better handlebar

Trigger warning: deep bike geekiness ahead.

A couple of weeks ago, I posted about my dissatisfaction with the bars on the Yellow Maserati, my titanium bike. The connection between the bar and the stem was no longer holding: when I would hit a bump, the angle of the bars would change. I'd put in an aluminum shim, but the shim had deformed, and was no longer doing the job. The section of the bars that was to be clamped into the stem is sharply corrugated, possibly on the theory that the sharp edges would catch in the metal of the stem... but both are aluminum, and, after about ten years of use, it just wasn't holding.

In a similar situation on another bike, I'd successfully used carbon paste. Originally formulated to provide extra "sticktion" because carbon fiber components can't be torqued as highly with the wrenches as metal components, it's also found use (by other mechanics as well as me) in holding aluminum components in place. But it requires surfaces with considerable surface contact; the sharply-corrugated section in the bars I had meant that the carbon paste would probably be wasted.

So I'd thought of abandoning years of noisy retrogrouchiness and "I don't ride no plastic bikes", and getting a carbon fiber handlebar (see the post to which I linked above). I was especially taken with the flat upper part of the bars; people who ride them say they are very comfortable. But then...

I use cross-top brake levers; they mount on the tops of the drop bars and allow me to engage the brakes from the tops as well as the hoods or drops. And I have a Crane Suzu Bell mounted; it's a beautiful thing, and the sound has sustain like a Telecaster. And I can't mount those on the flat-top carbon handlebar.

So I was back to looking for a round, aluminum bar. I've got the Nitto 115 on the Krakow Monster, and I really like it... but the only one you can get now is extra-wide. I looked at the Nitto 176... it's similar to the 115, with the almost-parallel tops and drops, similar depth, and so on...

But then Rickety G gave me a Cinelli bar that he had thought to put on his purple bike, but the mount area was too big around for his stem. But it fits MY stem, and the interface is flat enough to use the carbon paste. The area behind where the hoods go is slanted down, not parallel to the bottom drops, but it's very short... maybe it can work. It WOULD save me $59 plus shipping!

So I spent some of this afternoon, after my Sunday ride (I'll prolly blog about that, too) mounting 'em up.

Above, the bike is hanging by the front wheel. I haven't wrapped the bars yet, and I have some bar wrap that was an unfortunate purchase that I'm willing to sacrifice in case I need to make changes later.

Above, you can see the smooth section  of the bar where the clamp reveals. On the back, I put the carbon paste. 

Because of the unfortunate angle of the photo, the stem cap is at the bottom. I moved a 1cm spacer from below the stem to above it, "slamming" the stem down by a centimeter. Because of the shortness of the section behind the hoods, I was able to do that; I'll be out of the wind a little more, even when I'm riding in my most upright position with my hands on the bars. (I've ridden it around the local streets, and I'm not crippled, so it's apparently OK!)

The shorter distances on the bars meant that I had to adjust the cable and housing lengths, and that's all done. It just needs bar wrap.

But the Maserati looks kinda cool without the bar wrap. I wouldn't do a long ride with naked bars (my hands would hurt too much), but I may be a bit slow to get the wrap on. (That wrap really was an unfortunate purchase.)

Let's see how it feels for a while.