I've been getting into the steelisreal, rim brakes are good enough side of youtube lately, and the clickbait has gotten me thinking about my next bike. How much truth do you think there is to these memes that say that high end steel isn't like the cheap shit I think of when I think of steel? I refuse to consider cantis and if I get disc steel I'm told that's no better than carbon because it's "overbuilt" at that point which "defeats the purpose". So it has to be dual pivot classic road frame made of thin walled fairy tubing, and no I will not elaborate because we all know why.So it looks like if I'm not too hung up on getting a name brand duende meme bike I can probably pick up what looks like a pretty good steel frame for under $3k. Possibly even less. But then I'd really have to go with some pretty narrow, hard, puncture-prone tires, and I just don't have the energy for that shit. I haven't struggled with inner tubes and frame pumps in pelting ice cold rain by the side of the road in years and I like it that way, latex blood runs through my veins. But TPU was invented, and that's caused me to begin doubting my faith.Would I be consumed with post-purchase rationalization if I fell for the steel meme? Are steel bikes and rim brakes the cast iron of bikes? Opinionated attention whores who need to have something to argue about at all times so they pick the most argumentative pointless crap that has a grain of truth that gets overemphasized at the expense of the big picture? Or is there something to this memery?Before you start your angry typing, I am a mamil with crabon and aero and absolute black and all that stuff, so please, be accurate with your strawmanning. I can supply some other personal aspects of myself if you wish to find something to be aggressive about but I trust I have given you enough information to get irrationally angry over bicycles.
>>2023940>steel frame for under $3kI should say so. Steve Rex, Mandaric, Rodriguez, Elephant all spring to mind as boutiquey builders with name-brand tubing who will do that for you.>Would I be consumed with post-purchase rationalization if I fell for the steel meme?I mean you could always shop around for a cheap used one, flog it for a while, and see how you like it. Your choices for nice MiUSA frames are basically steel or ti, if that matters to you--there are a few domestic shops doing carbon or aluminum, but not many, and the carbon in particular is quite expensive.
>>2023942I'm not hung up on what nationality makes it, it can be made by DPRK child soldiers or the finest craftsmen of Hamas or the Houthis if the product is up to snuff, but MIUSA is fine as long as it's not just riding on mindless jingoism which I worry that a lot of MIUSA product branding has been reduced to these days. I know rodriguez is fine, I don't mean them, I just mean as a general rule.So you're saying that they're as comfy as a plush tire'd crabon bike with toobless even if I have to ride 100 PSI tires? I want to believe but it just doesn't sound scientifically plausible.
>>2023940Steel is real and rim brakes are good enough but not all steel is equal. There's basic hiten steel and then there's exotic alloys of steels like Reynolds or Columbus steel. Now the material is one thing, design is another, which means geometry plays a big role in how real is that steel. Exotic steel is usually thin walled, butted, and hardened which gives it spring-like characteristics, making the bike feel alive, reactive, and dynamic.
You write like a faggot desu
>>2023950>making the bike feel alive, reactive, and dynamic.shut up faggot
>>2023962It's not wrong but the same can be found with carbon, aluminum, and titanium anyways. It should be said, shit steel is not those qualities
OP gobbles these down
>>2023950for me its 4130 CrMo
>>2023940I have a Gunnar (rip) Roadie, I like it a lot. I've never owned a real expensive carbon bike, but I raced on a caad12 for a little bit and then china carbon after that. I got a steel fork with my Gunnar and it helps dampen road buzz compared to the carbon forks I was riding on prior. Same wheels and tires between the bikes, the only thing that changed was the frameset. All steel isn't created equal, I have some 90s steel road bikes with unicrown forks and those things beat my hands up harder than anything I've ridden. A steel road bike with rim brakes that can fit 28 mm tires is all I'm really interested in owning (for road riding) from here until I stop riding bikes altogether.
My cromoly frame with dual-pivot calipers runs 28C and I think it is indeed a very nice ride. I have no idea how it would compare in feeling to your aero crabon though. My other bikes are all alu-alloy frames. I paid about a tenth of what OP is looking to drop, for the steel one second-hand.I think you should get a nice but not stupidly expensive steel frame and decide for yourself how it feels to you.That's about as helpful as I can be on the topic.
