Re: The long, slow build for the Lil' Lady - ?Weightweenie?
Weight Weenie? Not really....well, maybe just a bit….
So, weight. Given the light frame and forks and the general intention of making this a ‘better’ proposition than a shop-bought jobbie I’m keeping an eye on the numbers to make sure it doesn’t get unnecessarily lardy. I have already started considering weight in the previous chat about in-hub gears. So where from here? Well, let’s start with what we already have....
The parts supplied with the frame were tidy enough but nothing special, so I popped them on the scales and compared them to others I had in the spares bin:
Stem – no-name silver alloy job, ~90mm reach, 236g. OK….. Azonic ORC ~90mm from the parts bin comes in at 180g. Ditch it, that’s
minus 56g. This is easy.
Bars – ‘XTX’ (?) black risers, alloy, 545mm wide, 292g. Some black Easton EA70 Syncros bars (karma’d from Alison) 500mm, come in at 114g. Ditch it,
minus another 178g. That’s a good saving right there.
Seatpost (31.6mm x 300mm) – black alloy logo might say ‘Most’ not sure. 394g. There’s definitely some room to improve there. Got plenty of spare posts and they tend to come in between 200-300g, and could lop a chunk off the bottom to save a bit more too since the saddles never going to be raised too far on a frame this size. There’s a cheapy alloy jobbie cut-down to about 150mm in there that weighs in at 218g, and a full length raceface XY unit at 292g. So a decent full length post or even a cutdown cheap post would cut the weight down considerably. Let’s split the difference and call it a
projected 150g saving.
Saddle is another 350g. It’s a basic saddle so didn’t expect it to be super light, and these ‘ladies’ comfort saddles are rather more generous than most. Got loads of saddles in the box and many are sub 300g, bet I can find one to suit that’s under 250g if I tried, but will have to leave that to m’lady to see what’s comfy when we get there I guess. But call that another
projected 50g saving to be had.
Forks (Bomber Z4 flylight air) – nice and work well. Book says 1780g, my scales say 1950g but that’s including bits of headset and a fancy SFN plug thing. Book also says my RST XMO are around 1500g so might be a few hundred grams saving to be found there. Could also explore the Pace route as I gather they come in about 1500g too. Need to be 24” wheel friendly so disc brake mounting is ideal. Hmmmm.
Looking at the above, weight matters. Just by switching a few parts out I have saved nearly half a kilo for zero spend, and can save a dollop more by looking carefully at forks. I think I will keep a keen eye on weight, not going crazy but it will be a consideration. The Boys’ build he chose a chunky frame and his emphasis was all about bulletproof so it came out a bit on the heavy side, I mean we didn't even consider weight. This one I fancy being a bit more careful with.
