Dazed and Confused

Simon Brooke wrote:

To what extent can it be upgraded?

That's kind of a non-issue. Modern bike parts are highly standardised,
and with few exceptions virtually any bike can be upgraded to very
close to the limits of current technology - if your pockets are deep
enough.

It depends whether you count replacing the frame as an upgrade, or
starting a new bike. If you want to end up with a suspension fork, it's
probably worth looking for a frame designed for the sort of travel
suspension fork you want (and if you want to end up with a rear disk
brakes, it's probably worth looking for one with an appropriate mounts,
though adding one is more practical than changing geometry to suit a
suspension fork - front disk mount you can get with a fork upgrade).
Adding rear suspension I think counts as a new frame, even if you could
use an existing frame as a starting point.
Not that I'm suggesting the OP needs suspension or disk brakes.

(If you do count replacing a frame as an upgrade, I suspect any bike
at all can be upgraded right to the very limits of current technology,
but not necessarily keeping any parts at all of the original bike.
Which is a silly use of "upgrade" - but on the other hand I can see how
if you have a bike with a damaged frame, and replace just the frame with
an identical one, that could reasonably be the same bike, so I'm not sure
exactly where the dividing line is.)

in message , Alan Braggins
') wrote:

Simon Brooke wrote:

To what extent can it be upgraded?

That's kind of a non-issue. Modern bike parts are highly standardised,
and with few exceptions virtually any bike can be upgraded to very
close to the limits of current technology - if your pockets are deep
enough.

(If you do count replacing a frame as an upgrade, I suspect any bike
at all can be upgraded right to the very limits of current technology,
but not necessarily keeping any parts at all of the original bike.
Which is a silly use of "upgrade" - but on the other hand I can see
how if you have a bike with a damaged frame, and replace just the
frame with an identical one, that could reasonably be the same bike,
so I'm not sure exactly where the dividing line is.)

Which brings us right back on topic....

Simon, dazed and confused.

--
(Simon Brooke) http://www.jasmine.org.uk/~simon/

;; no eternal reward will forgive us now for wasting the dawn.
;; Jim Morrison

"Paul D" wrote in message
...
I posted a thread yesterday, entited; "stressed and depressed",
because that's
just about how I felt trying to come to some sort of a decision
about upgrading
my bike.

Today, despite quite a few people posting advice, and a definite
flow of
knowledge in my direction, I am just as stressed, and even more
confused.

[snip]

12 years or so back, when I decided to start cycling again, I just
bought a
cheap BIKE.

[snip]

So I went along to my LBS (not knowing that abbr. at the time), and
said I
wanted to buy a bike.

I think the answer might be to borrow a book on the subject from your
local library. That would not only answer the questions you have,
but might also tell you some things that you didn't know you didn't
know. It might even suggest that some ideas that you thought were
true actually weren't.

Which raises the question, which is the best book to read? Right now
I can't think of any. The newish books that I can think of, I
specifically wouldn't recommend. What's happened? are publishers
scared of being sued by anyone who falls off their bike?

But with luck not all libraries will have thrown out the books that
now are out of print.

Jeremy Parker

Jeremy Parker wrote:

Which raises the question, which is the best book to read? Right now
I can't think of any. The newish books that I can think of, I
specifically wouldn't recommend. What's happened? are publishers
scared of being sued by anyone who falls off their bike?


Myra's (formerly of this group) web page is a pretty good start.
http://www.myra-simon.com/bike/tips.html

--
Tony

"A facility for quotation covers the absence of original thought" Lord
Peter Wimsey (Dorothy L. Sayers)

On Sat, 30 Apr 2005 23:17:13 +0100, "Jeremy Parker"
wrote:

I think the answer might be to borrow a book on the subject from your
local library. That would not only answer the questions you have,
but might also tell you some things that you didn't know you didn't
know. It might even suggest that some ideas that you thought were
true actually weren't.

I did actually think of that, but, sadly, non of the libraries to which I have
access have any bike books at all.

The "things that you think are true but are not, is a very important point, and
one I've had a lot of trouble getting accross to at least one poster here.

For example, if you know, from basic mathematics, how to calculate the speed at
which you will travel, given cadence, wheel diameter, and front and rear cog
count, being told that you are confused about gearing is totally unhelpful.

Being then told that you are obsessed because you want to know WHY people are
saying that is, again, unhelpful (and offensive).

You actually need someone to either explain where the problem in your
understanding is, or admit that no one knows exactly why experience runs counter
to common sense, but that there is such a large body of anecdotal evidence that
it does so, that it's well worth trying it out to see for yourself.

As a result of things people have said here, I have carried out various
experiments, and have learned a lot (including that cycling 120' up a moderately
steep incline almost every day for 6 months does wonders for your your climbing
ability, both in terms of strength, and cardio-vascluar fitness).

Paul D wrote:

The "things that you think are true but are not, is a very important point, and
one I've had a lot of trouble getting across to at least one poster here.

I think it's fair to say neither of us covered ourselves in glory last
week. I regret that and apologise for being over-nuclear: even if it
was in reaction to getting my head bitten off for trying to help, it was
My Bad.

Being then told that you are obsessed because you want to know WHY people are
saying that is, again, unhelpful (and offensive).

What I was /trying/ to say was that IMHO you were concentrating on some
particular fine details which were clouding your view of a bike as a
whole (and relatively straightforward) package. I didn't mean "you have
a personality disorder which makes you obsessive in general".
Unfortunately you seemed to take it a different way, which is a good
demonstration of how Usenet is not a perfect communication medium...

Pete.
--
Peter Clinch Medical Physics IT Officer
Tel 44 1382 660111 ext. 33637 Univ. of Dundee, Ninewells Hospital
Fax 44 1382 640177 Dundee DD1 9SY Scotland UK
net http://www.dundee.ac.uk/~pjclinch/

On Tue, 03 May 2005 09:18:42 +0100, Peter Clinch
wrote:

I think it's fair to say neither of us covered ourselves in glory last
week. I regret that and apologise for being over-nuclear: even if it
was in reaction to getting my head bitten off for trying to help, it was
My Bad.

I in turn apologise for getting so ratty, but apart from the problems I was
having trying to get a handle on what I needed (or thought I needed) to know
about buying a bike, having my current one returned in a non-functiong state did
very little to improve my mood - especially as people were telling me to find a
good bike shop, and these people were the only ones in my town!

Being then told that you are obsessed because you want to know WHY people are
saying that is, again, unhelpful (and offensive).

What I was /trying/ to say was that IMHO you were concentrating on some
particular fine details which were clouding your view of a bike as a
whole (and relatively straightforward) package.

As I said, I needed a certain amount of information before I could see if and
where I was making incorrect assumtions.

Simply being told I was confused wasn't going to persuade me that I couldn't
calculate the effective gearing, or that I was wrong to be trying to. I needed
to know where the error lay, or where I was drawing a false inference - or
indeed where common sense and physics must give waay to overwhelming anecdotal
evidence.

Unfortunately you seemed to take it a different way, which is a good
demonstration of how Usenet is not a perfect communication medium...

Indeed. When I carelessly used the phrase "decent bit of pressure on the
pedals", a couple of people quite reasonably assumed that by "decent bit" I
meant "quite a lot", whereas what I _intended_ to say was enough that I can
continue to transmit power for a few extra MPH (i.e. as opposed to my current
state when going downhill: no more pressure than is needed to spin the pedals
against transmission losses). I'm still not quite sure I'm explaining that
properly!