Talk:Cannondale Bicycle Corporation

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Contents 1 Balance 2 Lefty / Headshok 3 marketing ploy 4 External links 5 Pro sponsorship?

[edit] Balance

It's surprising to not read about any of the downsides to Cannondales; the awkward large tubes can be hard to fit and accessorize. Also, there's no coverage of the failed Cannondale Motorsports venture which is notable because it drove the company to reorganize under Chapter 11. -- Mikeblas 03:48, 1 April 2006 (UTC)

How is hard to fit or accessorize a CAAD7 or CAAD8 frame? they use the same types of headsets, bottom brackets and seatposts as bikes from all of cannondale's competitors. Six13 and Synapse frames are the same size as other manufacturers' frames. If you're referring to the 1.5" head tube used on mountain bikes, there's tons of freeride/downhill bikes that use 1.5" headsets now. gary fisher, etc. Thewalrus 19:39, 2 April 2006 (UTC)

Made some edits, corrected grammar, and corrected stuff that was out of date. There's nothing particularly light about cannondale frames, the whole "legalize my cannondale" thing is some marketing hack's ploy. I can name more than a dozen other companies that make frames the same weight as or ligher than a CAAD8, Six13 or Synapse. I think the article might work better if divided into three distinct sections for Road, Mountain, and Professional Team Sponsorship.

While you will find a number of other frames that are lighter you will have trouble finding more then one or two that are lighter and also safe. Most of the other sub 1kg frames have a 1-2 year warranty vs. Cannondale's lifetime one. And more then a few also have a rider weight limit of under 170lb. If you weight more then this and ride the frame you avoid the warranty. This also highlights one of the often missed point of the "legalize my cannondale" campaign. The UCI weight limit is there under the pretence of safety. At the time Cannondale was the only company that was under the weight limit and could also pass all the CPSC safety tests.--Raelx 01:45, 4 May 2006 (UTC)

How much of this article is taken from Cannondale PR material?

Having read most of their PR material, very little. --Raelx 01:45, 4 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Lefty / Headshok

Regarding this recent change: The availability of repair and rebuild components and experienced service technicians for Cannondale forks is much less widespread than Fox, Manitou and Marzocchi designs.

I think something like this would be more honest: Many Cannondale dealers are uncomfortable servicing Lefty and Headshok products and prefer to return them to the factory for service, this can be inconvenient for the customer. Despite this reluctance Lefty's and Headshok's are no more difficult to service then other suspension forks and often require fewer specialty tools to do so.

I base this on the following. 1) I have never found a shop that has seals and/or bushings for any suspension fork in stock, they all special order them. 2) Replacing said seals and bushings on all twin leg forks requires around $100 in special tools. 3) Having spend a few years servicing Cannondale forks the "castle tool" is the only special tool you need to completely gut a fork. It costs ~$12 from any Cannondale dealer. --Raelx 03:37, 26 June 2006 (UTC)

This comment is interesting: 1) I have never found a shop that has seals and/or bushings for any suspension fork in stock, they all special order them. ---- Very nearly every bike shop in Vancouver, particular in North Van, will replace seals or fully rebuild a fork from the big 3 manufacturers. Marzocchi even opened their own factory service centre in north vancouver last year. With the exception of 2 or 3 road specific shops, it would be hard to find a shop that doesn't stock common seals for freeride forks like the 888RC or Fox 36. It's possible the popularity of high-end ($3000+) mountain bikes has driven demand for repair parts. Where are you that none of the shops stock fork parts? Thewalrus 11:26, 30 June 2006 (UTC)

All of my experience is in western Pennsylvania. I will admit I have never found a shop that really impressed me in this area. Most shops seem to think that if you are buying that level of parts you will be willing to wait a week for them to order it. Cheap accessories and tire patch kits however are always in stock. This has driven me to buy parts almost exclusively online.--Raelx 03:03, 3 July 2006 (UTC)

---

I suggest changing Cannondale started its foray into aluminum racing frames in the 1980s with their CAAD series frames. to "Cannondale started to manufacture aluminum bicycle frames in the 1980s." I believe that they were selling complete bikes from their early days, and at the time the frames did not have the CAAD designation - at least they were not marketed that way (I know because I bought one in 1986). They made road touring frames and mountain bike frames as well as racing frames. I could suggest heading the section more generically like Bicycle Frames and Forks and removing the brand names, which many people won't recognize.

Also, the paragraph beginning The Saeco team is known for their pranks and antics. probably best belongs on a page devoted to the Saeco Cycling team, if it can be sourced. The anecdote about Cipollini is funny but has little to do with Cannondale.

RosinDebow 17:43, 13 May 2006 (UTC)

I aggre with all of these changes. I also know that CAAD was not used on the early bikes. --Raelx 03:44, 14 May 2006 (UTC)

I edited the article for better focus. There is now a Products heading with subheadings for frame, forks, and components. I commented out (not removed) parts of the article that didn't fit into that, including sentence about changes in the Saeco team, and details about Hollowgram, which I suggest putting into a new Hollowgram article. I also removed some text about the Saeco team that already appears in the Saeco (cycling team) article.

