Lynskey Sportive Di2C

ronstew

I missed why you changed dynamo hubs. I use an SP on my old bike, and am happy with it. Not a fan of the Shimano dynamos.

Did the change bring about the improvement you were looking for?

ledeev

Hi, I've not done it yet. The reason was to use the SP hub in a lighter wheel set for when I'm not commuting.

I'm still planning a lighter wheel set with the SP dynamo and H plus son rims but haven't decided on a rear hub as yet.

The Hope evo hub with 11s body is currently running favourite.

ronstew

Got it. Thanks.

When I get my next bike, I am going to want a quiet rear hub. How does this Evo hub sound?

ledeev

Probably like all Hope hubs, as in loud.

For me, I prefer loud hubs for 2 reasons:

1) I know that they're still working when they're clicking. (I've had one seize in the freewheel position unannounced once and it hurt).

2) For commuting, it's handy to freewheel and let people (like dozy pedestirians) know you're there.

ledeev

After a completely uneventful winter of commuting on my Sportive, I decided that with the lighter evenings and better weather, it was time to give the bike a clean ready for swapping over to my summer commuting bike.

After giving the frame and components a quick once over with the sponge, I wiped the black mess off the chainstay to reveal this 70mm long crack in the frame. Quite an unusual place for a crack, but a crack. The frame has always had a weird clunking noise that until now, I've been unable to pin point, thinking it was the headset.



Fearing the worst, I got in touch with Don at Lynskey, who promptly and apologetically confirmed that the frame would be repaired 'better than new' back in the US. Thank god, and fair play to Lynskey, their support continues to impress.

What it does mean though is that I have the nauseating job of dismantling the bike with its various wiring harnesses and faf. It does give me the chance to give all the bits a proper clean, swap the brake hoses and pads and swap over that nasty insulation tape job that I otherwise would never have done. Hopefully the frame will have a nice holiday over the summer and be refreshed and ready in time to do battle with the elements again in the autumn.

luv2ride

This is the 2nd such failure I've seen on a Lynskey frame on here. Kind of puts me off them, although the other was also repaired by Lynskey under warranty I believe. I was very close to getting a Sportive frame second hand but when I established with Lynskey that the warranty only covered the original owner I decided against it. Hope it gets sorted for you soon.

ledeev

Secondhand without a warranty would be a bit risky too in my opinion. I'm still wondering why anyone would sell a Lynskey though, unless they really didn't get on with it.

ledeev

My Sportive frame has finally made it back from its trip to the USA. At first I thought that it was actually a replacement frame rather than a repair, until I found that the chainstay hadn’t been drilled for Di2. Obviously no frame would be built like this is one go. Annoyingly, this meant another trip back to the shop to be remedied.

In spite of this, the process has been pretty painless and took approximately 8 weeks from shipment to final receipt. Fortunately I didn’t need the bike over the summer so haven’t missed it and the repair is so good that you couldn’t actually tell it was a repair.







One bonus is that the frame has come back thoroughly cleaned and with a new set of decals. I’m looking forward to putting the bike back together over the weekend.

ledeev

Following my house move, I've made a couple of alterations to my Sportive. First I added a pannier rack and after a bit of research I opted for a Topeak in silver hoping that it would set off the bare titanium. It's not a brilliant match and in hindsight, a black one would look better. Can't fault how well it's made though, and I can't believe that my pannier bag has stayed on after some of the potholes I've hit!



A more interesting change is the addition of a Stages powermeter. I wanted this as I'd got used to having one whilst on my summer bike and when I saw an Ultegra 6700 one in the sale in Evans I went for it. I chose a 172.5 silver one, thinking it would match the colour of my 6600 crankset, but Shimano's definition of silver seems to have become more grey and it doesn't match at all. I've got a 5-arm 6700 crankset now as well, but am waiting until the rings wear out on the 6600 before I swap it out.




