dorset boy
Senior Retro Guru
Nah,bloody rain !
Mangizmos "Rant Of The Day"
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Takingabreak
Dave Yates Fan
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Some subtle changes in technology surely? Brakes? bottom bracket? Indexed shifting? freehub?Very good, thats mehere I am 1983 and 2023, still the same technologyView attachment 722717
We're the same age but I have less of a bike history being more pedestrian in my earlier outdoor activities. As this is 'Retrobike' it would be good to read your views on the higher end Retro kit from your younger self's perspective. I can't see you digging some of the high end kit back in the day.
Mangizmo
Raleigh Fan
I didnt ever own high end kit back then, however I did not have the same negative opinion of expensive bikes of that period,
I had friends that raced and spent alot on road bikes, but they were never anything like as expensive as todays bikes even accounting for inflation. I always wanted a high end touring bike, (like a Super Galaxy or something higher custom built) some of my friends had such bikes but they were super functional and customisable. The latest advavances back then all made perfect sense and were a genuine move forward, things like brazed on mounts for Cantilever brakes, and later disc brakes. Bottle cage mounts, carrier mounts , later index gears, cartridge bottom brackets, later the A headset was a welcome advance. Triple chainsets were a great addition, SPD pedals were brilliant and I LOVED mountain bikes when they arrived, the "Gravel bike" is nowhere near as revolutionary as the mountain bike was back then and I think they will fade away. So many great ideas suddenly appeared which have been carried forward to todays Hybrid bikes, many of which are great value and very practical functional machines . I just feel that we reached a great point about 15 years ago, components were relatively inexpensive, everything worked really well, gears became super slick and you could have any ratios you wanted at relatively low price. I never remember looking at even very expensive bikes and thinking "thats a gimmik" or "I can't see the point of that", and thats the problem for bike manufacturers now, bikes hit a high point for me a long time ago, they are desperate to offer us something new but they are removing many of the great features of older bikes, you now get a load of features that dont really add anything meaningful but just jack up the price, but many new riders dont really realise just how good older bikes are. For me, they just cant get any better, and electronic groupsets, hidden cables, funny shaped manufacturer specific seatposts etc are a step backwards, they add to the cost, make home maintenance more difficult and make tweaking the bike to your liking harder.
After Mountain bikes came in, everybody could have a triple chainset at low cost which is a wonderful thing, now we are trying to be convinced that a single ring is a much better idea LOL
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Mangizmo
Raleigh Fan
Agreed
Takingabreak
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the change for changes sake has been happening for years but it has accelerated greatly over the more recent years.
I still can't get my head round why anyone would want to use anything other than a square taper cartridge bottom bracket
I still can't get my head round why anyone would want to use anything other than a square taper cartridge bottom bracket
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Because Shimano nailed it with their external bearing 24mm steel axle cranksets. There's nothing *wrong* with square taper, but this is better.
Alternatively; Bring back Cotter pins!!!
Takingabreak
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aren't those external bearing cranksets prone to creaking more than my back creaks trying to use a cotter pin press?
Mangizmo
Raleigh Fan
It is technically better I agree, move the bearings further apart but the cartridge bottom bracket is pretty good, its universally available and is inexpensive. When touring outside the UK I wouldnt contemplate using anything other than a square taper cartridge because they do last well and I can get a replacement crank/ chainset or bottom bracket anywhere in the world, not so sure about the other variants and they will inevitably be more expensive and harder to come by
Mangizmo
Raleigh Fan
I agree, universally available, inexpensive and pretty robust, even if other options are technically better, but not enough to convince me to change, I am planning a cycling trip to India, and it will be a square taper cartridge that I will be using
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