Tandems of the forum

Yeah!

What I can’t work out is, who changes those gears, the captain or the stoker?!

Neither, 60/11 all the way!

I’m sliding into this thread as I’m about to buy a tandem that’s in pieces. A 26r Dave Yates from a member of this parish. Was holding off so no-one talks me out if it. I have questions... but maybe I’ll wait til I’ve done the deed and worked out what the hell is going on. Every day’s a school day, for the foreseeable future.

What child seat is that?
Is it mounted utilizing the seatube as well?

I could use one of these.

Its a bobike, clamped onto a seatpost, with a tandem stem or two then some bars!

Think its great.
Ta.

no-one talks me out if it

Tandem is love

merci, she loves it, but now needs something a bit bigger!

Tandem has been the best thing we did for cycling, holidays etc!

& @rj
Thanks for encouragement!

Frame is built for rim brakes. Shall I just live with it? Have to have frame repair anyway, would people stick a disc mount on the back end? Would like to use the original fork with a V, thought I might set a rear V up as a drag.

We’ve only got Vs on the Dawes, didn’t die in the alps despite heavy load. Only ever almost died once, somewhere outside Jumieges where I misjudged the grade of a road that was 20% straight downhill into a the Seine.

By which I mean going Vs only will be fine, anything more than that will be good...

Get a drum drag brake

From my understanding you’d want the (cable) disc as the drag. Our thorn also only has V and they’re good when well set up with good cables and proper brake pads .

+1 for drum on a friction shifter.

We have experience with Vs+drum, Vs+disc, and discs only, and never had any serious issues apart from consumables wear on hilly areas. Any configuration can be set up to stop you safely as long as everything is put together properly.

However, in terms of feel I'd say that drag brakes are a noticeable improvement, I feel safer when I'm able to add resistance so the bike doesn't build too much momentum. To be able to do that without overheating rims or discs is a neat solution, so I'd go with Arai too.

This makes sense to me too, but on our Santana the rear V was the drag, and the disc was the regular brake. Built like that by JD Tandems, don't know why.

My less confident stoker liked having control over the drum brake to mediate my enthusiastic descending in the Surrey hills!

Let me know if you decide to go Arai drum as I may be able to help you out.

The xtr rim brakes on my thorn are great. But I do mostly just use the hope moto disc

OK thanks for all the detail, everyone. All food for thought. To add to the confusion, the bike was built with Magura rim brakes in its previous incarnation.

@6pt I might explore the Arai option, is it added to a hub or inbuilt? I’ve seen hubs that took something threaded on the NDS I think.

My stoker is now a teenager! We went out the weekend before last up to the top of the Downs then back through Tatsfield. First time out on it this summer. Now have a saddle with cutout on the rear. Can really tell when no effort from the stoker now.

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Got any pics? Sounds lush.

Threaded something on NDS sounds about right to me.

Nice! Good to see this bike still being used.

Makes me feel old because I remember the pictures when she was basically a tiny wobbler :(

So much time wasted on this forum.

Good ride though...is that picture from half way up beddlestead?

That's exactly where it is. I'm so unfit.

Yeah! here it is as built last. I’ve only got frame & fork, seat pins (stoker is a lovely weird one with a long adjustable clamp section), some basic crossover cranks & old timing chain, shimano triple and the BB eccentric sleeve & bolts.

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