Sloping Top Tubes

i've seen a few fixed wheel bikes around town with sloping top tubes. someone told me they were for indoor track racing. just wondered if anyone knew anything else about them, the history and what purpose they serve.

Depends which way they slope. You're probably talking about the 80's pursuit frames that slope down towards the front of the bike to lower the rider?

yeah exactly

those sort of bikes use a smaller front wheel don't they?

http://velospace.org/node/4003

Often a 650c on front and 700c rear, yeah.

http://www.yellowjersey.org/axr.html

I never rode one but they should be very confortable to ride in town - you should get one ;)

http://velospace.org/node/2202

the main technological goal of sloping top tubes is to increase your level of hipness when fitted with cut-off risers. Proven scientifically..

go tom go!

Good lord it's like an optical illusion!

It's is designed to put the rider's weight further to the front of the frame, to increase power transfer to the rear wheel due to less resistance, and also to increase aerodynamics. I think it looks really cool..... I've always wanted one..... I've only ever ridden one on the road that was comfortable.

Roberto, remember that ridiculous sloping Argos that I wanted off you..... I road around Kennington in the pissing rain with tubs pumped to 190psi or something on a bike fitted with massive aero bars and the most ridiculous angle of top-tube..... just staring at tarmac.

That Argos above looks so nice and plain..... + much better to ride brakeless as there is little weight put on the back, making it much easier to skid and do stuff with back wheel.... one of the advantages of having a track frame and/or a sloping TT/LoPro frame.

Hey wait is this the guy with the stupid clearances on his front fork?

Here's some techy bowl locks: http://www.nimbuscycles.co.uk/html/low_pro_design.html

Oh yeah remember that, god the rain that day was terrible!

I remember a while ago i got a track stem and fitted on my bike, it looked gorgeous but was after ride a bit my neck was hurting due to the position...

I was training up round Constitution/Highgate Hills couple of months ago and had a chat with a courier who was riding an orange low pro brakeless fix that he seemed to want to sell. Nice looking bike but watching him try to stop the thing coming down hill was a lesson in the impracticality of the design off piste... He managed okay, but it looked damned hard on his knees and his head was sticking out in front of him like a gargoyle on a gothic church.

hahaha

i do love lo-pro though

(see what i did there)

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i can see myself having a bad back with one of those sloping frames

Dot? WTF?

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