View Single Post
  #6  
Old June 4th 04, 06:04 PM
Jonesy
external usenet poster
 
Posts: n/a
Default Danny-boy flails some more! (was: Advice on a good hardtail.)

"Dan Volker" wrote in message ...
"Jonesy" wrote in message
om...
"Dan Volker" wrote in message

...


Mostly X-country ( 3 inch travel models)


So, comparing all these different bikes, ones with completely
different design purposes, really doesn't give you much of a broad
base for discussing free-ride bikes. Got it.


I never said I did.


And yet you are claiming to have knowledge on bike handling esoterica,
based on no real experience. Wow.

And since you bought a free-ride style bike, that somehow translates
into full knowledge on all bikes? Wow, again.

Most bikes I have ridden are 3 inch travel or less


So, you really don't have a broad base of comparison. I see.


I'm "not" a professional mountain bike reviewer


Neither am I, nor do I claim to be. I only report my *experience,*
nothing more. You seem to be taking issue, like you actually know
something about the subject. But you haven't ridden the bikes, didn't
make the side-by-side comparisons I did, and yet somehow you know it's
all bunk.

Uhh, yeah. Now tell me a story about those killer hills and
"technical" trails in the mountains of FL.


that you have sufficient bike action input on rides to become aware
of this flex


There's motion in the rear of the bike. A bending moment that can be
felt on the trail, that disrupts the bikes handling.


You still have not explained how you could possibly know it is bending which
is taking place


Simple. It's lateral motion not felt with bikes of the same purpose,
nor on bikes with similar wheelsets. All bikes were set up according
to factory specs/recommendations for a person of my weight/riding
style.

as opposed to tires skipping from poor rear shock set
up--exagerated by the long rocker arm.


If the bike was designed to take that shock, and the shock was set-up
according to factory recommendations, then how is this possible?
Let's go with something more plausible - the carbon seatstays are not
limited to one axis in their flexibility.

Mostly, it seems that what we have here is one person, with a
broad background in twisty, challenging singletrack, demoing a bunch
of different free-ride bikes, vs. some flatlander know-it-all who
tested one or two different bikes, and now thinks he's some sort of
expert.


[snip]

Unlike you, Danny, I'm just relating what I felt and how I came about
my conclusions. Your weak theory of "poor set-up" has been discarded
due to it's implausibility.

While I don't have the same high opinion of my bike knowledge that you do of
yours


BWAHAHA! "Technical", etc. You are flogging yourself mercilessly
trying to establish credibility in this thread alone! Who are you
trying to kid, here?

[snip]

You didn't ride but one free-ride style bike (according to your list)
and yet you seem to be able to tell a guy who *did* ride a number of
them everything about why you'd only recommend the one you just
happened to get. Uh-huh. Just like how no bike shops let their bikes
out for demo rides. Uh-huh.

Keep digging.

I can live with that comparison.

And after you have shown repeatedly that you have almost
no awareness of whether you are riding a rockshox or a Manitou


Bzzzt. I knew exactly what I was riding. Just because it wasn't the
very same model as what you rode makes very little difference. Just
because *you* claim some world of difference doesn't mean anything.
Hell, your claims are frequently and hilariously debunked here.


So far most of the hilarity has been in your attempted debunking, where you
were clearly backstroking after you made some claims you now know are pretty
ridiculous---such as your saying that a Trek dealer can assemble a Liquid 25
with any spec it wants


An obviously lie. Look up that quote. Good luck.

The plane of motion that we are discussing has nothing to do with how
the shock is performing. It could be completely locked out, and there
would still be the same forces acting on the carbon stays and rocker
arms. (More or less - the point at which the tires are on the dirt in
the corner is where it moves laterally.)


I disagree.. In a high speed turn, there are vertical forces from bumps on
the trail, and there are lateral forces.


Have you *seen* the trail I was riding? No? Then you have no idea
what bumps were in the trail. Frankly, your casting about for some
sort of hook to hang your hat on is pathetic, but let's just say that
the shock worked OK, that the sag was set properly, and that the
rebound was set such that it wasn't too slow.

It seems your contention is that
only lateral forces are working on the bike


You seem to not be able to read. Try again...

My contention is that unless you are cornering with slick
tires on glassy smooth blacktop, the irregular surface of the trail will be
acting to throw the tire ( and bike) up and down


Again, you didn't see the trail, so (as usual for you) you have no
clue. Let's just say that the trail at the points where I felt rear
flex was pretty smooth, and that my weight shift from braking caused
more suspension action than the trail could have.

In the same corners, with the other free-ride style bikes, there was
very little lateral movement. Odd, huh?

and that as each of these
vertical hits occurs, as the tire bounces up, the tire can skid laterally.


If that would have happened, I'd have known it. But it didn't. Look,
dufus, I ride a softtail as my main bike. It's bump response is
similar to my beater hardtail. Better, but nothing like an FS rig.
On bumpy turns, I don't stutter-skid, evn though bump compliance is
close to zero. And yet these bikes don't flex laterally either.
Weird, huh?

[snip an attempt to lecture in FS 101]

Get over yourself Danny - you look like an idiot banging away at this
stupid theory that doesn't hold any water to begin with.

Its not
about lock-out or the SPV alternative , its about how well the shock does at
smoothing out the bumps to keep traction


Finally we agree. The SPV has nothing to do with non-pedalling
forces, so all that remains is shock set-up.

Having the right pressure for the
Manitou 3 Way rear shock ( for the rider), both in main spriing and in
preload, is necessary for this.


