Analog Cycles w(Right) Stem write up. Why use one? Super short stems, made in the US.

[analog...@gmail.com]

Hey Gang, James from Analog Cycles, formerly the Co-Owner at Gravel & Grind here.  We have some interesting projects in the works that are probably of some interest to this group.  Hope you'll take the time to check them out.  Also: for right now, we're the DC area Rivendell and Crust dealer.  Wanna get a Riv or Crust?  We'll set you up.   In late spring, we're moving Analog to Vermont, but we're in Frederick for a few more months!

We have a new entry up on the Analog journal: w(Right) Stem Write Up which details our recent super short stem project

It's about super short reach stems, the benefits, the history and the future.  We've been riding the prototypes for a while, but they're about to go into low scale production.  Check it out when ya get a sec. 

Best,  James

[David Parsons]

Do you have any photos of just the stem?

Off the top of my head, the only thing "wrong" with a super-short stem is that you'd reduce steering leverage by pulling the bars back.   You can get around that by wider bars, but some people (waves hand) prefer narrower bars.

[Andy Beichler]

I am intrigued by this.  I hope you keep exploring this idea.  

[Chad Kirby]

We short-torsoed cyclists appreciate the effort. Good luck!

[Mark Bulgier]

I made a couple of zero-extension stems like in your picture, about 30 years ago.  One was for my wife's MTB-XC racing bike in the '80s.  Not at all a cruising position, it was a full on racing position and she won a couple races on it.  Drop bars of course.

It looked like yours except a bit shorter, and single bolt -- not removable face plate.  It clamped to a stub of 7/8" tube that was silver brazed into the top of the 1" threaded steerer.  (I didn't invent that -- French constructeurs did that as far back as the '30s, I think.)  Lighter than a quill stem.

The zero extension stem allowed the front wheel to be placed further in front for confident descending.  The steep seat tube angle emphasized seated climbing.  Ideas that I hear are getting more adherents these days, though at the time most people just thought her bike was weird.  Of course a lot of people called it a cyclocross bike just because of the drop bars and skinny (road Prestige) frame tubes – 1" TT, road bike fork blades etc.  They didn't realize that it was so much better (and lighter) than the standard MTBs the other ladies were riding that it was practically unfair.  We called it her Secret Weapon.

Mark Bulgier

Seattle

[Bill M.]

Pacenti P-Dent

Bill

Stockton, CA

On Tuesday, February 27, 2018 at 8:29:20 PM UTC-8, analog...@gmail.com wrote:

[David Parsons]

On Wednesday, February 28, 2018 at 5:03:35 PM UTC-8, Bill M. wrote:

Pacenti P-Dent

The P-Dent is really a solution in search of a problem, given that handlebars can be designed to curve forwards or backwards around a minimum-length stem.

[Mark Guglielmana]

Mark,

I built a bike for gravel riding, and have thought often that instead of a 12cm stem, I should have built it at least 6cm longer with a corresponding shorter stem. That'll be on my mind until I build my next frame...

[satanas]

^ So Mark, how long a front centre are you talking about? And how tall are you?

I was thinking of going from a 120mm stem down to 90mm, which would give a front centre of ~625mm, just enough to avoid overlap with fenders and not feel scary off-road (for me at ~180cm).

FWIW, in the past I've found a really long front centre tends to result in the front tyre washing out on looser surfaces unless it's weighted deliberately and/or fairly seriously knobby.

Thanks,
Stephen

[Mark Bulgier]

Stephen/satanas wrote:

^ So Mark, how long a front centre are you talking about? And how tall are you?

I never made a frame like that for me.

Laurie's, the one I was talkng about, was not what most people would call a long F-C because she needed a fairly short reach to the bars.  TCO was an issue even with 26" wheels in a standard design, unless the HTA was made very shallow.  I don't like shallow HTA.

My own MTBs were influenced by tight twisty singletrack.  I was into Observed Trials even before I started racing MTB, and my first custom MTB in 1980 or '81 was a mountain-trials hybrid with a very short wheelbase, high bottom bracket and steep head angle.  Not good for high speed downhilling!  The MTB I had before that was a 1933 Excelsior, with stretch-limo wheelbase.  The main thing I wanted in my first custom was to not be anything like that Excelsior.

