[RideMonkey]

I walked into a bike shop today and SHAZAM! They had a couple of brand-new Scalpels sitting on the floor. Have you seen these things? Its a full suspension with 2.5 inches at the rear. There is no pivot in the chainstays. The movement comes from special carbon stays that flex. It looks really sweet. Awseome race rig!

Thing about Cdale is you gotta use their fork. Hmm don't knock it till ya try it I guess.

Think Cannondale will EVER settle on a FS design for more than a couple years?

 

[SirF]

well, if you keep the same thing for several years it gets kinda boring...

oh, and you could always change the fork if you wanted to. that's not a problem these days.

 

[Will_Jekyll]

Originally posted by ridemonkey
I walked into a bike shop today and SHAZAM! They had a couple of brand-new Scalpels sitting on the floor. Have you seen these things? Its a full suspension with 2.5 inches at the rear. There is no pivot in the chainstays. The movement comes from special carbon stays that flex. It looks really sweet. Awseome race rig!

Thing about Cdale is you gotta use their fork. Hmm don't knock it till ya try it I guess.

Think Cannondale will EVER settle on a FS design for more than a couple years?

Was that big ring cycles in Golden? They have the scalpel team edition that thing is sweet. It weighs something like 23.5 lbs with the Left carbon.

The scalpel is the first departure from their general suspension design if you don't count the DeltaV which was their first attempt at FS back around ,91. If you look at the SuperV, Raven, and Jekyll although they look drastically different they all share the same pivot point and some of the swing arms are interchangeable.

 

[B-Loco]

i personally don't like c'dales, but you gotta love their engineering team. They are always coming out with new designs where as most companies just buy the horst-link from specialized or copy it.

Not sure I could deal with the lefty fork. It felt okay when I rode it, but man it looks weird. I think I'd have to stick with my SID

The carbon stays sound cool though. GF is doing the same thing on the sugar 1 I think?

-B

 

[Merwin5_10]

I currently have one each, scalpel 800, scalpel 1000, scalpel team bikes on my floor. Yeah they are cool machines.

There is a significant difference between the chainstays. The cahinsatays on the canny are designed to flex. This in conjuction to the 2.5" fox shock absorbs the bigger hits on the ride and helps to smooth everything out (the scalpel is a soft-tail BTW.) The carbon in the sugar is just to eliminate a little weight and actually stiffen the rear triangle of the sugar as it flexes. This also helps its effiecency but in a totally different way.

There's only one thing I don't like about the engineering of the Scalpel. Drop the front into the small ring and watch the chain drag across your chainrings as you drop the rear into the smaller gears. How much does this affect the bike? Pretty much none at all. I just crinch when I visuallize a novice riderer on a steep climb crossing his gears and grinding the carbon.

The more real world concern is in the amount of flex in the rear. Its very soft. Very plush, comfortable ride, but you'll have to get used to the way it rides. Just don't bomb into turns if you get a new one or you may not make the turn.

Otherwise, thumbs up to Canny for yet another cool innovation.

 

[oldfart]

Saw one in a window this morning on the way to work. I love the technology of it. Very cool to me because its similar to an idea I had a while ago that I think Bontrager tried but never made. I had thought that instead of a pivot at the bb you could use a spring like the fiberglass one used by Slingshot on their frames. Instead of a shock you could simply use a damper. The spring could come in different strengths so it could be swapped out for different weight riders. But I suppose you'd need an air assist in the damper to tune more exactly for style weight terrain. I think it could work quite well.

With respect to the Scalpel, I'd love to try one out but I'm afraid its not the kind of bike for the kind of riding I do. If I'm going to haul around a shock and linkage I want at least 4 inches of travel on the back. By the way, it is claimed that Santa Cruz Superlight can be built to weigh in the 22 lb range with v's. Add a bit for discs and your as light as a Scalpel but with proper (for me) travel.

 

[HELLTACO]

Originally posted by ridemonkey


Think Cannondale will EVER settle on a FS design for more than a couple years?

Did chu fergets about da Super V

I seen Tinkers Scapal at a bike show an' it looked weak at da chainstays, Duh. But for real it's a soft-tail XC raceing bike. It dosen't look like a whole lot of fun ta me.

