Front suspension sux
- bigfriendlyvegan
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Front suspension sux
Postby bigfriendlyvegan » Wed May 06, 2009 11:01 am
<rant> how the hell does anyone commute with front suspension? It felt like I was riding a friggin pogo stick. Standing up for the hills was crazy. The bike was jumping all over the place. I think this may be the reason why people don't ride bikes to work, because all of the crappy cheap supermarket bikes have suspension. The ride quality is awful. </rant>
Today I was back on my nice un-bouncy roadie. Nice bike. Good bike.
David
- lemmiwinks
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Re: Front suspension sux
Postby lemmiwinks » Wed May 06, 2009 11:04 am
- Aushiker
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Re: Front suspension sux
Postby Aushiker » Wed May 06, 2009 12:41 pm
Yep, which is why I am so against hybrids ... and will push a "real" bike option where ever possible
Andrew
Aushiker.com
- ekib
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Re: Front suspension sux
Postby ekib » Wed May 06, 2009 1:41 pm
I currently commute on an old Hybrid - Avanti Discovery
Totally agree - cheap front suspension is a big negative.
I'm saving up to buy a roadie
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Re: Front suspension sux
Postby Nobody » Wed May 06, 2009 3:54 pm
I agree cheap shocks are rubbish. I bought a cheap MTB and one of the first things I did was to throw the rubbish shocks in the (recycling) bin and replace with a rigid CrMo fork.Aushiker wrote:G'day
Yep, which is why I am so against hybrids ... and will push a "real" bike option where ever possible
Andrew
Although you can get hybrids without the shocks or with lockout shocks. My wife's Giant Elwood has a rigid fork, while the next model up, the Cypress, now has "SR NEX 4610 63mm travel, w/lockout" so it looks like soon every reasonable quality hybrid should have lockout shocks.
- toolonglegs
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Re: Front suspension sux
Postby toolonglegs » Wed May 06, 2009 5:54 pm
Oh you don't find that on your commutes?...Sydney roads must have got better in the last year!.
- mikedufty
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Re: Front suspension sux
Postby mikedufty » Wed May 06, 2009 6:38 pm
- hartleymartin
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Re: Front suspension sux
Postby hartleymartin » Wed May 06, 2009 7:36 pm
I agree front suspension sucks. I regularly warn people not to bother with them unless they have front lock-outs. I also warn them that the K-mart bikes with the front suspension and disc brakes are usually rubbish (no offence to K-mart, but Big W, and all the other such shops peddle the same crap). It usually comes as a surprise to alot of people when I tell them that suspension is only worth it if you are doing alot of dirt track riding, where it makes a difference.
http://raleightwenty.webs.com - the top web resource for the Raleigh Twenty
- Kalgrm
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Re: Front suspension sux
Postby Kalgrm » Wed May 06, 2009 9:42 pm
Good front suspension is fantastic, when used as intended.
Cheers,
Graeme
---------------------
Music was better when ugly people were allowed to make it ....
- bigfriendlyvegan
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Re: Front suspension sux
Postby bigfriendlyvegan » Thu May 07, 2009 12:52 am
Yeah, it would be the same Karen. Anyone in Sydney who rides bikes with less than 7 cogs on the back knows Karen. The uni: Macquarie. When we get it all sorted an working, I'll post a story about it.hartleymartin wrote:Which uni do you work at? I'd like to help out with bicycle fleets. If it's the same Karen I think we're talking about I have had some involvement with her, and I am a big fan of bicycle re-cycling as a way to get people off four wheels and onto two wheels!
The bikes in question are great as MTBs. You can fang them around and do lots of technical stuff on them and the suspension forks are great. Just not for commuting. I am constantly surprised by the number of MTBs at Uni - all with knobby tyres and front (and sometimes rear) shocks.Kalgrm wrote:Good front suspension is fantastic, when used as intended.
I do have a "MTB" commuter which has 26x1.25 slicks, a rigid front and is close to the same size as my roadie. I used to use it as a rain bike and am in the middle of converting it into a workhorse with lots of racks and stupidly low gears.
Speaking of gears, when riding the MTB yesterday I couldn't find a gear high enough for my liking and wondered what the hell all of the low gears were for. I was spinning like a mad bugger on the middle ring. Didn't even use the granny gears. I was hauling my heavy butt and another 10kg or so of gear in the panniers from North Ryde down to Putney then back home. 27 gears and all I wanted was one I liked.
Don't get me wrong. The bike is great, but the bike as a regular commuter bike...as my mate Adrian (who also rode one yesterday) said: you'd never have a problem getting away from the bike cops if you were riding a roadie.
David
- Thoglette
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Re: Front suspension sux
Postby Thoglette » Thu May 07, 2009 10:33 am
As well as swapping tyres, swapping cassettes can make a big difference by reducing the inter-gear difference.bigfriendlyvegan wrote: 27 gears and all I wanted was one I liked.
The MTB cassette is going to be something like
12, 14, 16,18, 20, 23, 26, 30, 34
Which has some pretty big jumps (particularily 12-14).
Replacing it with a 12-25 or 12-23 will provide a much less 'gappy' set of gears. Even replacing the 12 with a 13 would help!
And you can get up to at least 50T on a 110 BCD chain ring
"People are worthy of respect, ideas are not." Peter Ellerton, UQ
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Re: Front suspension sux
Postby waynohh » Thu May 07, 2009 10:49 am
44T front 11T rear at 100rpm = 50km/h.
My forks don't bob at all when climbing and never lock them out. Just like anything else you get what you pay for I guess. I couldn't imagine spring shocks feeling like anything else but a pogo stick
- trailgumby
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Re: Front suspension sux
Postby trailgumby » Sun May 10, 2009 7:45 pm
I thought they weren't bad. Certainly didn't pogo everywhere, even without the lockout active. My current commuter has an airsprung Lefty fork with lockout. It's a lot more compliant in the fork, but I only use the lockout (conveniently near bar height ) when climbing out of the saddle. Otherrwise I leave teh fork active. Makes the commute a lot more fun and interesting, hunting out a bit of urban singletrack!
I certainly wouldn't use a cheap fork without a lockout on a commuter, though.
- Pax
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Re: Front suspension sux
Postby Pax » Sun May 10, 2009 10:03 pm
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