All Things Bikes and Tacos! (...and every vehicle imaginable)

Cannondale used aluminum flex stays as recently as 2017. Been done plenty before. Steel is actually a good material for it. Very forgiving and can be designed with an infinite fatigue life. But you can see how thin they needed to make the stays to get the flex they want.

 

Interesting, I didn’t realized they made aluminum flex stays. Engineering and manufacturing is pretty wild these days haha

 

I’ve eyed quite a few of their bikes. Several on PB with some cool custom colors. $350 for custom paint.

edit: the PB listings were for the Sqweebs. The SST is the business

 

Thanks guys, really appreciate it!

Another question…

Im not familiar with these 1x11 chainsets I believe it’s a 32 front and rear is 11/46.

Presumably this is a wide enough range for day to day cycling but maybe lacking in the top gear/ top speed?

 

You will be fine with that set up without lacking top speed, that is your 11 tooth and whatever you rock on the front chain ring. Most go for 32 T or 30 T with a 27.5” wheel set.

 

It's simpler and I doubt you or your wife would notice anything missing.

 

This is what I was just explaining to the wife. With three cogs up front and using the granny gear you should only be using 3-4 of the largest gears in the rear cassette. So in theory there are only 9-12 usable gears out of a ‘24’ speed bike.

Things have changed so much since the 90’s… for example it’s not fashionable to wear neon Lycra anymore

Hopefully I’m going to snag this Ghost for the wife and then find a bike for me.

We’re travelling right now and have found ourselves in Bend OR for a while so a bike and a fishing license are a must!!

 

Okay this is another thing that has changed… 27.5 vs 29. I forget what size my old Mavic 231 wheels were.

Seems as though for my larger frame set I’ll be getting 29’s. I’m presuming easier over terrain but slightly worse acceleration. No difference otherwise?

Have to see if I can get a Panaracer Dart for the front and a Smoke for the rear like the olde days

 

Yes, easier/smoother rollover, and you likely won't notice any acceleration difference. Sadly, those Panaracers are only available in 26". But that's what I used to run!

 

Oh now here's something I'd ride... I always wanted one of these but its $500 for a 20 s'thing year old bike! Even looks like it has the Dart/Smoke combo!!

 

What’s up with the front end? Does that allow you to adjust the rake?

 

Suspension, this was the ultimate bike of its time. It was a $3500 bike back in 1996!!

It’s a AMP research B3.

 

First time doing a lower service and let me say. It took way more persuasion for that damper to let go then I would have thought.

 

I'm looking at getting a bike computer because they seem to have useful information, I'm getting more and more into biking, and I want to try to ride healthier than I have previously. For example, today I rode a road route I made on trailforks, and missed a few turns because I had to pull out my phone. There was also a big hill which I probably could have made it up if I knew it ended just around a corner, but instead I walked like 50ft. Found an Edge 530 with some accessories (minus heart rate strap) for $250 so I'm thinking of hopping on that and getting a HR monitor to start off. I'd use it both for road riding and mountain bike riding

Pretty much have sold myself in my head, but need someone thats not being paid for a review to tell me they're helpful too lol

 

I have the 530 and like it. If I could do it over though, I’d get the 830 for the touch screen, that would help with trail navigation, easier scrolling around if you want to look ahead. Otherwise, it works fine. I’d you connect it with your phone and use the phone’s GPS, it keeps the battery a lot longer, otherwise it chews thru battery relatively quickly. PSA, use the tether!

 

You need to get yourself these. Fox damper removal tools. A couple of taps with a mallet and the damper and air spring just surrenders.

 

I also have the 530 and really like the functionality it provides. I use it on all of my bikes - road, gravel, MTB and my roadie that stays on the trainer. I use the navigation quite a bit, creating routes in the Garmin program on the web and uploading to the device. I haven’t done this as often on the MTB, but I do for the roadie and gravel bike. It’s linked to my Strava account and all is good with that, uploading rides and such. If I had the Strava super account, I think more functionality would show up on my Garmin head unit as well. The other day on the MTB, I did pull out my phone for trail forks, but you can link your TF account to the 530 and see trails that way also. I don’t ride with a heart rate strap, as the one strap I have is years old and lost it’s stretch so it doesn’t stay on my chest. But, i love the ease of being able to connect to the HR or the cadence monitor on the trainer.

And I also don’t mind the push button functionality. As you get use to it, you remember the number of clicks needed to get to the screens you need, so doesn’t bother me not having a touch screen. And as Pugga says, use the teather! I use it for all of my bikes just in case!

I don’t know what the price is these days new, but it’s a good unit. You will enjoy it!

 

I also have a 530 and I like it. Surprisingly I don't feel the need to upgrade it. It has numerous crashes and drops on it so it's sturdy for sure. I agree on tethering and getting good mounts. I just put the k-edge gravity cap on my mountain bike, it's kind of a weird angle if it's sunny out but good otherwise.

I have mine connected to an HR monitor, speed sensors, and a power meter on my gravel bike. It works quite well and has all the data you could need. Plus Garmin has workout plans that people have been doing reviews on and it seems pretty good. I think Blake from GMBN trained with the plan for like a month or two and saw some solid gains.

I haven't used the trailforks connection but the strava connection has actually been good recently. When I first got it, strava connections sucked, it would cause my garmin to crash on occasion but they must have updated it recently because I have had very few problems with it software wise...knock on wood haha.

 

530 is the sweet spot IMO and the one Ive been using for a while now. I’ve used Garmin bike comps since the intro of the 705 almost 15 yrs ago. Brief flirtations with other brands mixed in.

Garmin may not win on user interface when comparing with others. Greatly prefer Garmins with buttons over their touchscreen models. Partly cuz gloves but their touchscreens just aren’t great until you get to the 1000 series.

Their GPS, tracking, consistency, routing, and course loading/creating/following is head and shoulders above everything else I’ve tried which are the things I care about. If you’re gonna rely on it I. The backcountry it better work like you expect.

TLDR: get the 530

 

I have an early 800-series Garmin. I thought it was kind of weird at first that it didn't come with any maps, but I found plenty on GPSFileDepot. I'm not sure if they've changed that, but it's been nice to be able to layer maps on it. I've used it hiking as well, but battery life limits it to about a day of use, maybe 8 hours. When hiking I just turn it on when I want to get my bearings and then shut it off again. I haven't added any other ANT devices, that would probably shorten battery life a bit. I use the K-edge stem cap mount as well, much better than dealing with those bands -- they tend to dry out and break eventually.

I was looking at the 500 series and couldn't make up my mind, my wife bought me the 800 series as a gift. But I think I would have been happy with the 500, not sure the added features are worth the added cost.