Chuck Schmidt wrote:
> >What I have heard that was a concern to pro racers was a distrust of
> >aluminum cranks and aluminum bars because of breakage. Steel cranks and
> >steel bars and stems being used right up through the sixties in the pro ranks.
Jan Heine wrote:
> I don't know about reasons in the U.S. to stick with steel cranks. I
> find that the same equipment choices often were due to different
> reasons on different continents.
I think you've misunderstood my comment about "steel bars and stems being used right up through the sixties in the pro ranks" Jan. I don't mean in the U.S., I mean in Europe as there were no "pro ranks" in the U.S. in the sixties.
> In France, the cyclotourists had shown that aluminum cranks were
> durable - often during the same events as the pros, such as the Poly
> de Chanteloup - even on tandems.
I'd question aluminum cranks being "durable" enough for pro use in the mid 1930s to the mid 1950s in the big tours of those periods; the TdF, GdI or Vuelta.
> Of course, racers always have been slow to be persuaded that
> "unfashionable" equipment might be as good or better. But I find that
> more often than not, what seems like stupidity or backwardness to us
> from a vantage point 50+ years later, in fact was done for good
> reasons. The racers weren't stupid, and their bikes were their tools
> of the trade.
Yes, I agree, and pro racers slow acceptance of alloy cranks was probably done for, like you say, "good reasons."
Chuck Schmidt South Pasadena, Southern California
.