>>2023945>So you're sayingnot at all, that's where buying a cheap older high-end steel roadie and trying it out for yourself comes into the picture
>>2023940Rim brakes are totally legit, lighter, less complexity, and allows for the frame to really extend compliance features (which if you’re looking for vintage steelisreal, is specifically what you want). Vintage steel road racing bikes are absolutely super-compliant, in my opinion, in a bad way, they’re noodley in a good way against road buzz sure, but they’re also noodley in a bad way when cornering or sprinting hard. Carbon wins. They have to isolate the flex characteristics, and to do that will steel they would need additive metal design and extreme tube shaping (which is also heavy). Carbon wins here, it can isolate flex characteristics of the whole frame while keeping strength with just a few grams of carbon layer, or just a different layering processLook at titanium shaping if you want a glimpse of what the future of compliance focused steel might be (lots of expensive 3d printed parts, rare shaped tubes from a small handful of suppliers, gussets and bracing bars galore). Carbon is the smarter move
>>2023989I'm on rims with 23mm internal width and I'm happy with how these ride with 32mm tires. I'm willing to entertain the idea that a more noodly steel bike with rim brake fork and something like a HED ardennes plus with 700x28 tires (pic not related) might be adequately comfy but I'm not sure that getting a genuinely antique bike with 14mm internal width rims is going to give me a very good sense of what to expect on a better modern steel bike with rim brakes, or is it? If it is, then that would be a solid confirmation that I shouldn't go down this road at all.I realize I could get an antique and tear the whole thing down and spread the dropouts and build up a whole new wheelset and so on just so I can try to apples to apples it but at that point my mild curiosity is not adequate to overcome my aversion to buying antiques and fucking around with them as a sort of test drive. I know what works for me now and that's modern wide tires and dick brakes. I can just ignore the weeb in my head telling me to buy new shit that looks like old shit (but is presumably better than one would expect, pic related).>>2023996>noodley in a bad way when cornering or sprinting hard.I wonder if you might be overestimating my watts though, I'm no Chris Hoy. I did feel what I take to be a big change in flex when I went from metal to plastic wheels, at least when stomping up particularly steep hills and pulling up on the bars, but that applies to approximately 2% of my time in the saddle, on a good day. So unless it's incredibly obnoxious I could probably tolerate that if the overall experience is good.Titanium is the kind of thing I might get for the lolz if I had room for at least 3 bikes but it has always given me a serial killer vibe for some reason. Not the warm fuzzies like other materials. So I wouldn't consider it for my primary main bike. I realize this is not rational at all but none of this is rational.
>>2023997Just get an older nice bike and presume that a modern nice steel bike fits in the middle depending on what you get. That build isn't going to be particularly stiff with the tange prestige frame, quill stem, and old school raked out front fork.Admittedly it's probably fast and fun with those super blingy cranks and a 10 speed rear end.Either way used nice rim brake bikes are cheap if you live in the right part of the world.I buy nice 80's bikes for sub 100usd
>>2023940Get an old (but good) steel bike and check it yourself. It shouldn't set you back that much and you can sell it in case it isn't for you. You can also upgrade many of the components for a more modern feel. Point in case, I upgraded ( haters will say downgraded) my steel road bike with modern aero drop bars.
>>2023940>the clickbait has gotten me thinkingUhhhh>name brand duende meme bike>duendePic related(It's the word for "elf" in Spanish, btw)
>>2024067
>>2024070that fork is going to make me throw up
>>2024081Sounds like you just don't understand art, maaaan
>>2024083sounds like a post from a modern "artist".The paint is fine. Weird, but fine.The fork looks like a bent leaf spring. It might match the frame if the tubes were twice the size.
>>2023940post height and local craigslist
>>2024070as far as retarded gravel forks go this isn't even so bad, try a fucking lauf fork or any of the ~50mm meme travel ones Pegoretti are in the italian tradition of garish design like Colnago. You make it hideous to the point where it becomes sexy. It's like leopard print. That frame is gonna look good specced up with Campy Ekar (also hideous). I love the riser headtube, it's like Big Mig's Pinarello.Also those Pegs ride awesome. My neighbor has one and prefers it to his carbon LOOK and his Merckx.
>>2023997>antiqueThis is the wrong word. Antique refers to pre-modern bikes. Bicycles reached a relative end-state in the late 80s / early 90s. The steel bikes you'd be looking at are modern, to some people they aren't even classics but classic is the word you want. Antique (or vintage) refers to 60s bikes and earlier with actually archaic technology. Your klutzing about rim / tire size is ridiculous because you can run whatever wheels and tires you want and lots of classic road bikes have decent clearance. The notion that you'd have to spread the dropouts or build wheels for it is ridiculous. Many road frames are 130 and the rest you'd be looking at are 126 and easily accept a 130 wheel without cold setting. Don't buy faux-vintage. Quill stems are fine but if you're dropping the coin on a new bike it's retarded. What do you even want the bike for? If it's for serious riding, training, group rides, distance, ok, you have preformance concerns. Isn't it just a 'go out and thrash around for an hour' type of bike of a cafe cruiser though? Why obsess about 'comfort'? Get something cool. Buy something old, once expensive, and cool and overhaul it. If you're too lazy then just keep shitposting about how old bikes suck.