Unlike my P2M and Powertap, the Stages has ANT+ and Bluetooth comms so it can be updated and tweaked using an app. This feature, along with the fact that all you need to do is swap the crank to fit it, its low weight, comparatively low cost and (so far) reliability make it a really good powermeter compared to the others that I have. Power measurement seems to be in line with my Powertap, but at the moment I've only got one Garmin so can't verify one against the other. It'd be interesting to get one of these fitted to my MTB though, hmmmm.

During a cold commute last week, I lost the front wheel on ice and managed to have a crash. No damage to me, but the Lynskey slid a long way and lots of bits got damaged.

The brake levers got a bit scratched and I was quite glad that I have the V-twin as the reservoir is well out of the way. I suspect that the integrated levers with the reservoir on top wouldn't have fared so well.



The rear mech and pedal took a bit of beating too. Amazingly, after I'd bent the cage back, the mech works just as well as it did when it was new. Being as 10s Di2 rear mechs are no longer sold and getting rare, I'm glad that I didn't break this.




Worst affected was the SLR saddle, the shell snapped during the impact and it's finished.



I can't even get rid of this on eBay, it's just scrap. Can't say I'm that fussed, I never really liked this saddle anyway and I've had it for 9 years already. It's going to be replaced with a Fizik Arione, as I wanted to try something other than an SLR for a change.

ledeev

I swapped the broken SLR about a week ago and have done about 150 miles on the Arione.

Can't say that I find it overly comfortable but suspect that it may be too far forward at the moment.

As expected the shell on the SLR had split, in two places.



The shell reckons it's made out of carbon fibre. I'm sure Selle Italia would argue it, but it looks more like it's made out of mere resin to me.

Annoyingly, the little clip that holds my front mudguard in place at the top succumbed to fatigue and failed yesterday. I now have an irritating rattly mudguard that is top of the list to be fixed. Didn't stop me achieving a KOM on a local climb that I've been after for a few weeks. With a pannier. In the dark. Gale force tailwind did help though.

ugo.santalucia

The chain is too short

ledeev

I've saving weight.

ugo.santalucia

Ledeev wrote:

I've saving weight.

I'd say you are crucifying the derailleur

ledeev

Noted. I think I meant to swap the chain when I put the 12-27 cassette on, but forgot to. It does explain why 53-27 is a bit noisy though, thanks for that. Chain is due for renewal soon so I'll get that sorted.

harry-s

Hey Ledeev.
Well, so far my Lynskey has been faultless, - I hope I'm not tempting fate here...
I'm still running the Archetype wheels, but also have a pair of Rolf Elans in a bag, which I'll put on for the last few weeks of spring, before swapping over to the summer bike. Like you, I've also put a pm on the crank, mainly just to help add some structure to winter training. I used 4iiii, so managed to keep the original crank.
I replaced the steel mudguard clip with a bit of nylon/UVPC plastic that I cut to shape, and it's been solid and rattle free.
Great bike, and I never tire of riding it. Metaphorically, obviously. Most of the time I'm shagged.

ledeev

Hi Harry,

That's good to hear - my Sportive wasn't right from the off and since it's been mended it's been fine. Interesting about the 4iii system, I've not seen that before. I've been impressed by the Stages PM, although I don't always use it for specific training, it's useful to judge exactly how I'm feeling or how windy it is and I've kind of just got used to it.

Good idea on using nylon - I've found a bit of aluminium sheet in a scrap bin that was going to fashion into a mount, but I haven't yet and plastic would give a more robust solution. On my Ribble, I never ever changed the front mudguard but I used to get about a year out of a rear mudguard before the mount under the caliper went, but the one on my Lynskey is on its third year, I must be getting used to mounting them properly.

harry-s

4iiii pm:

ledeev

I find it hard to believe that something like that would work that well, but I guess it does. Amazing. Did you send your crank away to have the device fitted?

Things have moved on since I bought my Powertap hub.

harry-s

Yeah, I know what you mean. It appears to be a battery holder and nothing else, as it's just marginally bigger than a 2032 battery. The electronics and strain gauges must be minute.
Yep, I had to send the crank away, the procedure goes something like this:
Buy the pm online
A prepaid fedex waybill arrives
Send off your crank
Crank is returned via FedEx with the pm fitted.
Whole process takes 10-14 days.

ledeev

In late March, after 3 years of trouble-free commuting with minimal maintenance, both brakes and the rear hub on my Lynskey cried enough and seized up. In spite of having the whole summer to mend it, I waited until the week before the clocks changed to actually do something about it.

