ratz
Wielder of the Rubber Mallet
I thought I should take a minute to summarize what I believe I have learned in my project to set up our Silvio cockpits over in the carbon handlebar thread. I showed a lot of what we tested, including a lot of the failures that Charles thought would be interesting, but I did not at any point summarize what we where learning and why we were doing it. Since we did about over 100 hours worth of tinkering I thought I should share the thoughts and opinions that have formed in my head during the process as I tried to build on what others have done before me. I've put our background / driving needs at the end of this message. Those should be considered as they affect our bias.
We have had to draw all our conclusions on the trainer and stationary stands. Having ridden many miles for many years gives some confidence to my ability to figure out what is going to work on the road and what is not. But the road will be the true test of everything. Some might think that drawing conclusions at this point is foolish since it hasn't be road tested. If you are right I will come back and tell you that; but it's the dead of the winter here; and this work will save 100 hours of lost riding time by doing it now. These are initial preliminary findings, there is also no need to hold back this information until we road test it; as it may be of value to many other people in it's current form. We have had two days with dry road and +25F temperatures. Four of the configurations hit the road on those two days; that answered many of the questions that remained and guided the final efforts and caused some ideas to be abandoned without further investigation.
So our Seven key thoughts about the Silvio 2.0 stock and modified cockpit.
(A) Cruzbike drop bars are fine. If your riding is: Casual weekend rider that doesn't care about arms wide position. Riders going 20-35 miles, Commuters navigating in traffic, Rider that would not get an alergic reaction to riding without full kit. Your general recreation riders. These would include my kids that are < 16 years old. Basically people that ride for fun, but like to ride in style and zip along. People that would never install a computer on their bike to track telemetry. Basically it's clear that stock bars try to solve a number of ergo problems with a one size fits all approach. I think they hit the mark for 60-70% of the audience.
(A Prime) The Silvio 2.x will attract a new audience for which they are not optimal and might actually be disappointing.
(B) Without an extension the boom angle coupled with the new lower seat angle does not work with any of the traditional road bike straight bar solutions. A straight bar induces both a sharp out and a forward/downward bend at the wrist to operate brifters with strength. This would be tolerable for short periods, but on a ride of any length that wrist strain would become a problem for comfort and potential injury. This situation can be mitigated by installing the bars at a steep angle, but that has other trade offs and doesn't completely remove the wrist problem. There appears to exist a Vendetta drop bars that some people have that has a different geometry and should probably be offered for the Silvio as an option. I have only heard this bar mentioned more details would be needed.
(C) The minimum width for any Silvio 2 handle bars is probably 440mm. Meanwhile 460mm, 480, and 500mm are likely necessary as options. This means that most solutions will quickly become custom. 440mm is common on stock bars, 460mm is more rare, and larger is unheard of. A measurement should be devised to help people pick the correct width. 460mm will likely be the most common size.
(D) To solve the boom/seat angle discrepancy. A 50-60mm extension which doesn't currently exist can be used to bring the boom down enough to use road drop bars without inducing the wrist bend and leave the bars in a position that has maximum flexibility, at the same time this doesn't close down the cockpit so much that a non-slim rider can't comfortably mount and dismount the bike. This might most optimally be paired with the Vendetta dropbars that might still exist
(E) A 100 mm extension can be used by shorter people with the trade off being you get a jet plane cockpit that requires a very slight build; 36in waist or slimmer in order to get in an out of the cockpit.
(F) A traditional boom angle + bullhorns with a 60mm drop can be used to get the same affect as a 50-60mm extension. This allows for a more natural arm angle and no wrist bend; but has the advantage of not closing the cockpit. Riders with an "aero belly"/"drill Sergeant build" would find this optimal.
(G) a 50-60mm extension + bullhorns with a 40-60mm drop or the Vendetta drop bars Closes the cockpit raises the feet and getting the arms into a nice and ergo position. This would make the Ivan position available to those those don't share his slim build.
