The Wheels of Chance » Neo Primato

Euclid would have loved bikes.

cstandley — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 03:28:11 +0000

With my new Neo Primato frame due next week I thought that I’d discuss how I chose the size 54cm and talk a little about bike fit. I’m in the enviable position of having a few bikes and so I should know what size fits me, and I do up to a point. You see all my bikes have the relaxed geometries of tourers or sport touring bikes. They have 72ish degree seat and head tubes, long chainstays, 43 or 44 cm and slightly upward sloping top tubes. The result is a stable ride with the handlebars about level with the saddle. The fit is what would be described as French. This is an old school relaxed position favored by touring cyclists and randonneurs. There are two other generally accepted fits, “The Eddy”, named after Eddy Merckx, is more aggressive with the bars a few cm below the saddle and the most aggressive fit is the “Racer “or “Competative” fit which might have ten or more cms between bar and saddle height. I am not a fan of the Competative fit for recreational riders as it often causes back and neck pain and there’s no point to it’s questionable speed advantage if you aren’t racing. So with my Neo Primato I decided to go for an Eddy fit. Why not the French fit like my other bikes? Well the Neo Primato’s geometry just isn’t set up for a really relaxed riding style as it has fairly steep head tube and seat tube angles, short chain stays and

Neo Primato Geometry (from De Rosa)

the horizontal top tube means that it is difficult to get the bars up to saddle height without having ridiculous amounts of stem showing or getting a bike that is simply too big. To decide what size of frame I needed I started with my Pubic Bone measuerment which is the length from the pubic bone between your legs to the floor. For me that’s 81cm. This is short for someone of my height of 5′ 10″ (178 cm). I then subtract ten cm to find my seat height which is the distance form the center for the bottom bracket and the top of the saddle measured parallel to the seat tube. A further subtraction of 15 cm gives the bike size that I like measured to the top of the seat lug. For a more race fit it’s better to subtract 16 or 17 cm. Given that I like a saddle height of 71cm and I’m comfortable on a 56 cm Rambouillet (measured from center of the bottom bracket to the top of the seat tube lug) I decided to get a 54 cm Neo Primato. De Rosa measures its bikes from center of the bottom bracket to the the center of the top tube and seat tube intersection, so a 54 cm De Rosa is equivalent to a 56cm Rambouillet as it’s 1.4cm to the top of the top tube from its center and say another 0.5cm to the top of the seat lug. However, the 74 deg seat tube angle puts the seat tube and top tube intersection about one cm higher than my Rambouillet. With all these angles and triangles, Euclid comes into his own. Some calculation shows that the 54cm Neo Primato and the 56cm Rambouillet stand over heights at the middle of the top are both 80 cm with the top of the Neo Primato top tube at the head tube beingone cm lower than that of the Rambouillet. The Rambouillet also has a couple of cm head tube extension to get the bars up further giving the French fit. So the top of the Neo Primato head tube will be about three cm below that of the Rambouillet and the top tube is also one cm shorter so that I will have to use a slightly longer stem to get the fit just right. It looks like I’ll be able to get the handlebars to within three cm of the saddle without showing unsightly amounts of stem, however, there’s a final quirk as Rivendell tends to have long steerer tubes and puts 12 or 18 mm of spacers in the headset. But I have that covered as De Rosa tells me that the steerer is long enough to add a few spacers as well. So all should be good for my Eddy fit. Of course after all this calculation and measuring I went down to the local De Rosa dealer and got fitted. He set up the 54cm Neo Primato geometry on an adjustable geometry bike and I rode for a while. It felt good.

Something nice is on it’s way from Italy

cstandley — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 21:13:13 +0000

I had an email from my local De Rosa dealer today to tell me that my Neo Primato frame is due at his store on 8th December. The factory apologized for the longer than normal delivery time. It was delayed as I ordered the frame at the height of the trade show season. Still 10 weeks to build and deliver a frame with a custom steerer is quite good and it will be a nice early Christmas present. I’ll document the build taking lots of pictures and boring whoever reads this stuff with lots of description. But to keep you going here’s a link to a nice summary of how to build a bike.
http://tinyurl.com/RR28-bikeassembly

Here’s the Neo Primato Build.

cstandley — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 13:15:58 +0000

All the parts for my Neo Primato build are now in. All I need now is the frame!!! I confirmed with the factory that the steerer will be long enough for me to put a couple of spacers in there to get the handlebars a few cm higher than normal. I’m not a super skinny and flexible racer guy so I’m going for bars 2 to 3 cm below saddle level rather than 6cm…. The build is unapologetically mostly Shimano. I don’t have anything against Campy or Sram, I’ve just had good experiences with Shimano.

