Help! I HATE my aero seatpost!

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Just as the title says...I cannot stand the teardrop-shaped carbon aero seatpost on my Cannondale Synapse... I just want it OFF my bike for good! It is the most ridiculous design I have ever encountered. I thought the aero seatpost on my Cervelo sucked, but this one really takes the cake. Making any kind of angle/tilt adjustment is nearly impossible with this seatpost and clamping system that Cannondale uses. You literally have to hammer off these 2 black "caps" that are on each side of the post. These "caps" are what the seat rails sit in...but you have to take each one off individually and then turn them to the desired angle/tilt...making sure that they are perfectly even with each other, and then pound them back on...praying that neither one moves!! It is an utterly stupid design...whoever came up with that one, ought to be FIRED! My poor DH has been trying all afternoon to level my Toupe saddle, which is pointing slightly nose-down...but has been unsuccessful because of this ridiculous seat post and clamping system. There HAS to be a better solution out there. I've been Googling "carbon aero seatposts" all afternoon, but I have no idea if it is even possible to just swap out an aero seatpost such as mine. With the seat tube being teardrop-shaped, I am assuming that a round seattube would not work...am I correct? Can anyone offer any suggestions on a replacement seatpost? Cuz I have no clue what I should be looking for. For what it's worth...this seatpost has the "pointy" part of the teardrop facing the rear. I know that some are reverse of this (like Cervelo), so that wouldn't work in my case. Please help...as I am about to pull my hair out over this.

Thanks!

Linda

[nscrbug]

Oooh..thank you! I wish I knew the size of the seatpost...but like you, I found nothing on their site, nor in my owner's manual regarding the diameter. I suppose I could just measure it, but I'm not sure how a teardrop-shaped seatpost is even measured. I'm assuming it would be at the widest point?

I'm stopping at my dealer with my bike tomorrow, and will show them a pic of that seatpost you linked to and see what they say about it.

Linda

ETA - after looking more closely at those seatposts on the PBK website...I'm not entirely sure that those are teardrop-shaped...so I don't think they will work with my set-up.

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http://www.cannondale.com/usa/usaeng...plement_en.pdf

If you scroll down to the part titled "Saddle Clamp Assembly", you'll find a detailed description of the clamping system on my Synapse. And yes, it is the white/silver one. Indeed, it is a beautiful bike...but I've had a few annoying issues with it...unfortunately. Something in my headset/fork area makes a constant "creaking" noise. I've already had the bike back at the dealer for this. They tore down the entire fork and reassembled it. The mechanic ended up removing 1 spacer, saying that the creaking stopped immediately after he removed it. Well...guess what? That only lasted for about a week, and the creaking noise came back with a vengeance. My DH tore apart the headset and re-greased everything. No creaking...for about a week...then it came back AGAIN. I cannot tell you how frustrating it has been. We rode 85 miles today, and all I heard the entire time was - creak, creak, creak....I wanted to scream!!! The bike is going back tomorrow and I am demanding that they fix that creak PERMANENTLY.

ACK...sorry I got off topic there for a moment. I'll try and get some actual pics of my seatpost and clamp, posted here tomorrow.

Linda

[HillSlugger]

I have at least one seat post that looks like it has a very similar tilt adjustment but I haven't encountered your problem. I just loosen the bolt, tilt the seat to the right angle, and tighten the bolt back.

Maybe if you brought it to the shop and asked them how to make an adjustment there's a trick they can show you.

[nscrbug]

Nope...no trick to it, unfortunately. We already brought it back and asked and was told the only way to adjust the tilt angle is to pry those inner clamps off, turn to the desired angle, and then pound them back on. I cringed everytime I heard that pounding against that carbon seatpost....can't be a good thing.

[nscrbug]

Do you know if the seatpost is a one-of-a-kind design?

Perhaps you need to contact Cannondale and ask them if they can get you a seatpost with a different clamp design. Or, can you have one made? Does anyone make carbon seatposts?

Maybe these guys, or similar?

http://www.calfeedesign.com/

Hmm.

Gosh, I honestly have no idea on that. I was just on Cannondale's site and it appears that ALL Carbon Synapse bikes have the same seatpost (teardrop-shaped) that is on mine. The 2 non-carbon Synapse models, have a different seatpost (round). I also checked out the SuperSix and Six models, and all of those have round seatposts as well. The Slice (TT bike), uses an aero seatpost...but the design is altogether different from the one that is used on the Synapse.

I wonder why Cannondale decided to use an aero seatpost design on a plush-geometry bike? Kind of doesn't make much sense to me. I mean, the rest of the bike isn't really "aero", so why not just use a normal round seatpost? Maybe I need to go work for Cannondale so I could give them my input.