Current Projects chat and miscellany

Sorry, that statement needed a smiley or something, I wasn't actually irritated or anything.

Fair, thats why I tend to use lots of them, the finer points of expression being quite difficult with the written word, at least without being a poet, which I won't kid myself I am. :P

The problem I have with this statement is that various people have done supposedly scientific tests and come to a different conclusion to this.

They may well be wrong, but you're not providing any evidence to back up your assertions. I don't expect you to do your own tests, although I'm sure they would be interesting, but you could at least provide some basis for your assertions. Otherwise it's just someone on the internet telling people they're wrong, which I tend to be wary of.

However, you have convinced me it's not worth worrying about too much and I will just go for 170mm for the new road bike and save fifty quid, I'm quite happy with that outcome so thank you for that...

As far as I have ascertained so far (I think) as long as the gain ratio is constant crank length doesn't matter too much, as the leverage is in effect the same as is foot speed and movement.
But, cadence is a factor, smaller cranks can get upto speed quicker and spin easier at a higher RPM, but longer cranks make it easier to maintain a lower but more stable RPM cadence?
Which was kind of what I was getting at with the diesel Land Drover and nippy hatch back analogy.
Could also be referred to size of spinning tops, smaller tops can go very fast and accelerate quickly, but are innately unstable, whereas a table sized (I know the scale is wrong!) spinning top will be stable for far longer but at a slower speed and rate of acceleration.

How am I doing so far?