On Tue, Nov 9, 2021 at 6:44 PM Doug H. <[email protected]> wrote:
> ... I do think at some point a bike can be too heavy and I can understand > Leah getting a lighter weight wheelset for hers. For me, of all the non-road-type bikes (perhaps that should read "non-roadie-type-bikes," because of course you ride Clems on the road) it's the Clem I'd look at first, largely for its benefits-to-price ratio. Having said that: I think Grant overbuilds his bikes, and one of 2 reasons I'd hesitate to buy a Clem is the (to my mind) excessively stout tubes. (The other reason is tire clearance; we have sand.) And this for 2 reasons: first, just the heft. Why carry it around if you don't need it? Second, "planing." I was long a planing skeptic until I had Chauncey Matthews essentially clone my 2003 road custom. The clone has thinner walled and narrower gauge tubes, and it did solve a problem I'd noticed in the background for 17 years: the 2003 often seemed sluggish compared to the 1999 road custom that it was copied from. Sometimes my left quad would ache when seated and pushing the crank for extended periods (fixed gear, against wind or up inclines). The Chauncey clone *immediately* felt faster -- or rather, easier to sit and pedal -- up hills and against headwinds; I don't get that "bogging down" feeling and my quad doesn't start hurting. So, for simple absence of unneeded weight, and also for "planing." As for the stoutness being unneeded: for decades I've ridden far thinner-tubed bikes with heavy rear loads, without any problems whatsoever. (The key is a stiff rack.) The best rear load carrier I ever owned was a 1973 racing frameset of really light standard gauge 531 -- I recall hefting it upon receipt, and being disappointed that it was so much lighter than my 2003 Riv frameset -- I wanted the nicer bike to be lighter. But I regularly carried loads up to 45 lb on the rear, and more moderate (20-25) loads much more frequently along longer distances across bad pavement on 29 mm tires. I'm 170 without any accessories, not heavy but no flyweight. The bike is still in service, I think, under yet another owner, Eric "CampyOnly" Norris of this list, and he's a mega-miler. Still, I haven't taken a Clem off my "eventually" list. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "RBW Owners Bunch" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/rbw-owners-bunch/CALuTfgvCN4BfJwsBEmUbo55HL_Pqj9_XWf9mU8KTtojpNSFMkw%40mail.gmail.com.
