Tech Tuesday - Cane Creek Angleset Installation

 well a lot of people are incapable of setting up suspension properly so they end up bashing a perfectly good fork/bike/shock, but yeah, these angle sets sure do add a bigger margin for error.

 I think about it this way: you go to the surgeon with a terribly injured knee - he does what he does, eventualy your knee does not come out that well, ayou go for rehabs, finaly you meet some other doc that tells you: well the first guy screwed up a bit, if you came to me it would have been better. He should have done this and that. So you are really angry at the first doc.

Now consider the 2nd situation: you come to the first doc and he tells you: you have these and these options, I know this and this guy, they can do this and this thing better than me but I'm not sure if they are that good in other things. You have to take a decision - it's your knee! So a chance that you might end up as screwed up as in first situation are high - your knee is really bad after all. The difference is, it is you blaming yourself for a long time (probably for the rest of your life whenever it hurts or limits something you want to do, like biking?) and thinking what could you have done better. Questions about options you were never able to check. At the end of the day, you couldn't do anything, your knee would never be back to normal, it was pure chance whether your knee ended up better or worse. And if it is someone elses fault, it's way easier to get on with it.

As an ultimate example why it is not good to have an opportunity to adjust bikes geo, and trust designers, please see this:
www.pinkbike.com/photo/6018569

 Im torn on these. On the one hand I think that the fact they exist is awesome. There are more than a few "confused" frame designs out there that could benefit from a tweak in head angle to suit your particular need.

On the other hand, I think to some degree people are on this quest to rake out the front of the bike beyond what might be for the best. There is something to be said for the engineers and racers and designers that put alot of R&D into these designs. Take the Demo featured here. These bikes are dialed, Specialzed is one of those brands that really knows what they are doing and there is alot of things that go into choosing the angles that you may not fully understand. A simple example would be the fact that these published angles are static. As the bike sits, things change once underway- sag, for example affects your head angle once you start down the mountain. All that aside- the Demo is 64 degrees in its "low setting" .........you put of these in and take it out to 62.5? Thats really slack, I would think it would make the bike completely lethargic. Now, keep in mind, ive not ridden a Demo at all, and I have not tried a angleset, this is all purely thought aloud for discussion, but the point Im making is to be careful with these things especially if you are not the most experianced of riders. Slacker isnt always better.

 Pretty pointless tech tuesday in my opinion. I mean most of us don't have a headset press. And if I had to take it to the shop anyway to get the cups pressed in, then I would just let the shop install the whole thing.....

 I don't want anyone to take the wrong impression of what I meant - I'm not into any conspiracy theory that industry is throwing another thing at us. All of that innovation works great, no doubt about it but it also another mean to enslave ourselves.

Yesterday I had a huge internal struggle whether to buy new shifters or not. My shifters are 2000 XTRs, lightweight, reliable, they are perfectly fine after 10 years! Yet I was sitting in front of the screen with CRC on, and looking at new XTs and XTRs just because these old XTRs of mine don't fit on my bars that well, coming into conflict with the brake lever. Should I go for SRAM the voice said...


I mean there's so many people I know saying: I got the get rid of this XTR, Deemax wheels because I want something better - Am I the only one to whom it sounds ridiculous?!

 what about the fact that the angleset allows riders to improve the geo on their bike rather than having to buy a new frame? A perfect example is the new glory, it's an amazing bike, but it's HA is a tiny bit too steep to handle as well for some of the faster tracks. the angleset allows them to slacken the bike a little in order to improve the bike for those tracks.

Your argument about it being an unnecessary expense is invalid, because it allows you to improve the geo of whatever bike you currently have so that you dont have to shell out $2000+ for a new frame.

 From the point of view of bike set up it's ideal. I'm not an advocate of changing bike set up to suit each course, I'd far rather modify my riding to suit - that way the bike is always going to be reacting and handling in a consistent manner. However, when you're trying to get a bike built into your ballpark handling range it's a fantastic tool to have in your box. Many riders are now riding super slack head angles but, for me at least, this angleset is great as it allows me to set the bike up steeper than many riders will prefer to run. It's not so much that you'll be chopping and changing every month but playing about with it in the first month or so to try out different setups. Frame designs that use pinch bolts for the top cup like the M9 is certainly the easiest way to go about doing this as it saves having to knock and repress the cups each time. Really it means that you can more readily tailor your bike to suit the trail conditions you normally ride - there's a big difference between Whistler and your average UK race track yet riders in both locations are using similar equipment.

 Agreed, i wasnt suggesting changimg it for every set of trails, but rather to allow you to tune your bime for whatever you ride most.

 WAKIdesigns, what point are you proving with the picture of the Nicolai?