So anyway, what I'm talking about is a moderately longer front center combined with a moderately steep STA, to keep some weight on the front wheel.

-Mark 

[Stephen Poole]

Thanks Mark. I had MTBs like the first and second ones you described (as my #1 & #2), and decided something in the middle was better for me; #1 was at least good on downhills, #2 (influenced by a John Olsen piece in Bike Tech) wasn't too great anywhere. 

However, my question was actually aimed at Mark G; I will try to remember to specify Witch Mark in future.  ;-)

Later,

Stephen

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[Mark Bulgier]

Stephen wrote:

> my question was actually aimed at Mark G; I will try to remember to specify Witch Mark in future.  ;-)

Ha ha, I of course think everything is about me.

My first custom, the mountain-trials hybrid, was also influenced by John Olsen.  I rode with him a lot on my Excelsior, him on a modified Kos Cruiser (26" wheel BMX), and I entered the Trials meets he ran -- yes Trials on a 1933 klunker with a mile-long wheelbase, vintage drum brakes, and about 40 lb too much weight.  Worst Trials bike ever.

John, for those who don't know, besides designing Trials bikes for himself, also designed the first Cannondale MTB and the first Raleigh MTB (the "Edge"), both of which were mountain-trials hybrids with 24" rear wheels for a shorter chainstay.  He later was an editor and "Uncle Knobby" for Bicycling Magazine.

My '81 custom had  26" wheels front and rear but a shorter chainstay than the Cannondale or the Raleigh, due to clever* manipulation of the chainstay shape in the tire/chainring clearance area.

*no humblebrags from me -- just regular bragging.

That bike was awesome for riding over giant fallen trees, picnic tables and small cars.  It finally died by wrinkling the TT/DT while trying an impossible section of "trail", more like riding off a cliff.  It was John Olsen who bent my frame -- he borrowed my bike to try that section after he bent his bike trying it.  How could I possibly have seen that coming?  ;)  I didn't mind, I was almost done with custom #2 by then ('84), the XC-racer, that still had very short chainstays and a high bottom bracket (i.e. still influenced by John Olsen, and Trials).

To this day I loathe hitting a pedal on the ground or rocks/logs, and think most MTBs have a BB that's too low.

-Mark

[Mark Guglielmana]

Mark, Mark,

There's a joke that involves a dog there somewhere.

I'm 6'2" Well, I used to be 6'2", but I'm older, and a bit shorter, and can't bend over as much as I used to ;-)

I'm not sure about the front center dimension. I do know I used to ride racing bikes with longer top tubes, typically 59cm, along with 14cm stems (I have a long torso). What Mssr. Bulgier is something I'd consider building. Since I don't ride like a racer anymore (some who know me well would argue I never did!) a longer, more comfortable ride that's easy to control out on the gravel is on my mind.

Am I turning into Grant Petersen?

[analog...@gmail.com]

https://www.bikeradar.com/us/road/gear/article/analog-cycles-0-30mm-stem-51838/   Pics here, David.   I ride with Nitto dirt drops, which are about 37cm ctc at the hoods.  Handling is great, even at speed carving down a mtn with a winter touring load.  Candice rides a flexy XO1, and she rides the 0 stem (I ride a 30) and same thing: more stable than say, alba bars with a 100mm, at speed with a load or without a load.  Bike handlebars as levers are I think more complicated than I originally thought.  If narrow bars didn't work well with 0 or 30mm stems, then the bike designers at the turn of the last century would have either put longer stems on or made wider bars, etc.  It's hard to get one's head around.  I was taught, by professional bike builders and fitters, that the shortest stem one could safely ride was 80mm.  It's etched in our mind that longer is more stable, longer lever, etc.  Anyway, that's been our experience on this thing.

-james

[analog...@gmail.com]

Bill, the Pacenti  stem is an interesting enduro mtn bike stem, for sure.  We're working on a threadless, steel, removable faceplate 0mm and 30mm stem that should be out closer to summer, but it will be more gearing toward bike packing and touring, not Enduro bikes.