Note: I excluded the cruzbike bull horns from our testing because the cost savings allowed the funding of the other tests we did. The cruzbike bull horns do not have a "drop" to them so it should be simple to deduce how they work related to the above comments. They likely will work good for taller riders. In any case John and company can simply compare them to the above results and extend the conclusions.
Conclusions/Implications:
1) Make a 50-60mm extension available for sale.
2) Make the mythical Vendetta drop bars available to Silvio 2.x buyers. Or create a drop bar with a 60mm drop and less outward flare.
3) Create a version of the Cruzbike bullhorns with a 60mm drop in the shoulder.
4) Create some simple sizing guide lines to help people pick the right combinations.
Other notes and things of Personal bias:
1) Redesign the brakes on the Cruzbike bullhorn so they don't require moving the hands and are not reversed.
2) Examine further a bullhorn that uses a brifter. (We will comment more on how that work out for us.)
The background
Understand, that the goal of the entire effort was to get an optimal setup of the Silvio 2 for what we consider to be casual ultra-cycling; which entails weekly rides of 80-100 miles; and nightly rides that are 35-50 mile sprints. These are unsupported rides with a time limit of <= 6 hours for the long ones which means holding average speeds of 17+ and being ultra light but self sufficient. The terrain we are building for is moderate, 100 miles equals 3500-4000ft of climbing.
Like any riding optimizing for specialized riding; stock parts usually get replaced. So it was no surprise that the stock Silvio was going to need some attention. That's not a flaw in the bike; that's a need of the goal.
I am a short 5'10" and my wife is a tall 5'7" we aren't heavy but we aren't petite people as we both have stronger than average legs for our size. For me this means I need a wide cockpit for my size; and my wife needs a long cockpit because of her leg geometry with a thigh that is almost 2x her calf in length. We are 3 inch separated in height and 1 in on the x-seam. I having stood next to a lot of bikers over the years, we are about as average as average gets you wouldn't pick us out as the "Skinny" rider, nor the "hefty" rider we just sort of blend into the crowd and go un-noticed. Daughter is a very skinny 5'8" when she's home from school we'll throw her on the bikes and see if any of the fit is bad for her.
Thank you to all the people that have shared what they have done with their bikes. Much of this was guided and stolen from what others know. Without that open sharing and all the photos available; I'm pretty sure we wouldn't have under taken the project to build on what's been done before.
We have had to draw all our conclusions on the trainer and stationary stands. Having ridden many miles for many years gives some confidence to my ability to figure out what is going to work on the road and what is not. But the road will be the true test of everything. Some might think that drawing conclusions at this point is foolish since it hasn't be road tested. If you are right I will come back and tell you that; but it's the dead of the winter here; and this work will save 100 hours of lost riding time by doing it now. These are initial preliminary findings, there is also no need to hold back this information until we road test it; as it may be of value to many other people in it's current form. We have had two days with dry road and +25F temperatures. Four of the configurations hit the road on those two days; that answered many of the questions that remained and guided the final efforts and caused some ideas to be abandoned without further investigation.
So our Seven key thoughts about the Silvio 2.0 stock and modified cockpit.
(A) Cruzbike drop bars are fine. If your riding is: Casual weekend rider that doesn't care about arms wide position. Riders going 20-35 miles, Commuters navigating in traffic, Rider that would not get an alergic reaction to riding without full kit. Your general recreation riders. These would include my kids that are < 16 years old. Basically people that ride for fun, but like to ride in style and zip along. People that would never install a computer on their bike to track telemetry. Basically it's clear that stock bars try to solve a number of ergo problems with a one size fits all approach. I think they hit the mark for 60-70% of the audience.
(A Prime) The Silvio 2.x will attract a new audience for which they are not optimal and might actually be disappointing.
(B) Without an extension the boom angle coupled with the new lower seat angle does not work with any of the traditional road bike straight bar solutions. A straight bar induces both a sharp out and a forward/downward bend at the wrist to operate brifters with strength. This would be tolerable for short periods, but on a ride of any length that wrist strain would become a problem for comfort and potential injury. This situation can be mitigated by installing the bars at a steep angle, but that has other trade offs and doesn't completely remove the wrist problem. There appears to exist a Vendetta drop bars that some people have that has a different geometry and should probably be offered for the Silvio as an option. I have only heard this bar mentioned more details would be needed.