 Duh, like, that if you leave it up to designers, you'll like end up with a horrible orange paint job? (sorry, I neg propped you by mistake)

 great help

 reading a perfectly good discussion.. suddenly in the middle..
SuperShoreMedia (20 hours ago)
Pretty pointless tech tuesday in my opinion. I mean most of us don't have a headset press. And if I had to take it to the shop anyway to get the cups pressed in, then I would just let the shop install the whole thing.....
Show- 5 z-man (20 hours ago) (Below Threshold) show comment
There's ways to do it with no press. you just have to be delicate with a hammer.

and i was like OMFG

 It's alright to be delicate with the hammer when speaking of a frame and headset that are cheaper alltogether than this angled headset alone. Otherwise it's like buying Enve rims and trying to learn wheelbuilding with them...

Antron, point I was making with that Nicolai: I don't know if you noticed the head angle on this thing. Seems like someone wanted to maximize the rear travel, and became more than fine with the fact that he got BB height of Karpiel Apocalypse and head angle of an old school XC bike.

 if you know what you're doing, its not hard at all, or damaging at all to anything if you use a hammer, and a flat head (slotted) screw driver. Not saying its the bust, but it does work

 I see your point now. My bike has a higher bb setting and I NEVER use it, in fact, I wish it had an even lower one. Those settings might be good for drops though. Just trying to look at it in a different POV.

 I would agree with this. With the exception of "being careful" this doesn't seem too different of instructions compared to a regular headset. Mind you I've never used one of these but my feeling is that the cups need to be correctly oriented relative to each other as well as the frame to achieve the desired head angle. Wouldn't it be possible to angle your steer to to the left or right if done incorrectly?

 @fraserbritton I realize that you are bias because you wrote the article, however I agree with boomintrucker. You left out pressing the cups into the frame which is really the only main difference in installing an angleset over any other headset. Don't believe me? How about Cane Creek's headset engineer Jim Morrison in this video: www.youtube.com/watch?v=mrjgyu79sb0&feature=related . He spends over half of that video discussing the cups and aligning/installing them in the frame. The only reason I write a response to this is merely because you brushed of boomintrucker's valid point as stupid by suggesting he get glasses, then suggesting the "hardpart" is the rest of the installation that "won't work" if he tries it without watching your tech video. I thought you did a great job at explaining the rest of the installation, however anyone qualified to install a normal headset will already know those steps and could be left scratching their heads at the cups part. Just my 2 cents.

 Really pinkbike? The author of an article on the front page insulting the users over a matter of opinion? I mean yes, the users can be a*sholes quite often, but come on.

 @s4nt4cruz, he also says in the video to "not agonize over it too much, just get it as straight as you can," though it is important.
the gimbles take care of any bit f mis-alignment

 This is exactly right. As Josh said, it's not a huge deal as the gimbles will self-align to a certain extent. They don't have to be perfectly spot on at all. Which was entirely the point of the article. There are a lot of misconceptions out there, such as the alignment one and the "they install like a regular headset". No, they don't. If you read the article and listen to Josh, you'll see why.

 I'm a technically minded person but I completely agree with boomintrucker. Finding the centreline would be the biggest challenge.

 yes please

 why is he building a bike in the forest?

 Hahahaha

 Might be his back garden. You dont know whats behind him

 you would have to tap out the top cup, reinstall the -1.0 cup and reassemble. Now if you have pinch bolts on your head tube this will make the change even that much easier. I have one on my bike right now, with the angleset the bikes geo is sitting very pretty.

 I am completely shocked that you have to un-install the head set to swap angles , it's gotta be a joke right? People are gonna be wearing out their head tubes or cups if they swap say once a month to suit different courses !!

 thats the thing. Its not good for that, its more of a permanant head angle change. if you want your bike to do that (change head angles to suit courses) there are frames on the market with rotating headtube sleeves and or pinch bolts. ( i.e. Scott Gambler, Commencal, I think the intense has pinch bolts)

 Hallo,

I have a 2010 Giant Glory M. I will now change the h/a to 64 degrees. What is your wheelbase now ?. Can this make a problem for the frame (crack)?.

Thank you in advance

 I live in North Vancouver and have been running one since November. The wet weather riding won't kill this headset but (like any headset) don't spray the hose at it when you're cleaning your bike after.

 just looking at it i took a assumption that they aint well sealed seeing as you can still see the gimbal when assembled. In hindsight ive realised the gimbal doesn't move and therefore shit wont get in there and the bearings look well sealed...might have to inquire about one :-)

 Yes

 cane creek has been talking about making a 1 1/8" version
dirt.mpora.com/news/dirt-exclusive-1-18-angleset-campaign.html

 For sure, the angle change will be smaller.

 They are working on all sorts of variations, so you can expect something for pretty much everyone in the next while.

 Sweet

 I guess you have a point there - it does affect BB height, but only a very negligible amount.

I think the author was referring to two other methods of changing your fork angle : sliding the crowns up or down the stanchions of a dual crown fork or; changing the mounting of the shock (for those frames where that is possible).

 Iamamodel: correct. I'm sure this changes your BB 1 or 2 mm, but that's pretty negligible and I'd challenge anyone to actually notice a difference.

 still, the assertion that BB height remains unchanged is plainly false.

 Nine out of ten slithy toves agree with you.