[mitch....@gmail.com]

James at Analog, it may help to think of bike design as having many places where you can increase stability and many places you can decrease stability. You don't want a bike that's too stable because then it's harder to initiate turning and can feel less responsive. You don't want a bike that's too easy to turn, too responsive, because it may not feel stable enough for steady confident riding. So there's a balance you choose. Most bike designs I'm familiar with have reserves of both stability and responsiveness. So there's a wide sweet spot as you choose your preferred balance. This means you can make a change that makes a bike more stable and it's still responsive enough. Or a change that makes it quicker turning, more responsive, and it's still stable enough. This is why, I think, professional bike builders/fitters may have taught you that 8cm was the shortest stem you could safely ride. Not only might they have been working perhaps on tradition and received knowledge as you say (and which can be incorrect), but they may have been working with a certain responsiveness feel of a quick handling bike and they didn't like (or had seen their customers not like) a "too short" stem on a bike that didn't have enough reserve of stability for that stem. A better way to describe it might be the reverse--they may have been familiar with and have a preference for, the tiller effect you get with a fairly long stem (I'm familiar too, and like this handling), and so they wanted their customers to have this good trait too (moderate tiller stability) and had judged that 8cm stem was the minimum required. Probably it's no coincidence 8cm was the shortest stem Cinelli offered. Now as you experiment with much shorter stems and still find plenty of stability and responsiveness, you're showing there was a much wider reserve of stability and responsiveness than you'd been taught (and the results are well within your preferences and habituation). 

P.S.

Preference and habituation may make up a larger difference in handling than the bike geometry itself. Maybe it's mainly outliers, but this 650B google group includes, for example, people who prefer to ride low trail because it keeps them from veering across the road suddenly and others who abandon low trail because they believe it caused them to veer across the road suddenly. That range of difference can't be accounted for by the bike geometry. That range has to be explained by preference/habituation or other rider factors. 

P.P.S.

James, I can't remember from your Analog description whether you'd ridden these short stems mostly with high trail bikes (say 62mm and above) or whether you also ride them with mid-trail bikes (~ 56mm)? I think the XO1 mentioned is a high trail bike(?). 

--Mitch

[Stephen Poole]

On 12 Mar 2018 6:40 am, <mitch....@gmail.com> wrote:

[snip] Probably it's no coincidence 8cm was the shortest stem Cinelli offered.

^ A point of order: Cinelli made the 1/A stem in 70mm; we sold a few to people on small frames. It's true the shortest 1/R was longer, IIRC 95mm, but Cinelli stems back then (late 1970s/early 1980s) were intended for racers only. Most bikes we sold to women (UJBs at the time) were fitted with the shortest stems we could get, 60mm SRs, whether they had drop bars or flats; with drops they were usually still too long.

It's true that for trad road bikes the normal stem range was ~100-120mm; shorter than this was unusual for males, with 130-140mm stems regarded as odd (unless you had long arms, like me). Shorter stems on males' *road* bikes implied something was out of the norm, i.e., a very short rider on a ~19" frame (usually the smallest possible with lugs and a level top tube); with 27"/700c wheels the top tube length was constrained by TCO considerations.

Now that most frames are lugless, and other wheel sizes have become more acceptable (to most others except road racers) there's IMHO no reason to tolerate poor fit(!). Women and shorter males *should* find it much easier to be comfortable, once the remaining bike fit dinosaurs have joined their brethren in extinction.

Later,

Stephen (who's used stems from 60-190mm, but mostly 100-120mm)

[mitch....@gmail.com]

On Sunday, March 11, 2018 at 5:55:58 PM UTC-6, satanas wrote:

On 12 Mar 2018 6:40 am, <mitch....@gmail.com> wrote:

[snip] Probably it's no coincidence 8cm was the shortest stem Cinelli offered.

^ A point of order: Cinelli made the 1/A stem in 70mm; we sold a few to people on small frames. It's true the shortest 1/R was longer, IIRC 95mm, but Cinelli stems back then (late 1970s/early 1980s) were intended for racers only. Most bikes we sold to women (UJBs at the time) were fitted with the shortest stems we could get, 60mm SRs, whether they had drop bars or flats; with drops they were usually still too long.

You're right, I forgot the 1A came in 7cm and I have a 7cm 1A in the drawer somewhere.  

--Mitch