On Sat, 28 Apr 2012 08:44:03 -0700, SMS
wrote:

On 4/28/2012 5:53 AM, Lou Holtman wrote:

As you said the slope of the TT is immaterial so IMO there is no (fit)
reasons to exclude these frames in your friends choice.

If you accept the old Midas Muffler logic, that's true. The other shop
welds a bunch of pipes onto the muffler they have in stock and assure
the customer, "Fit? We'll _make_ it fit."

You can take a few sizes of compact frames and use various seat posts,
cut the threadless steer tube to length, and use different angle and
reach stems, and "make it fit." But it isn't optimal. It's less
comfortable, you have excessive seat post flex, you can't mount enough
usable bottle cages, etc..

Unfortunately you'd drank the Kool Aid.


And unfortunately you are wrong. The sloping top tube simply allows a
shorter seat tube - to fit those with short legs - it has no effect on
the geometry of the bike, assuming that by geometry you are referring
to the bike's relationship with the ground and not simply its
appearance to a casual passer-by.

One can built a bike with no top tube, sloping top tube or horizontal
top tube with no geometry effecting changes whatsoever. The height of
the seat tube simply changes.
--
Cheers,

John B.