Originally Posted by
tbonefitz
Hey everyone, so, since this thread lives, I asked a buddy of mine about this. He's a mechanical engineer who does material stress with F-16s and F-15's. I explained all this to him, along with the theories. He then used lots of big words and math to explain it back to me. He then almost immediately knew how to actually test these theories. He started explaining a series of experiments on a bike outfitted with strain gauges on all the tubes - multiple strain gauges per tube. He immediately picked up on e-Ritchie's assertion that the frame was merely one part of a big system, and that if we're only talking about the frame, we'd need to isolate it in a particular way. Needless to say, if anyone wants hard facts on this, the actual hard facts are within reach - for a price. He figured that his company could do it, no problem, but not for free.
He did a bunch of calculations on the back of a napkin and seemed to think through stored energy due to the flex of the frame was negligible. He did, however, completely understand the concept that a stiffer frame would feel more tiring--exactly what Jan felt. It has to do with the power smoothing of the flexible bike. Again, strain gauges, math on a napkin, and this could be verified as well.
So, who wants to pony up $10k or so to figure this out?
Keith Fitzgerald
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