The bicycle zenith

[simongt]

Much of the view of improvements with bikes is the same with any techno., it's in the view of the user.
My preference is still with quality chomoly frames and more 'basic' kit, but that's me. I don't have any particular issue with modern developments, although some do puzzle me why it's being done.

 

[Ming the Merciless]

Though I thought that by the late 80's indexed gears were actually the norm

Nope, they had only just been introduced and buying bikes isn’t like cars where you trade in every few years.

 

[Ming the Merciless]

12 speed friction shifting is where it is at. Already compatible to 13 speed should you desire. Plus compatible with 10,9,8,7,6,5 speed friction etc. No pissing about indexing or charging batteries or programming them, no cables getting snapped in over complicated shifters.

 

[tyred]

I use friction shifting on all my derailleur bikes. Cheap to buy, easy to set up, reliable and removes all compatibility issues. For the type of cycling I do, I have no need of anything else.

 

[Fredo76]

What a daft response!

I suppose that's what I get for calling your response silly...

Do you think that telling the internet you are a software engineer makes you an expert on these particular components?

No, but it gives me some knowledge of complexity, which is what I was talking about. I'll tell you (and the whole internet!) additionally that I once told the head of the Electronics Shop at the Geophysical Institute, University of Alaska Fairbanks, a grizzled old NASA veteran, and a gen-u-ine 'rocket scientist', that I thought that our network of computers in the Seismology Lab was probably a more complicated thing than the Apollo moon rocket, and he thought about it for awhile and agreed that it probably was. He had just installed what was then called a 'learning bridge' to separate our Ethernet network from the rest of the Institute's.

Now the whole internet knows, but I suspect you are none the wiser. No, I take that back, as I may know even less about you than you do about me.

As I wrote, typical attitude and thought-processes from those who have ZERO actual experience with something but feel the need to diminish it anyway. Why is that?

This is the silly part. It is projection, a product of your imagination, both with regard to my expertise, and my motivations.

If I can't afford to buy a certain something, or simply don't see a need for the added expense for my own use case, I don't go about trying to justify this by belittling the thing - I'm happy to accept from those who have years of extensive use of said thing that it works and is a positive evolution of the version I may have.

I don't either. I say ride what you want! And affordability was never the issue; complexity was, as I stated. A CatEye wireless bicycle speedometer, with two radios and two computers, is a far more complex thing than any mechanical bicycle it is mounted on. I'm fine with pointing stuff like that out. Sorry you got butt-hurt.

Weird how some folks have to defend their views by making silly comments and casting dispersions about things they have never owned!

Yes, isn't it?

No dispersions were cast in the making of my comments.

 

[Sharky]

Having had time to think, the zenith of all bike designs must be the Lotus Boardman bike from the early 90's.

So far ahead, that the UCI banned it.
If only they hadn't, we would all be riding around on bikes like this.

 

[Punkawallah]

Having had time to think, the zenith of all bike designs must be the Lotus Boardman bike from the early 90's.

So far ahead, that the UCI banned it.
If only they hadn't, we would all be riding around on bikes like this.


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Well, -you- might ;-)

 

[iandg]

5 speed friction shifting obvs!!

Friction shifting I know but you could get 6 speed in the 70s and I raced on Suntour ultra/winner(?) compact 7 in the early 80s. A good thing about freewheels back in the day was that you could get all the sprockets individually so could change the ratio to suit the terrain that you were racing on.

 

[Dogtrousers]

12 speed friction shifting is where it is at. Already compatible to 13 speed should you desire. Plus compatible with 10,9,8,7,6,5 speed friction etc. No pissing about indexing or charging batteries or programming them, no cables getting snapped in over complicated shifters.

I use friction shifters with 8 speed with no problem but I wonder if it would start to get a bit fiddly with more sprockets. But I've never tried it.

 

[Ming the Merciless]

I use friction shifters with 8 speed with no problem but I wonder if it would start to get a bit fiddly with more sprockets. But I've never tried it.

Not fiddly at all and muscle memory gets it dialled in pretty quickly.

 

[Big John]

When we work on friction shifters at the bike charity where I work we absolutely love 'em. No messing, fit a new cable and away you go. If you're after a simple bike they don't come much simpler. Not for racing snakes, admittedly, but horses for courses eh?

 

[rydabent]

Having had time to think, the zenith of all bike designs must be the Lotus Boardman bike from the early 90's.

So far ahead, that the UCI banned it.
If only they hadn't, we would all be riding around on bikes like this.


View attachment 729652

The only way bicycles can continue to advance is to let riders ride any kind of bike they want, or can find. They would be available to everyone.

 

[Roadrat77]

IMO bicycles probably reached their zenith in the late 80s. The frames were made with beautiful lugs, and they had down tube shifters. Frames with lugs were brazed together with low heat, and the tubes were not damaged. With down tube shifting the bike were clean of cable flapping around, especially if you had your brake cables under the handlebar wrap. And they already had click shifting and clipless pedals. Bikes didnt get any better than that.

You could apply the same argument to fishing - gone are the days of a wicker basket, one rod and reel and three floats - now its 16mtr carbon fibre poles and multi draw seatboxes and about ten rods already set up worth thousands and needing a van to transport it. I don't know an Angler who's experienced both era's who prefers the modern one. There's a certain amount of that in other sports too. My favourite bike of all time was a Raleigh Team Banana from the eighties until some scumbag on false plates pulled out of a side street and T-boned me straight off it.

 

[Dogtrousers]

You could apply the same argument to fishing - gone are the days of a wicker basket, one rod and reel and three floats - now its 16mtr carbon fibre poles and multi draw seatboxes and about ten rods already set up worth thousands and needing a van to transport it. I don't know an Angler who's experienced both era's who prefers the modern one. There's a certain amount of that in other sports too. My favourite bike of all time was a Raleigh Team Banana from the eighties until some scumbag on false plates pulled out of a side street and T-boned me straight off it.

My interest in fishing was fairly brief, in my early teens. My dad gave me a wicker creel containing loads of old crap and a rod with a missing top section. This was a great project for me renovating the equipment and so forth. I sourced a new top section for the rod and bound the little eyes/line guide thingies onto it. Polished up the ferrules. Mended the keep net. Sorted out the floats and got a reel working nicely.

Unfortunately, although I loved fiddling around with the equipment and so on, and enjoyed cycling out to the canal with the equipment mounted on my bike, I found the actual fishing a bit of a bore, and really hated having to deal with any fish I caught! Not the hobby for me.

 

[hobo]

Gearing on modern bikes gets to me.
Cassettes starting at 11 teeth and 16 tooth gaps on doubles just bad.