New bike day

[sjbraun]

This morning we took delivery on a New tandem, a Co-Motion Steelhead. After twenty years, we decided it was time to retire our Santana. The new bike is a celebration of our retirements. The Steelhead is a new model, more or less an all road tandem. It will fit 45mm tires, but zips along nicely with 28s. It was fitting that our first ride on an Oregon made tandem was done in the rain.

[AngryScientist]

beautiful bike sj, and congratulations on your retirements. may you have many happy miles ahead of you!

[cgolvin]

Congrats indeed.

Makes me curious what tandem gravel grinding is like…would love to be educated (though maybe you need time to put some gravel miles down first?).

[oldfatslow]

Saw your other post on your Di2 issue and came to find this pic of the your Steelhead. My wife and I have a Cannondale mountain tandem we built up with drop bars and Ultegra a few years ago. Pretty badass bike for which we have two sets of wheels (one 29r with 2.1" tires and one 700c with more reasonable 32mm tires). We can catch a pedal if we hard corner on the 700c wheels but we enjoy the one bike to ride both road and gravel. Really fun bike.

How are you enjoying your Steelhead? We have a Speedster which has been an amazing bike (we keep it at our weekend house where it still gets ridden).

Has the Di2 been pretty clean on the tandem (ignoring this most recent issue)?

Also, are you running hydraulic brakes (we built ours a couple of years ago and went with TRP Spyres).

[Blue Jays]

Enjoy! Hope the first month or two have been terrific on the new tandem.

[Mzilliox]

i like anything called a steelhead. how fun.

[vqdriver]

that's awesome
let's see some build specs and more pics!

obviously you tandem more than me, thoughts on a suspension post for the rear?

[sjbraun]

In spite of the rd issues written about elsewhere, the bike is a blast to ride. It’s much smoother over rough pavement, quicker, and lighter than the 20+ year old Santana it replaced. My stoker says she has no need for a suspension seatpost. It’s back to the shop next week for a thorough review. Once we get the assembly issues resolved, all will be well.

[joosttx]

Yes sir. Good looking color

[pdmtong]

Co-motion for road is where it is at.

Santana had its day but that day has long since past. Chapeau to them for creating a rising tide but their bikes never kept up.

If you want x2 on technical single track - Ventana is the answer.

[oldfatslow]

that's awesome
let's see some build specs and more pics!

obviously you tandem more than me, thoughts on a suspension post for the rear?

My wife has never been a fan of suspension posts as a stoker. She felt it robbed her of some power without really improving the ride.

YMMV.

[PaMtbRider]

Beautiful tandem. Any updates on how it is working for you? We previously had a Cannondale, followed by a steel coupled Co-motion. It's been 7 years since we sold the Co-motion and are getting the itch again.

[pooneej]

Every time I visit Tandems East I am in awe of some of the bikes there. Last time I went was a few years ago - he built up my current road rig (not a tandem) - he had a Calfee tandem. !!

[pooneej]

oh yeah and that is one killer looking tandem. enjoy!

[theboucher]

super cool. always on the hunt for a cool one to replace the davidson we used to own!

[buddybikes]

Does the lack of a lateral tube make it more flexy or with tubing size changes that all goes away?

[PaMtbRider]

Every time I visit Tandems East I am in awe of some of the bikes there. Last time I went was a few years ago - he built up my current road rig (not a tandem) - he had a Calfee tandem. !!

We bought both of our tandems from Mel. I also have a Co-motion Nor'wester with couplers I got from him. They no longer are selling Calfee tandems and are now dealing with John Slawta at Landshark for carbon tandems.

[pooneej]

We bought both of our tandems from Mel. I also have a Co-motion Nor'wester with couplers I got from him. They no longer are selling Calfee tandems and are now dealing with John Slawta at Landshark for carbon tandems.

I just reached out to him for another build I want to do. I'm very local to him and go back a bit.
His shop is really very impressive. So non descript. 15 years ago when he did one of my first builds I was in awe. Still am but you just dont expect that at all at first glance !