I had a new SP8 hub and a Hope XC rear hub ready to go, as well as a pair of hard-anodised H Plus Son Archetypes in grey. I had hoped to recreate the look of the 2005 Mavic Crosscity wheels as I'd always liked them. To do this, I elected to go for black spokes and black nipples. Whilst I would have liked to tackle this myself, I didn't have any black spokes in my parts bin so decided to get Ryan the wheel-builder (http://www.ryanbuildswheels.co.uk) to do it for me. A couple of days later they were ready. They look fantastic and are superbly laced. Thanks Ryan!




From the outset I'd planned to update the Hope V-Twin and 6770 levers with the new Shimano Ultegra R8070 STI levers and, following the lengthy release period of the Hope RX4 brake calipers, a set of those. I'm sure that the R785 levers and Shimano calipers work just fine, but I really liked the aesthetics of the new R8070s and the Hope 4-pots. Probably the wrong reason I know, but Shimano rarely come up with a bad product and I used to run the Hopes on my DH bike so am happy with the modulation and power. The operation of the full hydraulics is a revelation compared to the old cable / hydraulic hybrid system.






There were two challenges with fitting the new levers and calipers:

1) The Shimano hydraulic levers are impossible to bleed without a bleed kit and the Shimano brake bleed cup. Just impossible. The fact that the RX4 caliper doesn't have a bleed nipple that you can fit a hose to compounds the issue. You just have to buy a bleed kit. Simple as that. It's easy then.

2) When I first plugged in the levers, the system didn't work. This wasn't a surprise so I updated the software on the deraileurs and shifters. It still didn't operate. With no way of doing a further software update I was forced to buy a PCE1 diagnostic device. Sure enough, the Junction A and the battery needed a software update too. After that, the system worked fine.



One of the great things about the R8070 levers is that they have a couple of buttons on top of the hoods that you can select to either change gear or change the mode on your Garmin. Not that I can actually do this as I don't have a Bluetooth interface or compatible Garrmin, but it's a nice feature anyway. In addtion, since the 6770 levers, Shimano have made the shift levers a lot bigger and more positive. This is a big improvement as the 6770 levers are a bit small for use with thick gloves.

Frustratingly, the bike didn't work properly and the green warning light kept flashing whilst riding. There was no consistency and it happened at random. After much faffing about and swapping of mechs and shifters, I found the issue to be the battery holder. I had a spare one so I swapped that out and the problem has gone away.

Another thing that happened this week is that I managed to pick up a piece of debris in between the front tyre and mudguard that ripped the mudguard off it's mounts. As the Lynskey has a long fork, I designed and 3D-printed a replacement in ABS plastic to replace the thin alloy sheet one I fashioned a couple of years ago. The new mount works well and is much more solid that the old one. You can see it behind the mount for the front light in the photo below.



The final thing swapped over the summer was the 6600 crankset for a 6700 compact crankset. The main driver for this is that I'm getting old and don't have the grunt to push over a 53/39 during the winter. A second reason was to match the 6700 Stages power meter that I bought a while ago. I'd already sent back my Gen 1, so was a bit surprised that the Gen 2 replacement went the same way over the summer. This unit was a bit of a disappointment as I'd only done 25 miles on it. It ate 3 batteries in 50 miles so I returned it. Stages were really good about it and sent me a brand new Gen 3, no questions asked. So far so good with the new one. Just a shame that the 105 doesn't exactly match the appearance of the 6700 crank. Not exactly the biggest problem though.

ledeev

I had an issue at the end of last winter where the Di2 battery would drain itself after every ride. This got annoying very quickly, so I swapped the front and rear derailleur, as well as the junction box and battery. This didn't solve it, so I set about swapping the wires. It turned out to be a defective battery cable.

