I have noticed differences. I set my Trek 610 with it's modified high-trail (58 mm trail, 28 mm 700c Gators) fork with a front rack and tested riding it with about 10# up front. It was controllable and rideable for 30 milers, but only with two hands firmly on the bars. One handed it was sketchy (tending to shudder) and no-handed was impossible. I could ride it at low speeds, but lost control once at low speed, too. The bike rides with perfect alignment with no added front stuff.
I put the same wheels and load on my former Woodrup with about 45 mm trail. It was a lot better one handed, possible to ride no-handed, but still some tendency to shimmy. I can definitely say I think reducing trail makes a positive difference in front loads. The wheel base of the Woodrup is 2 cm longer than the Trek, and its drop is 1 cm less. I now have a custom 65 mm fork on the Trek, which gives a trail of 39 mm with the Gator wheels. Only problem yet is that I haven't gotten a rack on it, so I can't test it out with a load yet. Since I got it back, rain got in my way, as did saddle issues, fitting big fenders with 32s, revising the alignment and dish of the rear wheel (it was never right! Grrr), and sorting out front wheel braking (settled on Mafac with red KoolStops). The new fork is waayyy longer than the old one. The Mafac pad posiiton is maxed out. Now the bike again rides like a bike, so I'm back to selecting a rack, bag, and decaleur. I also now have a mid-trail 1983 Trek 620 (55 mm fork rake, 73 degree angle, 684 diameter) which sports 47 mm trail and a normal 7.2 cm drop. We'll see how it handles sometime in the Spring. On Sat, Nov 19, 2011 at 7:00 PM, William <[email protected]> wrote: > My A. Homer Hilsen is a 58cm with 650B wheels. According to the Riv Geo > charts that bike has a 71 degree headtube angle and 49mm of rake. That > calculates out to 63mm of trail and 19mm of flop with my 38mm tires. I > only run it with a handlebar bag. The Marks rack weighs about a pound and > the empty handlebar bag weighs maybe closer to 2 pounds. I've probably had > as much as 15 pounds of total stuff in it. When I park the bike the front > wheel wants to flop over BIG TIME, but riding at any speed I can't imagine > a bike being much more stable. Climbing a steep hill at 8km/hr it goes in > a straight line perfectly well. Descending at up to 80km/hr I've been > confident and shimmy free. Riding no handed is no problem. I've never > ridden this bike with a rear rack at all, but I have one for if and when I > need to carry more stuff for a 600k. I'm also setting up a low-trail bike > this winter, so I'll probably have some kind of Pillsbury bake off to see > if there is a noticeable difference. It's got 36mm of trail and 10mm of > flop with the same tires that I run on the Homer. > > -- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > "RBW Owners Bunch" group. > To view this discussion on the web visit > https://groups.google.com/d/msg/rbw-owners-bunch/-/EnUdXkB6MmQJ. > > To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. > To unsubscribe from this group, send email to > [email protected]. > For more options, visit this group at > http://groups.google.com/group/rbw-owners-bunch?hl=en. > -- Ken Freeman Ann Arbor, MI USA -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "RBW Owners Bunch" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected]. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/rbw-owners-bunch?hl=en.
