@Yellow Saddle How come stem length doesn't effect handling? I swapped from a 110 to a 50 on the MTB and it made quite a difference when keeping the bars at the same width. I prefer short stems anyway but it felt very different which I don't think is soley due to my weight moving further back/up
Genuine question.
All questions are genuine and I never mind a question.
Keep in mind that this thread started off with the OP being uncomfortable on her bike and enquiring about fitting a shorter stem and smaller bars.
The the warnings came in. "be careful" "be aware" etc etc.
This is of course pure nonsense. None of us, when trying out a bike for the first time or riding someone else's bike, need to be careful or aware that the stem length is different. That's because no-one falls off a bike because of a stem difference of any reasonable length. Different bikes feel different for various reasons but if you have a bike and change stem length, the only difference you notice is better or worse reach. Ditto with handlebar width.
No-one came up with a definition of "twitchy" but I would assume it means "slightly more unpredictable handling" or " creating fast handlebar movements that are tricky or difficult to control". It may even mean "loss of stability", who knows. Those two clowns in the video used it without definition, yet agreed with each other. Or disagreed, I can't remember.
That takes care of the subjective.
For for something more concrete. Bikes don't steer by the rider turning the handlebars. If that were the case, then you won't be able to ride and steer without hands on the bars. I can do that and plenty of others can too. Perhaps you can ride no-hands. I recommend occasionally riding like that because it makes you agile and makes you think. Bikes steer by leaning through a counter-intuitive process. If you ride no-hands and concentrate on how you steer, you'll discover that to turn left, you move your weight (concentrated on the saddle) in order to get the front wheel to steer right (that's correct, you lean left to get the wheel to steer right). This then increases the lean in a controlled way and the wheel turns to the left ever so slightly and you now follow a left curve.
Motorcyclists and some cyclists are fond of calling this counter-steering. You can read about it here and it has been discussed plenty of times. I don't like the term, you'll find why somewhere in the archive. Nevertheless the mechanics are the same, whether you lean or steer in the opposite direction, that's how you turn.
Since this is the mechanism for steering, the stem length has nothing to do with steering.
There are instances where you can feel a (large) difference in stem length and that is under unusual circumstances. You can feel it if you are climbing extremely steeply, very slowly, and out of the saddle. Then there is a noticeable feel in different bikes with different stem lengths. When you ride extremely slowly, the steering mechanism is completely different. In order to stay upright, you steer into the fall. In other words, if you fall over to the left, you steer left. It is like balancing a broomstick on your hand - another good exercise to do for understanding. You continuously move your hand so that it remains underneath "the fall". If the stick falls left, you move your hand left etc. Riding slowly requires this technique. Now your hands are clenched on the bars and you are using the bars to keep the bike upright and steer. It is a powerful movement, as opposed to when you are balanced at speed. Then your touch on the bars are light and there's no force going through the bars to the wheel.
Does that help?
