anyone experience anything similar?

i mentioned it on a group ride once, where there were about 3 others with either zonda's or fulcrum 3's (same wheel, basically) and they thought they had felt a similar thing from time to time.

Re: New to cycling
 

Of course :doh

Still not used to them being a factor on road bikes.

I have heard a lot of good things about discs and certainly I can not think of any disadvantages except for the weight penalty.

It will be interesting to see what the UCI does about allowing them into competition, at the moment you can not race on them.

Re: New to cycling
 

It might be?? I've never really played around with the derailleur since i've had the bike (over 2 years) its always selected gears pretty easy, thou interestingly enough it was in a lower gear when it happened so its possible?? just spun me out as i've never seen it or have had it happened before.

Re: New to cycling
 

The most common cause for breakage of the derailleur hanger in the absence of a crash is the derailleur limit adjustment is out allowing the derailleur to move too far to the left when the largest cog is selected. This results in the derailleur contacting the spokes which then forces it back and breaks the hanger. Were you shifting when it broke, is there any evidence of contact on either the derailleur or the drive side spokes?

Re: New to cycling
 

Just like your car. A decent set of pads goes a long way (or should that be a short way) many folks run their factory shimano pads.l thinking they are a good pad... Well they are just like the factory pads that come with an XT falcon. *****!! Get some decent koolstops or Swiss stops. Set them up correctly ( I mean angled and toed) and it will make a world of difference.

Re: New to cycling
 

Agree there. Setup is crucial. Swisstops are on the to do list especially if I want to descend with more confidence.

Re: New to cycling
 

And for gods sake don't go for the cheap copies of shimano pads, they are terrible .

Re: New to cycling
 

Hi guys , after giving some deep thought on upgrading , I think I'll stick with my current ride but just upgrade the group set.

Now here is what I'm thinking , but I'm a bit confused with the options .

http://www.chainreactioncycles.com/a.../rp-prod110818


Medium cage ? Short cage ?

Re: New to cycling
 

Thought I'd contribute to this thread getting back into cycling again. Looks like it's mostly road bikes which I'm not really interested in. My last bike was a giant stp1. I wanted something similar but instead I have purchased a 2015 giant trance 3. Can't wait to get back into it

Re: New to cycling
 

most short cage RD's can only go to about a 30 tooth rear cassette. after that you will need a long cage. not sure why they give you a choice when it only comes with 11-28 cassette. i guess its for those who want to save themselves in the long term if they decide to change casettes.

thats about all i can help you with, sorry. i'd say a short cage RD will be fine.

chainrings you have a choice of compact (50-34), mid compact (52-36) and standard (53 - 39)

just determine what you currently have and whether or not you want to stay the same gearing, or go up or down, depending on what you have.

Re: New to cycling
 

Thanks Prydey
Current is 50 / 36. But 10 speed ultegra. Compact crank with 1725 stamped on em so I guess they are a 172.5 mm length.

So I guess the 50 /34 option is closest with the 172.5 crank and 11 - 28 rear cassette with a short cage ?

I'm hoping this new gear set will fit on my MAVIC Ksyrium wheels ?
Wheels are more than 7 years old.

Thanks for help so far , gearing is such a difficult thing to choose.....