54cm (c-c) 2009, red, De Rosa Neo Primato with threaded fork special ordered from factory
Head set: Chris King 2Nut
Stem: Nitto Dynamic, 100mm
Bars: Nitto Noodle 44cm
Tape: White Fizik
Brake Levers: Shimano BR 600
Brakes: Dura Ace BR 7800
Shifters: Shimano Dura Ace Barcon
BB: Phil Wood 111mm
Crank: Sugino Alpina, 170mm, 48-34
Pedals: Shimano PD-A530
Chain: Sram PC-991
Cassette: Dura Ace 12-25
FD: IRD CD
RD: Dura Ace RD 7800GS
Front Wheel: Dura Ace FH 7900, 32 hole Mavic Open Pro, DT Swiss
Rear Wheel: Dura Ace RH-7850, 32 Hole Mavic Open pro, DT Swiss
Tires: Conti Ultra Gator Skins, 25-622
Seat Post: Nitto Dynamic
Saddle: Selle San Marco Regal, white

There’s a thread running through this post

cstandley — Fri, 25 Sep 2009 01:23:50 +0000

Once I’d decided on a red De Rosa Neo Primato I had to actually go out and buy the frame. It was available on a few websites, but all the forks had non-threaded steerers and I wanted a traditional threaded steerer tube. The threadless steerer is the modern standard. It extends above the bearing, or headset, that allows the front fork to rotate, and is held in place by a bolt that screws into a star nut inside the head tube. A modern “A-Head” stem then clamps to the steerer. This is lighter than the traditional threaded steerer set up, but it gives the stem a “chunky” look and also limits the amount of height adjustment possible. With a threaded steerer the headset threads onto the steerer and the stem looks like a backwards figure seven and slips inside the steerer tube to be secured by an expanding wedge.

Several emails to the web stores that sold the Neo Primato got replies that said “can’t get it with a threaded stem”. So I went to my local De Rosa dealer to see if one could be special ordered. The dealer said it should be possible and put me on a bike fit machine to confirm that a 54cm frame was the right one for me. It felt good so I left the store with the dealer promising to check on the availability of the frame……….

Fast forward a few days and I got a disappointing email from the dealer saying that the US distributor could not get the frame with a threaded steerer. Well that was just my cue to step up my search. I’d seen a really nice Neo Primato build on Cyclofiend with a threaded stem http://www.cyclofiend.com/cc/2007/cc415-vincentkluwe1207.html and a quick email to the owner in Berlin, Dr. Vincent Kluew, got an almost immediate response. He thanked me and said that he’d got his frame from Doriano De Rosa, the son of the founder Ugo De Rosa, and that it was definitely possible to get a threaded steerer. Then he offered to call Doriano and make sure that I got the frame the way I wanted it. That was very kind and sure enough I received an email from Milan soon after saying that I could have the threaded stem and just had to include a note about it on the order. Now that’s service. Thanks Vincent and Doriano and Cristiano.

I forwarded the factory email to the dealer and went round the next day to put a 50% deposit down on a red 54cm Neo Primato frame with a 1″ threader steerer. Now all I have to do is wait six weeks for it to be delivered!

…and so it begins.

cstandley — Wed, 23 Sep 2009 02:24:14 +0000

I arrived back from work today to find the first part for my Neo Primato build waiting for me on the doorstep. Thank you Velo-Orange and Mr. Fedex Man.

It’s a beautiful Sugino Alpina 48/34 110BCD compact crank. The rings are almost as shinny as those made by TA. The 48t big ring might be an issue as the Neo Primato has a braze on front derailleur and is speced for a 53t or 52t big ring. So I may have to put the derailleur all the way down and even then it might be a couple of mm too high. Still we’ll give it a go and if it doesn’t work I’ll just use a bigger TA ring. This build is going to be pretty old school and I’m going to be an iconoclast my using mostly Dura-Ace 7800 series parts. Some people will be outraged that I’m not installing full Campy Record, but frankly I don’t like the way it looks, and 11 speeds, come on who needs it. To prove I’m a heretic I also use clipless pedals on my Rivendells, …….born to be wild………….

Bicycle Fever!

cstandley — Mon, 21 Sep 2009 04:22:10 +0000

I have a very serious illness – bicycle fever. It’s dormant for long periods, but it can come back to attack my wallet at any time. The latest attack was brought on by a convergence of circumstances. Rivendell decided to bring out a new “club racer” style bike called the Roadeo that is lighter and has a slightly more aggressive geometry than their previous designs, I’ve lost some weight over the summer and the last time I was out on my Rambouillet I felt stronger and faster than normal, and I read an article about Eddy Merckx. All these things came together to convince me that I needed a new “fast” bike that is lighter and has steeper angles than my laid back Rivendells.

So the search was on. I considered the new Rivendell Roadeo, but I looked at the specs and they weren’t that different from my Rambouillet. They have similar length chainstays at 43cm and a 73 degree seat tube to provide Rivendell’s signiture big tyre clearance. Anyway I wanted to try some other bike makers. The frame had to be lugged steel and I thought of all the usual makers; Waterford, Circle A, IF, Mercian, and more, but I was drawn to an Italian bike and their classic stage race geometry with 41cm chainstays and a 74deg seat tube angle. Now that is significantly different from the Rambouillet. I looked at the Cologno Master-X, and Cinelli Supercorsa, but when I saw the De Rosa Neo Primato I was hooked.

It happens that Eddy Merckx rode a De Rosa so that sealed my intention and I set off to order the frame from my dealer and buy the parts. This became a bit of an adventure involving email correspondence between Cambridge, Berlin and Milan and I’ll go over all that in my next post.