 

[novice]

doesn't IBIS have a similar design to the scapel? Not the linkage part of the scapel, but the flexable chainstays. I believe they now make it in both Al and Ti.

 

[oldfart]

Yes the Silk Ti and I don't recall the name of the aluminum one. The Cannondale concentrates the stay flex at the narrowing of the carbon chainstays whereas all other soft tails spread the flex over the entire stay length.

 

[Joe Pozer]

Merwin, I agree with you that the Scalpel is a soft-tail but C-dale swears up and down that it's a Full-suspension bike, not a soft-tail.

Knowing Cannondales tendency to put out a product before it's really ready I wouldn't be buying the first year model.

 

[Will_Jekyll]

They call it FS because they consider the center of the chain stay a picot point due to the manufacturing process. Where as soft tails flex trough out the length of the chain stay. At 2.5" it also has more travel than most soft tails.

 

[B-Loco]

novice -

The Ripley is the AI version of the Silk TI softtail from Ibis.

Ibis Ripley

 

[Revol]

Hmmmm.There's just some thing not right about letting the carbon stays flex that much.
I've never been a big fan of carbon mtb's.I had a '98 GT Lobo STS that was supposed to be the dogs bollox for d/h.Broke that within eight months.All my friends that have had carbon bikes have had problems with them.Much safer to stick to 6061 or cro-mo IMHO.
Suppose the Scalpel could be ok if your a sponsored x/c racer but i wouldnt wanna trust if for much else.

 

[Spud]

O.K. I'll brazenly flaunt my ignorance.

What's the difference between a soft tail and a FS? I was under the impression they were the same.

Wallowing in the shame of it all.....

 

[Will_Jekyll]

Originally posted by B-Loco
novice -

The Ripley is the AI version of the Silk TI softtail from Ibis.

Ibis Ripley

I still don't understand how they get Aluminum to flex without breaking.

 

[Ranger]

Servus!

Spud, a softail is any frame that is constructed in a way so that a small amount of travel is achieved due to a flexing action of the seat- and chainstays. This may or may not be dampened by a smaller rear shock element. The deciding factor is that the rear triangle does not have any dedicated pivot points (i.e.- any linkage point with bearings) and looks, at first glance, like a plain vanilla hardtail with something wrong with the chainstays.

Some riders like the comprimise. I am not sold on the concept yet. I keep begging Peter down at the LBS to let me ride his Scalpel Replica but he keeps telling me no, no matter how much beer I want to bribe him with

Any experts out there want to add/comment to this definition?

 

[Spud]

The lightbulb comes on! Thanks Ranger.

 

[B-Loco]

Ranger -

you pretty much nailed it! Good explantion!

Will -

I have no idea how Ibis does it with AI. They seem to trust the design though - lifetime warrenty on the chainstays and 10 year on the frame. Not bad since the frame is only 1K.

Maybe we should email Ibis and ask them how it works? I'm sure they'll be helpfull, they seem like a good company from what I've heard.

 

[oldfart]

Originally posted by Revol
Hmmmm.There's just some thing not right about letting the carbon stays flex that much.

It can be done quite well actually. Time will tell if the scalpel is proper though. I think Corvettes have fiberglass springs. My father usd to design mining equipment and they used fiberglass springs in certain applications because steel ones weren't durable enough. I would expect that glass fibers, carbon fibers or boron fibers are all stiff brittle little things, but used properly can be very good materials.

 

[SirF]

Originally posted by Will_Jekyll


I still don't understand how they get Aluminum to flex without breaking.

Oh it's rather simple. you can bend and crush a can right? sure it deforms but it's still together. Al. just doesn't have the same degree of flexability as steel or ti.
By engineering and shaping the stays properly, this flex can be achived.

(note: Aitplane wings can flex up to 20 feet or more in flight even if they are Al...and they don't break...much...)

 

[Merwin5_10]

In soft-tails, it is my oppinion that Al is a liability. Aluminum has a relatively short fatigue life. (the number of times it can flex without failing.) Considering the flex achieved in a soft-tail...

Cannondale says a lot of things about their new products ("its an FS bike".) Look at the thing. Its a soft-tail. Only, its a soft-tail from CANNONDALE so they call it a "pivotless Full Suspension."

(I thought that's what a soft-tail was. Stupid me.)


They can't stand to have any of their bikes be regarded as "normal" or "standard."