salem
04-22-2011, 06:10 PM
I'd been thinking of trying to roll my rain, winter, rough road, and touring bikes into one. I came up with the following rough criteria.
-Non-rusting metal frame (Ti or Al)
-700c
-roughly 440mm chainstays
-down tube shifter mounts (this is a must have)
-disc brakes and clearance for 38c tires
-58cm TT (for a 73 seat angle) for a size I can clear with 34" inseam.
I was pretty sure that was a tall order, but then I found the Portland, which except for slightly shorter stays, matches well. Problem is, it seems ridiculously overpriced at almost $600 more than Trek's road bike that shares the Tiagra group, and still $350 more than the 105 bike with equivalent black series frame. This may be simply a case of production numbers for a niche bike, but seems hard to justify. It's a high enough price to make a custom Ti frame look appealing for just a bit more.
Can anyone think of any other bikes that meet the all criteria above? If I drop the disk brakes (the easiest item to give up), that would open up a lot of used options, but I'm curious if there is another exact match. The down tube shifter mounts are the hard item to find, but I'd been swapping to a flat bar with interior mounted bar "ends" for touring, so not having to muss with shift cables is key.
Out of production used suggestions are very welcome too.
Thank you.
-Non-rusting metal frame (Ti or Al)
-700c
-roughly 440mm chainstays
-down tube shifter mounts (this is a must have)
-disc brakes and clearance for 38c tires
-58cm TT (for a 73 seat angle) for a size I can clear with 34" inseam.
I was pretty sure that was a tall order, but then I found the Portland, which except for slightly shorter stays, matches well. Problem is, it seems ridiculously overpriced at almost $600 more than Trek's road bike that shares the Tiagra group, and still $350 more than the 105 bike with equivalent black series frame. This may be simply a case of production numbers for a niche bike, but seems hard to justify. It's a high enough price to make a custom Ti frame look appealing for just a bit more.
Can anyone think of any other bikes that meet the all criteria above? If I drop the disk brakes (the easiest item to give up), that would open up a lot of used options, but I'm curious if there is another exact match. The down tube shifter mounts are the hard item to find, but I'd been swapping to a flat bar with interior mounted bar "ends" for touring, so not having to muss with shift cables is key.
Out of production used suggestions are very welcome too.
Thank you.