Seat height vs bar height?

[staceysue]

Lovely Lexi and Edith



Close-up of Lexi's stem

[Cataboo]

staceysue,

You can probably flip that stem over.... Or you have a lot of spacer rings underneath your stem.... If you take the stem off, take out some of those spacer rings, put the stem back on... then put the spacer rings on top of it - you can drop the handlebars... but you're then going to have a bump sticking out right there... which is not ideal if you're bending over into your aerobars. But it will let you try out various positions to see what you like.

so if you do want your handlebar dropped long term, you can get your fork cut or shortened so that it doesn't stick up so high.

Pretty pretty bikes. Lexie's handlebars seem to be rotated upwards with the shifters tilting back towards you... if you loosen the connection at the handlebar to the stem, you can let them drop a bit so that they're more level and then the drops will probably feel more natural to you. (you'll probably have to rotate the aerobars level as well when you do that.)

If you decide to shift the stem around... make sure to tighten it back up in the right order. tighten the bolt up at the top of your fork first - then tighten the 2 bolts on the side of the fork... And after tightening everything, stick the front wheel of your bike between your legs and grab the handlebar and try to steer it.... if you don't have it tight enough, the handlebar will move independently of the wheel and that's really bad if you're biking.

[staceysue]

Thanks, Catriona! I really appreciate your help. Maybe some time I'll get somebody to take a picture of me riding it and you can give me even more great tips!

I've enjoyed riding so much already - I hope I don't get everything so out of whack that it won't be fun anymore. But I do want to ride in a better position so I'll give it a whirl. If I get it all out of whack I'll head on in to the bike shop.

[Cataboo]

Just make small changes one at a time, ride with it and see how it goes...

That way you can always undo whatever you did if you don't like that. If you develop pain or anything like that, consider getting a fitting done.

[staceysue]

Thanks!

Hey - by the way - I was just looking at the picture of the bike in BikePedia: http://www.bikepedia.com/QuickBike/B...%27s&Type=bike and the picture I posted above, and it looks like different wheels? Mine have fewer spokes.

[jusdooit]

Mine have fewer spokes.

The bike on wikipedia has single spokes, your bike has paired spokes. Overall count should be about the same.

+1 on rotating the bar down. And the stem is definitely in a positive position and can be flipped. It may say on the stem +/- the number of degrees. Looks like maybe 7%.

Forgot to add that changes to the bar and/or stem may require adjustments to seat position.

[OakLeaf]

Just make small changes one at a time, ride with it and see how it goes...

That way you can always undo whatever you did if you don't like that. If you develop pain or anything like that, consider getting a fitting done.

+1

And +1 on the bars being rotated oddly, but maybe you did that to bring the shifters closer to you? Which means that if you want to put the shifters where they're comfortable and have the bars rotated so that you can ride in the drops, you'll need to re-tape the bars anyway.

The good news about that is that you only need to re-tape above the shifters. I just did it myself, in fact. Before you unwrap the handlebars, put masking tape just below the shifters - low enough so that you'll be able to re-position the bit of tape right against the clamp, but high enough so that it holds the tape in place and you're not unwrapping any more than you have to. The hardest part to tape is the ergo bump, and you won't have to do that if you don't unwrap them.

[staceysue]

+1

And +1 on the bars being rotated oddly, but maybe you did that to bring the shifters closer to you? Which means that if you want to put the shifters where they're comfortable and have the bars rotated so that you can ride in the drops, you'll need to re-tape the bars anyway.

The good news about that is that you only need to re-tape above the shifters. I just did it myself, in fact. Before you unwrap the handlebars, put masking tape just below the shifters - low enough so that you'll be able to re-position the bit of tape right against the clamp, but high enough so that it holds the tape in place and you're not unwrapping any more than you have to. The hardest part to tape is the ergo bump, and you won't have to do that if you don't unwrap them.

I bought it used and the handlebars/shifters came like that. I do really like where the shifters are.

So - do I need more handlebar tape before I start this mess? The shifters are on top of the tape . . . .

I'm getting a little intimidated by this whole process. I am seeing myself sitting there surrounded by tape and handlebars and pieces, not knowing where everything's got to go . . .

[Becky]

I bought it used and the handlebars/shifters came like that. I do really like where the shifters are.

So - do I need more handlebar tape before I start this mess? The shifters are on top of the tape . . . .

I'm getting a little intimidated by this whole process. I am seeing myself sitting there surrounded by tape and handlebars and pieces, not knowing where everything's got to go . . .

Check out these instructions: http://www.parktool.com/repair/readhowto.asp?id=71 They show you how to wrap a bar from scratch. You'll only be doing it from, at worst, just below the shifter lever.

Then again, if you like where the shifters are, don't mess with them. Start with some of the other tweaks and see if they make things better.

[Cataboo]

Where those shifters are looks like it probably bends your wrist/hand back towards you - which is a recipe for developing pain or numbness... you want to try to keep your wrist in a neutral position while riding.

Try just swivelling the handlebars down and seeing how you like the position of the shifters first... you just have to loosen the bolts lightly and it should rotate.... if it doesn't work for you, then you might want to retape things... but if you're careful when you unravel the handlebar tape that is on there, you won't need new handlebar tape. just pay attention to how it's wrapped, have some electrical tape to retape it at the ends afterwards...

to loosen the shifters so you can move them, pull that rubber hood thing at the top back towards the handlebar, and it'll expose a bolt head on the outside of the shifter... loose then, the shifter'll slide to whereever you want, then tighten it back up and then retape.

Your wheels do look different, definitely less spokes - but that's not a bad thing... more performance type wheels typically have less spokes because it makes the wheel lighter. it does make the wheel not quite as strong - so if you're very heavy that might be bad when hitting a bump.

I'm not sure if bikepedia is entirely accurate on their archives of lemond bikes... I've looked up a few lemond bikes I've seen on craigslist, and the pics/descriptions usually don't match the listings and what I see on forums when I google... but since trek took the lemond archives down, bikepedia's all there is.

[Becky]

+1 to everything that Catriona said. The position of your bars looks a little awkward to me, but that's easily fixed.

I might even think about moving the shifters themselves down, but that requires untaping the bars partway and retaping them.

Take all of this with a grain of salt- I sometimes have trouble judging these things from pictures.

ETA: You might want to see if the shop would help you make some adjustments. It's sometimes easier to have someone else tweak things while you're riding the bike in a trainer.