Given that I was running Hope hubs from 1999, these weren't 11s compatible. I did some research and found that the Shimano 11-34 HG800 cassette is a 11s cassette that fits a 10s hub. All it needs is a medium cage rear mech, so I sold my 6770 mech and got a fancy R8000 one instead. Works well, although there are some big gaps in the ratios which takes some getting used to after a summer on 11-25. The 34-34 range is insane though, I feel like I could ride up a vertical slope.

Aside from that, the hub is making some weird noises, so I'll need to give that a service soon. Not bad for 20 years! I've been on my Lynskey pretty much every other day for the past three months. It's been pretty wet, but the bike has worked without fault.

ledeev

[img]https://i.imgur.com/vOHSXVT_d.jpg [/img]

After last winter, the Di2 system on my Lynskey developed a fault. Basically the battery drained itself after every ride. This got annoying very quickly, so I set about fixing it.

I'd planned to change to 11s, but as I had Hope Sport hubs (dating from 1999) that were 10s only the normal Shimano 11s cassettes wouldn't fit. Fortunately, Shimano make the 11-34 HG800 cassette which is an Ultegra level cassette that fits 10s road hubs. You do need a medium cage rear mech but I was swapping that anyway, so I picked up an R8000GS. Annoyingly, you have to swap the FD, so I swapped the 6770 for a 9070 Dura Ace unit. Incredibly, I sold the 6770 bits for a lot more than the R8000 and 9070 units cost, so this was a pretty cost effective upgrade. Interesting, the Dura Ace FD is a lot lighter than the old Ultegra unit. A lot lighter.

This didn't solve the issue, so I swapped the Junction A box too. This didn't solve it either, but it did allow me to plug the PCE1 in for diagnostics.

The next swap was the battery. I did away with the external unit and fitted a brand new BT internal unit. This didn't cure the problem, but it did clean up the look of the bike as I could lose the saddle bag.

Finally, I started on the wires themselves. It turns out that the wire between the junction B and battery was at fault, so I swapped it and solved the problem.

After all the updates, I've ended up with an almost entirely new drivetrain, which does work really well. There are some big gaps in the ratios, but the 34-34 bottom gear is insane. You could almost ride up a vertical cliff in that gear.

The bike has run smoothly otherwise, but the rear hub is making some nasty noises. I suspect that after 20 years, the pawls and springs are getting a bit tired.

One cool gadget that I bought was the Di2 bluetooth interface. Stupidly expensive for what it is, but it does tell me the condition of the battery, which gear I'm in and how many gear changes I've made.

ledeev

At the end of last winter, the Di2 system on my Lynskey developed a fault. Basically, the battery discharged itself after 2 hours, which became annoying very quickly.

As I had already planned to update the drivetrain to 11s, I decided to see if the problem was due to the derailleurs, so fitted an R8000 Ultegra rear mech and 9070 Dura Ace front mech. As the hubs were only 10s, I was forced to use an HG800 11-34 cassette which is compatible with 11s road, but fits on a 10s hub. It works, but the shifting isn't quite as crisp as with a smaller block and there are some big gaps in the ratios. That said, the 34-34 does give incredible climbing ability. Amazingly, I was able to sell the 6770 front and rear mechs for what I bought the R8000 and 9070 mechs for!

However, this didn't cure the fault, so I swapped the Junction A and the external battery for a latest-spec BT internal battery. Whilst this cleaned up the look of the bike and allowed me to plug in the diagnostic tool, it didn't solve the problem either.

Finally, I checked the Di2 wires individually and the wire leading to the battery turned out to be at fault. After I swapped it, the bike has run on the same charge all winter.

An additional gadget I fitted was a Di2 bluetooth module. It's ludicrously expensive for what it is, but now I can control my Garmin as well as monitor the Di2 battery level and which gear I'm in via the hoods. Handy.

Finally, at the end of last winter I suffered a huge number of punctures, so swapped tyres to the Panaracer Gravel King in a 26mm width. Not only do these have much more grip than the terrifying Gatorskins that I used to use, but they seem to be pretty puncture resistant too. I highly recommend them.