>>2024070I know it's a gravel bike but that fork is mega fugly
>>2024104I don't do "serious riding" or "training", think of me as basically the op of this thread >>1999701 except creepier and more antisocial, my weekday rides are about 20 miles and my weekend rides around 50. The reason I obsess over comfort is sometimes my rides are longer and usually past mile 60 or so, things start to get sore from all the cracks and bumps. Not always, but sometimes, it really depends on how aggressively I'm riding, and how tired I was at the start of the ride. But that's on 32mm tires. So I worry about what a 28mm tire would be like. I don't know if I mentioned this earlier but I'm not a spry young man like you kids. I require a degree of comfort or I become grumpy.Granted this is probably going to be the bike I keep at the home of an elderly parent so I can ride when I'm there, and I don't really know what the riding is like around that place, other than the fact that the immediate surroundings are disgustingly flat and "bike friendly" which to me is code for unracer hell. I should really just borrow a shitter and get the lay of the land first. For all I know I'll fall in love with my fantasy window shopping bike that does not exist yet, and abandon crabon forever.Thanks for the warning about quill stems, I assumed they were de rigueur for pseudo-old bikes but the idea of something so unconfigurable gives me hives, it's like buying an aero cockpit. GNU plus Bike would provide a degree of reassurance for a frame whose geometry is unfamiliar to me. I know I know, "just get a bike fit", I have a prejudice against those people since I blew a lot of money on one once and it didn't fix my problem. So the sizing and fitting is going to be a DIY job. That's one of the reasons why I'm not that interested in custom geo, I believe that stuff is just snake oil. Thank you for reading my blog.
>>2024110Not him but vintage road bikes are pretty much at a free fall cost right now , so if you find one that looks nice, post it and we can give a quick run down.
>>2023940>How much truth do you think there is to these memes that say that high end steel isn't like the cheap shit I think of when I think of steel?100%, cheap shit will never be anything like expensive shit. Doesn't matter what you're purchasing.>Would I be consumed with post-purchase rationalization if I fell for the steel meme?Probably not.>Are steel bikes and rim brakes the cast iron of bikes?No. Steel material science has advanced dramatically over the last few decades, and that has definitely worked its way to the high end bike world. Rim brakes can still send you flying over your handlebars with one strong finger.>Opinionated attention whores who need to have something to argue about at all times so they pick the most argumentative pointless crap that has a grain of truth that gets overemphasized at the expense of the big picture? That's just idiots on the Internet, doesn't matter what subject you're speaking about>Or is there something to this memery?Yeah, there's something to steel bikes. They been around for over 100 years and they're not going away anytime soon. There are so many super steels that have never even been made into bike tubing, there's a lot to experiment with in the future and a lot of interesting advancements to come for sure.
you just know op has been non-stop seething and bickering against steel bikes on /n/
Steel is real slowThe ideal bike is aluminum frame, steel fork. The thing you really need is rim brakes. Until you understand what a rim brake fork feels like don't give up on aluminum.Modern bikes ride like shit because the disc requires insanely overbuilt forks, which are shit. Then they pad that shit with fat slow tires to compensateIt's rare to find aluminum frame with steel fork but they exist.. Best combination
>>2024245Aluminum sucks I'm trying to find an alloy megapro and they are all cracked
>>2024245what steel bikes have you owned lad just a bunch of shitters right?
>>2024250Even if you find one that isn't cracked and buy it, it will crack on you at some pointBecause aluminum is shit
>>2024245>Steel is real slow>The ideal is [...] steel fork Steel forks are the number one contributor of weight for a steel frameset. The main triangle of a steel frame is only marginally heavier than an aluminum frame.
>>2024252Nope I've owned classic 531 and Tange bikes. I've owned modern steel Soma crosscheck. They're heavy as balls and ALL of the comfort comes from the flexible steel forks - which are only flexible when they are RIM and (forgot to mention) 1" steerer.Tom Ritchey himself says 1" and run 3 is the key to a comfortable bike, but you retards want thick overbuilt garbage meant for DH mtb
>>2024258Bad day huh.
>>2024258>Tom Ritchey himself says 1"steerer, ok>and run 33 what?google gives me nothing
>>2024258>I've owned classic 531many shitters, plaingauge 531 is not particuraly nice and i bet unrestored>and Tange bikesdoesn't really mean anything, plenty of quite basic and overbuilt tange frames>I've owned modern steel Soma crosscheck.not even a bike at all, wonder if you're lying bud
>>2024272I think he left out a : as in >Tom Ritchey himself says 1" and run :3 is the key to a comfortable bikewhich is to say>Tom... says that 'to implement a 1 inch and then run (bottom smiley) is the key to a comfortable bikewhich is to say that Tom Ritchey is bottombrained
How tall are Tom’s headtubes, huh#slammedgang
>>2024258I'm with you on wanting a compliant fork, but how much compliance do you really get from a steerer tube as opposed to the fork blades ? Just fucking think about it for one second. Brandt / Ritchey shilling 1" was probably more about aesthetics. Also these are rich guys who are designing their own custom bikes to ride. You can have autistic preferences, but if you're a poorfag scrapping the barrel of the used market then it's better to not have hyper specific preferences for uncommon tech, because all that means is that you're going to miss out on most nice stuff that's actually available to you. Brandt and Ritchey both fully embraced threadless, and how many fucking 1" threadless steel forks are there? It's incredibly rare.
>>2024258You're talking out of your ass with your stupid ass anecdotes.
