I could have been clearer in what I wrote earlier. To begin, my original post in this thread, now deleted, was an attempt to find objective reasons for avoiding extra long chain stays. To flip the problem, short stays have obvious disadvantages -- reduced tire clearance, feet hitting panniers, sometimes kludgy looking chainstay-BB interface, harsher ride, etc. I was just wondering where the limits lie in the opposite direction.
I understand why Grant P. likes longer chain stays and I didn't mean to imply that boat-like handling is a flaw. For instance, if I were going bikepacking, I would choose a bike like the Appaloosa. For my more usual mode of riding, however, less than a day, fairly lightly loaded, I prefer sportier handling. With a longer wheelbase bike, I feel as if I am guiding the bike, I have to think about the rear wheel, I am aware of it trailing behind, whereas with a shorter wheelbase, I forget the bike almost entirely, I feel as if I am inside it, part of it, rather than on top of it. As I wrote, purely a feel thing. To put it another way, I think longer wheelbases make sense for heavy touring or mountain bikes, but not necessarily for all types of bikes, eg, the AHH, which is supposed to be an all-arounder and now has stays of 475+. On Saturday, February 1, 2020 at 6:47:38 AM UTC-8, Mark Roland wrote: > I think the "boaty" feel is an objective of the design, not a bug. I'm not > sure if boats were mentioned in any of the posts Grant did on his reasoning > for the benefits of long stays, but I do remember station wagons and surf > boards, I think. One obvious benefit is a smoother ride. That's why my > stoker seatpost has a built in shock, because that rider is closer to the > rear wheel. For me, the handling of, say, a Big Dummy, is different that my > Ron Kitching, is different than my Clem, is different than my Trek 830 or > rSogn or L'Avecaise or what have you, sure. But if all my bikes handled the > same, I wouldn't need all my bikes;^) I don't see Grant or Rivendell > designing a bicycle that could be labeled "poor-handling" by anyone's > metrics (and you didn't say that). Different than what a lot of people are > used to? Yup. Not everyone's cup of tea? Sure, if they give it a try (I > like a 100-day trial for most stuff) and it doesn't float their boat--or, I > guess, in this case if it does. > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "RBW Owners Bunch" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to rbw-owners-bunch+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/rbw-owners-bunch/c436fc8e-1af9-4d43-a16e-ff1e011d7575%40googlegroups.com.