And when you set the sag, according to manufacturer's recommendation,
you are setting the shock to operate according to your weight.
Anybody with a shock pump can do this. I have a shock pump, and a
ruler. Maybe I could set up the shock, huh?

Since you have not ridden the Liquid with
this shock, you don't really know how different it would be in mating to the
rocker arm and rear end of the Liquid, than the shock in the bike you did
ride


It doesn't make any sense that a change in shock would make such a
vast difference in handling on the same frame. In pedalling, sure.
If it has to be perfect in order to ride properly, then the design
sucks eggs.

They don't need to be set up "perfectly." They need to be set up
"close enough." If a bike doesn't operate well in "close enough",
then it's **** and you need to find a better bike. Funny, the
Specialized, Giant and Marin bikes worked just fine.


What would lead us to believe the bikes you rode were even set up "for you"


Is it so tough for you to understand written English? Maybe that's
why most folks think you're a total fool.

Maybe the last person the Liquid was "set up for" was at a drastically
different weight and riding style than you.???


Who says it was at the settings from the last person?

Maybe the Specialized, Giant and Marin bikes were last ridden by someone ...


Who says they had settings remaining from the last person?

Don't you find
it odd that one bike was so poorly set up that it acted like ****, but
the others were set up well enough to act great? Was that just purely
by chance? As in every other claim you make, you destroy your
crediblity by even suggesting it.


I knew you wouldn't be able to hack this one.

Danny, I set up the shock, according to what Trek said in the manual
(it could have been the Fox manual - either way, it was for that
shock, and that bike.)


Maybe it was a Giant Manual you were reading--or maybe it was the manual for
your car---what's the differnence ?


How would I have the Giant manual when I was riding the Liquid? When
it comes right down to it, Danny, I blow all of your straw-clutching
arguments right out of the water.

but the pivots, rockers shock and stays should not
flex laterally.


You still have not shown a shred of evidence that any lateral flex or
movement occurs.


Sure I have. Just because you can't begin to recognize what
*observation* is all about doesn't mean the Liquid isn't a flexy POS.
Of course, you bought it, so it *must* be good.

Everything you attribute to latteral flex seems more likely
to be vertical hit induced lateral skidding--from poorly set up back end.


Since you haven't seen the trail, and haven't ridden the range of
bikes that I did for this specific test, it seems unlikely that you
can competently diagnose the issue. But that's you, in a single
sentence.


Trek dealers are not supposed to be so incompetent that they can not
assemble bikes properly.


Unless, of course, the bikes come with a certain component spec from
the factory. One ordered specifically, or maybe there was a mid-year
spec change, or...


So you really are a backstroker....You have to know how hilarious it is for
you to pretend that a dealer can assemble any components they want on a bike
and still call it a Liquid 25.


Where did I say "any components they want?" You're just making that
up.

Fact is, Danny, you have no idea WHY the bikes got specced this way,
and pretending it's incompetance means that you're just casting about
for some lifeline to save you ass.


That's not what our local Trek rep says about this :-)


What's his name and phone number?

Too bad you're not man enough to admit that you don't really know what
the answer is.


I knew you'd pass this one by too...

Funny thing about that - they have told me that some bikes get
different forks because they have similar price points. I'm sure you
could call them and hear the same thing.

But you won't.


A local Trek Rep is close enough.


Give me his name and number. I'll call him and talk to him
personally.


Like when you're pedalling? Ooops, except I wasn't pedalling, I was
going down the hill. The shocks are supposed to act completely
differently in that mode? Explain that, Dan. You keep speaking in
general, marketing, terms. Be specific and technical, so that
everyone will know that you know EXACTLY what you are talking about.


All shocks are not equal in their ability to work with a given rocker arm
and rear end.


Since we are talking about Liquids, the rocker is the same. Since the
Liquid was originally conceived to use the TALAS shock, your
"poorly-mated" theory is just plain bull****.

The only way to be specific, would be to have you at a real demo, where the
bikes could be set up optimally.


And some marketing/sales guy can operate a shock pump and read an
instruction manual better than I can? Now, I get that it's possible
that *you* couldn't follow along, but I'm a little smarter than that.

As I said before, if the bike needs to be perfectly set up to even
work acceptably, then the design is ****.

The 10 and 30 are a whole different
philosophy----changeable travel.


And this makes the same bike so drastically different on the downhill
(using the same travel setting as the SPV-equipped frame) that they
act like totally different bikes? Be detailed in your technical
description.


Yeah right.


I knew you wouldn't have an answer. Talk about the backstroke, LOL...

Exactly what has this to do with the internals filtering low-frequency
inputs? What's that, you say? Nothing? Yup, you're right. When
you're not pedalling, the bikes have *essentially* the same behavior,
assuming the shock is set up correctly.


[snip]

You really need to learn to trim out the stuff you aren't responding
to. I guess you need to be schooled in the basics of USENET, too.

A bike with a short rocker arm will have less leverage


Both bikes have the same rocker arm length. And both bikes had the
same travel (5 inches.)


You were comparing the Liquid to the Fuel


No, stupid, I was comparing the Liquid 30 to the Liquid 25. Try and
read before you make yourself look like a total tool.

So, all you've got, after all this, is some vague "set-up" error, and
a "poorly-mated shock/frame" combo, on a bike that was designed
originally to take that particular shock. LOL, you crack me up.
Funny, I can build up my bikes and service their parts by myself with
no problems, and yet I have difficulty reading a manual and operating
a shock pump and a rebound adjuster. Yup, it looks like a real
convincing argument. LMAO.
--
Jonesy
Ads
 

Home - Home - Home - Home - Home