Yeah, I think you experience is clear, I wonder if others have a different opinion. Seems strange that riders would tolerate a harsh saddle for a brevet of several hundred Km, but maybe the idea of light weight makes people do illogical things. Btw, received a Ti B17 today and unpacked it while the alloy Ideale was still sitting on the table. Despite its greater width, the Ti Brooks is very noticeably lighter than the alloy mod 90. How much weight did the alloy Ideales actually save vs steel rails? No spring of any sort in this alloy Ideale, BTW.
Regards,
Jerry Moos
Big Spring, Texas, USA
> From: Tony Colegrave <tony_colegrave@hotmail.com>
> Subject: RE: [CR] Ideale Alloy Rail saddles
> To: jerrymoos@sbcglobal.net, classicrendezvous@bikelist.org
> Date: Wednesday, January 28, 2009, 11:30 AM
> I think that we've been down this road before, Jerry. In
> my experience, the only alloy-railed Ideales that could be
> described as reasonably comfortable over fairly long
> distances are those later Model 90s with spring-loaded
> noses. Not all the '90s' have those springs (the
> majority don't, I'd suggest), and yours appears to
> be one of those that doesn't, although, if the leather
> has stretched to a degree, it might be possible to
> 'improvise' such an arrangement?
> Ideale seem to have come late to the realisation that
> there was a need for some sort of suspension in these
> girder-type frames - Brooks introduced it in their first
> attempt at such frames, in the early 'thirties, but soon
> abandoned it and 'gave up' on girder frames
> altogether pretty quickly. I don't think that Mansfield
> ever produced a sprung girder frame.
> I've always imagined that Ideale used steel rivets
> on either side of the nose of most of their saddles for the
> good practical reason that they are very much easier to
> 'set' than copper ones, when working at the sort of
> angle presented by most nosepieces; on many of the
> wire-railed Ideales (and some of the earlier alloy-railed
> ones, as well) there is a mixture of steel/copper rivets
> into the cantle-plate - most usually the steel rivets are in
> positions to which direct access 'inside' the cantle
> is hampered by the rails.
> Tony Colegrave, Northiam, East Sussex, U.K.
>
> > Date: Wed, 28 Jan 2009 06:52:02 -0800
> > From: jerrymoos@sbcglobal.net
> > To: classicrendezvous@bikelist.org;
> edvintage63@aol.com
> > Subject: [CR] Ideale Alloy Rail saddles
> >
> > Just received yesterday from a French eBay seller the
> first alloy-railed Ideale saddle I've ever owned. This
> one was not cheap, but a little more reasonable than some
> examples have gone for of late. I blame Jan Heine in part
> for the recent escalation of alloy Ideale prices. His
> wonderful book The Golden Age of Handbuilt Bicycles,
> although not exactly on the New York Times Best Seller list,
> I think has enormous influence in collector circles, and it
> seems about half the bikes pictured have alloy railed Ideale
> saddles. I think this has spurred interest in those saddles
> and driven up the price.
> >
> > This one was slightly more than $250 and certainly not
> NOS - the stampings on the side are worn down so far ot is
> hard to tell the model number, which is claimed to be a
> model 90, which is consistent with other details. But the
> Rebour stamp on the top rear is still very clear, and the
> saddle is still supple,with no cracking and retains its
> original shape quite nicely.
> >
> > I have a question for those who have used these
> extensively. How is the ride? Some have said that the ride
> is very harsh and uncomfortable due to what is essentially
> an I-beam undercarriage. If so, I'd think these would
> be very tiring on a long event. Now I get the impression
> that the Technical Trials and some other similar events may
> have been of moderate length, but bikes like those pictured
> in Jan's book were also extensively used in the long
> events we usually associate with randonneuring, culminating
> in PBP. I know at least a couple of CR members have done
> PBP and probably a lot more have done randonneur events of
> several hundred Km. Are these alloy rail saddles very
> tiring in those long events? Does anyone feel compelled to
> switch to steel rail saddles for long distances?
> >
> > One other question I've long pondered but never
> asked. I note this model 90 has copper rivets for all but
> the two rivets on either side of the nose, which appear to
> be steel, although the rivet on top of the nose is copper
> like those in the cantle plate. I believe every other high
> end Ideale I've seen is the same way - all copper except
> on either side of the nose. Why did Ideale do this? I
> doubt they were trying to save a couple of Francs
> (espeically the old Francs worth only a few US cents) on
> their top models. Did they judge that the rivets on either
> side of the nose needed to be stronger than the others?
> Presumably steel ones would be stronger than copper. If
> this was the reason, Brooks seem not to have shared their
> concern.
> >
> > Regards,
> >
> > Jerry Moos
> > Big Spring, Texas, USA
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