Comparing bike fit setups
I have a few bikes in the ol' bike garage, and I like to ride all of them. I try to keep them all set up with the same fit measurements to make going from one to the other an easy transition.
The weekend, I went on a long hilly ride on my rain bike. It kind of felt weird, but I quickly adapted. Yesterday, I went for a spin on my road bike, and it felt very different, and in a good way.
So while the kids and I were outside enjoying the sun yesterday, I set up the camera on a tripod, and took a side view photo of each bike. I then brought those photos into a photo editing program to compare them.
I found most bikes were set up well, but the rain bike was way off. Here's the road bike. I marked the intersection of the bottom bracket, the top/front of the saddle, and the top/center of the handlebars:
The guides are probably pretty hard to see in the preview pictures, so click them to see a bigger shot.
Here's the rain bike, with a new set of guides for comparison:
The saddle height a bit low, and WAY further back. I don't know how this happened, but it did. I had to adjust that, and I also tried to get the bars set up as close to my road bike as possible. So after a few adjustments, we're close enough:
My cyclocross bike was set up exactly as I assumed it was - same saddle position, but with the handlebars a centimeter or so shorter reach and higher up (I made no adjustments):
So it's certainly doable to get your bikes set up the same by measuring your saddle position and handlebar position relative to the bottom bracket. But if something is just not right, this photo trick might help out.
If I do this again, I'll tape something against the background that is a known length (e.g. 10cm), so I know exactly how much to adjust something.
wicked easy to compare distances and what not (and it is completely free). That and using it makes you feel like you are running an old 512k Mac, except the software is as functional and powerful (and easier to use) than most current $5000-$7000 image analysis software packages (Metamorph and ImagePro)...