(C) The minimum width for any Silvio 2 handle bars is probably 440mm. Meanwhile 460mm, 480, and 500mm are likely necessary as options. This means that most solutions will quickly become custom. 440mm is common on stock bars, 460mm is more rare, and larger is unheard of. A measurement should be devised to help people pick the correct width. 460mm will likely be the most common size.
(D) To solve the boom/seat angle discrepancy. A 50-60mm extension which doesn't currently exist can be used to bring the boom down enough to use road drop bars without inducing the wrist bend and leave the bars in a position that has maximum flexibility, at the same time this doesn't close down the cockpit so much that a non-slim rider can't comfortably mount and dismount the bike. This might most optimally be paired with the Vendetta dropbars that might still exist
(E) A 100 mm extension can be used by shorter people with the trade off being you get a jet plane cockpit that requires a very slight build; 36in waist or slimmer in order to get in an out of the cockpit.
(F) A traditional boom angle + bullhorns with a 60mm drop can be used to get the same affect as a 50-60mm extension. This allows for a more natural arm angle and no wrist bend; but has the advantage of not closing the cockpit. Riders with an "aero belly"/"drill Sergeant build" would find this optimal.
(G) a 50-60mm extension + bullhorns with a 40-60mm drop or the Vendetta drop bars Closes the cockpit raises the feet and getting the arms into a nice and ergo position. This would make the Ivan position available to those those don't share his slim build.
Note: I excluded the cruzbike bull horns from our testing because the cost savings allowed the funding of the other tests we did. The cruzbike bull horns do not have a "drop" to them so it should be simple to deduce how they work related to the above comments. They likely will work good for taller riders. In any case John and company can simply compare them to the above results and extend the conclusions.
Conclusions/Implications:
1) Make a 50-60mm extension available for sale.
2) Make the mythical Vendetta drop bars available to Silvio 2.x buyers. Or create a drop bar with a 60mm drop and less outward flare.
3) Create a version of the Cruzbike bullhorns with a 60mm drop in the shoulder.
4) Create some simple sizing guide lines to help people pick the right combinations.
Other notes and things of Personal bias:
1) Redesign the brakes on the Cruzbike bullhorn so they don't require moving the hands and are not reversed.
2) Examine further a bullhorn that uses a brifter. (We will comment more on how that work out for us.)
The background
Understand, that the goal of the entire effort was to get an optimal setup of the Silvio 2 for what we consider to be casual ultra-cycling; which entails weekly rides of 80-100 miles; and nightly rides that are 35-50 mile sprints. These are unsupported rides with a time limit of <= 6 hours for the long ones which means holding average speeds of 17+ and being ultra light but self sufficient. The terrain we are building for is moderate, 100 miles equals 3500-4000ft of climbing.
Like any riding optimizing for specialized riding; stock parts usually get replaced. So it was no surprise that the stock Silvio was going to need some attention. That's not a flaw in the bike; that's a need of the goal.
I am a short 5'10" and my wife is a tall 5'7" we aren't heavy but we aren't petite people as we both have stronger than average legs for our size. For me this means I need a wide cockpit for my size; and my wife needs a long cockpit because of her leg geometry with a thigh that is almost 2x her calf in length. We are 3 inch separated in height and 1 in on the x-seam. I having stood next to a lot of bikers over the years, we are about as average as average gets you wouldn't pick us out as the "Skinny" rider, nor the "hefty" rider we just sort of blend into the crowd and go un-noticed. Daughter is a very skinny 5'8" when she's home from school we'll throw her on the bikes and see if any of the fit is bad for her.
Thank you to all the people that have shared what they have done with their bikes. Much of this was guided and stolen from what others know. Without that open sharing and all the photos available; I'm pretty sure we wouldn't have under taken the project to build on what's been done before.
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