RosinDebow 08:04, 14 May 2006 (UTC)

I thought of a slightly better structure, but I used up my three edits - rename the subheading "Components and standards" to "Components" and create a new heading named "Innovations" at the same level as "Products" RosinDebow 08:26, 14 May 2006 (UTC)

I updated references using the WP:FN style. I dropped the claim about OnePointFive that "Cannondale was involved in the development of this standard." because it is clear from the history at the OnePointFive website that Cannondale was not part of the industry consortium that defined the standard. They might have influenced the standard, but "involved" is incorrect. If you can find a source that says otherwise, by all means please cite and reinstate this sentence.

RosinDebow 22:33, 20 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] marketing ploy

I replaced the "citation needed" tag on the marketing ploy" sentence because after Thewalrus removed it with this comment:

(I don't see how a citation is needed for this - anybody in the bike industry can name 15+ manufacturers of sub-1100 gram road bike frames. Cannondale is nowhere near the lightest, and has never been.)

The article might be read by people who aren't in the bike industry and don't know about other light-weight frames. But a citation isn't needed for the bike being heavy (or heavier, or as heavy); it's for "Many in the bicycle industry considered this to be a creative marketing ploy". Who in the industry considers it a creative marketing ploy? Why? Where can we read more about it? Without a citation, I think that kind of writing is not objective; it's just weasel words. --Mikeblas 19:58, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

Further, I think the "nowhere near lightest" assertion is incomplete; as Ralex points out above. -- Mikeblas 20:00, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

I agree with Mikeblas. See Wikipedia:Avoid_weasel_words. RosinDebow 21:14, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

Maybe it would be better balanced if the article had something about how many other manufacturers' carbon fibre bikes introduced for the 2003 model year weighed the same as, or less than cannondale, and the marketing ploy bit was removed entirely? For the record I'm a fan of Cannondale's engineering (the System6 bike looks GREAT, wish I could afford one) but I don't have much love for the work done by the marketing departments of the big 3 american bike companies. If somebody wants a reference, cyclingnews.com, possibly the net's largest most frequently updated road racing news site, had coverage of the "Legalize my Cannondale" promotion at the Tour de France in 2003. I don't remember the article verbatim, but there was something about the Saeco team mechanics refusing to let any accredited members of the sporting press weigh any of the bikes with a hanging scale, and several other interesting paragraphs. Thewalrus 04:04, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

oh, and the 2004 54cm six13 frame with SI bottom bracket is about 1530 grams - I've seen several steel framed bikes built below the 6.80kg UCI limit, using expensive wheelsets and other bits.  :) Thewalrus 04:18, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

I think you've misunderstood me. I didn't comment on the balance or POV of the statement. I just said it needed a citation to show its source. Who said it, and when? A story on Cannondale not allowing the bikes to be weighed at a press junket doesn't show us that people are saying it's just a marekting ploy. If you can dig up some quotes, that would really help. Otherwise, the statement should be stricken as unverifiable. -- Mikeblas 04:21, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

I like the use of "effort" rather than "ploy" for NPOV and the addition of a citation but the sentence still needs a little reworking because "not unique" is modifying "this" meaning the Legalize My Cannondale campaign, when it fact I think it is referring to the frame weight. Since this sentence has been a little contentious I'll propose a change (italicized) here:

Original: Some in the bicycle industry considered this to be a creative marketing effort but not unique, as Six13 frames weigh the same as or more than competing frames from other manufacturers.

Proposed: Some in the bicycle industry considered this to be a creative marketing effort because Six13 frames in fact weighed the same as or more than competing frames from other manufacturers. RosinDebow 16:06, 17 June 2006 (UTC)

Sounds much better to me, Rosin. -- Mikeblas 17:06, 17 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] External links

It's unclear to me what the purpose of the P-bone link is. I wasn't the one who removed the link, but I agree with its removal for two reasons: 1) it constitutes original research and is not independently verifiable and 2) it is not essential to the content of the article (there is not even a mention of P-bone in the article). Cannondale has created perhaps hundreds of products, do we need to have reviews to each one here? But it's cool that Borislav has taken the time to review the fork and created an adapter (maybe not so cool about going airborne 20 times). See Wikipedia:External_links. RosinDebow 15:27, 17 June 2006 (UTC)

I agree, and have removed the P-Bone link. -- Mikeblas 17:05, 17 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Pro sponsorship?

Does anyone know when Lampre-Caffita switched from Cannondale to Willier? It seems like Cannondale is still selling L-C team replica bikes and I think Willier is now sponsoring 2 (two!) teams in the pro tour (Lampre and Cofidis). It must have been recent, but I'd like more details if anyone else is more familiar with this.

It was just the beginning of this year when their contract was up. --Raelx 02:22, 28 July 2006 (UTC)