---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: "gr...@rivbike.com" <grantmill...@gmail.com>
Date: Jul 9 2009, 1:21 pm
Subject: Frame-Bike Plans (some)
To: RBW Owners Bunch
Newlite Roadbike. TheROADEO<---final name, final spelling, thanks
for all your input and don't take offense.
This is really Mark's bike, by which I mean he asked for it/
suggested
it as a bike for clubbies. He's a club rider a couple of days a week,
and rides his cross bikes--which to me are light enough, at 19-20lb,
even with fatty tires (and he's still the fastest by a good margin,
and the humblest). But he sees his fellow clubbies buying road bikes
with carbon this and that, and was thinking hmm, they should get a
nice lugged steel bike, and if we made it light enough and roadynuff
they probably would.
Originally,'twas gunnabe for short reach brakes, but nobody here
really rides with those anymore, so, with some input from Jay's,
they'll use standard reach brakes, which means...about 56mm reach,
about like the 'bouillet.
TUBING: The goal is a clubbie bike, so it's going to be clubbie
light,
and it should, ideally, be ridding by somebody who is, if not clubbie
light, at least knows how to ride light. A Nureyev-like 225-pounder
who lifts over bumps and veers around pothholes and rides 32mm tires
at 85psi rides lighter than a Nagurski-like 150-pounder who rides
23mm
tires at 115psi and hits everything with a stiff body and locked
arms.
So, it's hard to give this bike a weight limit. I should point out
that you aren't buying an engine with this bike; you're supplying the
engine, and it's good to somewhat match the engine's weight with the
frame's weight.
OK: Up to 57cm, the main tube butts are 0.65, with 0.4bellies. Bigger
than that, 0.8 butts with 0.6bellies. It's superstrong heat-treated
steel, so strength isn't much of an issue. Flex is more of an issue,
but nobody really anymore believes that flexless frames are the goal
(I never have). A more rigid frame matters if you're toting weight,
but not as much if you aren't, and as we introduce this as a
superlight clubbie-bike, its flex-under-a-touring-load shouldn't
matter.
