Club Tour 4, Euro touring setup

[Far-Oeuf]

The best way I can describe the Simplex shifters is as if they were made with precision marshmallow. So, so soft and smooth, and yet very precise feedback which means very few problem shifts. Brilliant.

[triaesthete]

  "Precision marshmallow" Brilliant      Fuzzy indexing!?

What are you going to hang them on instead of the CT?

Ian

[Far-Oeuf]

A Disc Trucker, with my existing Long Haul Trucker (non disc) forks.

Me and the Club Tour just wafted past the Where Eagles Dare castle, south of Salzburg in Austria. It's now a blazing hot afternoon and I think this is where the CT is in its element. A great riding day in the mountains.

[Far-Oeuf]

The effect on rims (front v-brake, rear disc) after 1000km:



Climbing Mangart in Slovenia, the countries highest paved road (about 2000m). Follow it up with the ride over Vriši?.

[jags]

Briliant bikes were made for this sort of thing 

[Far-Oeuf]

Now trying out a Surly Trucker front fork, early signs are that it's much improved fast-descending on non-smooth UK roads.

[triaesthete]

Thong Haul Clucker.


That will annoy someone

[jags]

  not me .

jags

[Danneaux]

...That will annoy someone

Yes, terribly, Ian. I was drinking a glass of milk at the time and now have to clean and dry my keyboard.

 

All the best,

Dan. (...who loves malapropisms almost as much as he loves puns)

[jags]

gonna have to check wiki for that one dan

[triaesthete]

 Surly you jest.  He keeps forking out on that bike.

[Far-Oeuf]

to be fair, I'm simply trying out a heavier duty fork which happens to be made by Surly (I don't have a standard Thorn fork)  .   The 853 Thorn fork was great with about 5kg load on the front bars, but for my riding is a bit jittery unloaded. 

One thing I've learnt is that there's how a bike 'feels' and how a bike actually 'is'.   A bike may feel faster, lighter, etc, but that does not necessarily mean it is faster, lighter, etc.   And, further, it simply does not matter whether the bike actually is faster, lighter, etc, what's important is that it feels faster, lighter, etc.   Might sound convoluted, but I'm convinced.

Incidentally, the bars dropped 3cm with the fork change, and the axle to fork crown difference was +1cm.   So the bars have gone down 2cm.   Fork weight has probably increased by 800g.   I would love to know how much more leg muscle is required to push along an extra 800g?

[Danneaux]

Doug,

It sounds to me as if you've changed the effective trail of the bike by substituting a fork of different rake and reach/height.

This little treatise on trail, both geometric and pneumatic, might help explain what's going on handlingwise as a result of your fork swap: http://www.thorncycles.co.uk/forums/index.php?topic=4245.0

Of course, the Mk2 Sherpa in my example is a much different bike from your Audax Mk3, but the principles are the same.

Best,

Dan.

[Far-Oeuf]

Hi Dan,

Yes, for sure.  With the longer axle to crown (Surly fork 390mm, Thorn fork 378mm) the head tube angle will be slightly more relaxed.   From your link, perhaps the effect of this should be to move the handling a little way along the scale further into neutral territory.   I may try and work out the numbers over the weekend.

I've just ridden a few of passes in the Alps, and the handling was brilliant (Thorn 853 fork).   I was up in the 60-70kph range quite often, and not the slightest handling problem/poor sensation.   But when unloaded and, say, riding over some rough-ish ripple in the tarmac, if I look behind (for traffic) then I'd find the bike exhibits similar symptoms to those you describe in the high-trail section.   When thinking about how I ride this bike, I'm now aware that changes of direction over less-than-smooth tarmac are something I have been avoiding; I ride over it then turn.

That there is a difference between loaded and unloaded indicates to me, in troubleshooting mode, that this (how the bike feels to me) isn't caused/fixed by a geometry change.   I wanted to test my theory that stronger forks work better for me, as this was something that came up in my first impression of the bike.  If, as a result, the geometry becomes more neutral, that's a bonus for me, as I prefer stability over feeling-fast through a manufactured 'lively' geometry.   I get why people like 'lively' handling, but I actually go faster if I have more predictable handling (as I also do on motorbikes).

Your linked post is very interesting, I'll try and ingest it over the next few days.  For the sake of completeness it would be good to test a stnadard Thorn fork, but as triasthete says, I've forked out enough already... 

cheers,
Doug