How many headset spacers are too many?? Or too few?

[Mart]

Thanks. I'm going to 'practice' by cutting it halfway down to where I think I want to end up and see how I get on. That way if I do muck it up I haven't wrecked the forks.

Mart.

[lewis noble]

I have never cut a steerer tube, but I understand you do have to get a pretty accurate right angle.  Fine if you are handy with hacksaws, files etc to clean up the cut afterwards, but accurate cutting by hand / eye takes a fair bit of practice . . . . .

Lewis (. . . he who has learnt the hard way . . . .)

[Far-Oeuf]

Thanks. I'm going to 'practice' by cutting it halfway down to where I think I want to end up and see how I get on. That way if I do muck it up I haven't wrecked the forks.

Mart.

Here's an explanation : http://www.parktool.com/blog/repair-help/fork-column-length-and-sizing

I think a bike shop will charge £10-15 to do it for you.

cheers,

[rualexander]

I have never cut a steerer tube, but I understand you do have to get a pretty accurate right angle.  Fine if you are handy with hacksaws, files etc to clean up the cut afterwards, but accurate cutting by hand / eye takes a fair bit of practice . . . . .

Lewis (. . . he who has learnt the hard way . . . .)

Not really, because you have to have the top of the steerer about 2-3mm below the upper edge of your stem (or top spacer), in order for the top cap to apply compression to preload the headset bearing. Therefore it doesn't matter if your cut is at an imperfect angle.
I've done about four or five of these and never used a guide, it always ends up at a slight slant but no problem.

[mickeg]

I wrap a piece of tape all the way around the steerer tube first.  If I did not get the tape on perpendicular, I know that right away, remove tape and start over.  Then as I cut I just keep making sure I see if I am cutting along the edge of the tape.  And of course before I start cutting, I mark which side of the tape to cut so that I do not accidentally make it an inch shorter than I wanted it.  A few mm off and it is not a crisis.

If I already have the star nut in the steerer tube, push that down to where I want it first before I get out the hacksaw.

If you want to be obsessive about a perfect right angle, use a file later.  But it never hurts to put a 5mm or 10mm spacer above your stem.

[Audax hopeful]

Well, I've finally found time to mess around with the stem/bars/spacers on my Audax. By flipping the stem and reducing the spacers by 20mm the result is bars 11mm higher, reach reduced by 3mm. If riding leaves me happy with the result I will shorten the fork steerer. Aesthetically I'm pleased at present.

Still can't seem to add more than one photo per post, so here goes:

[Audax hopeful]

2nd photo:

[Audax hopeful]

And third:

[lewis noble]

Good advice with the tape, Mick, helps make a cleaner and more accurate cut. I must remember that.

Lewis

[John Saxby]

Aesthetically I'm pleased at present.

Looks pretty good to me, Audax!  Also worth remembering "No condition permanent," as they say in Nigeria.

[mickeg]

I think the max memory size of all photos combined in one post is 512k.  Thus, I also can only get one photo per post.

[Danneaux]

Nice looking result, Nice!

Mickeg is correct...total size of photos per post is 512K. They can be reduced by various means so more than one can be attached. If you use html tags to link to photos stored offsite, then there is no filesize limit to observe. For more on that and posting photos, see my little tutorial posted here: http://www.thorncycles.co.uk/forums/index.php?topic=4313.0

Best,

Dan.