Not used flat bars since I biked as a kid in the early 90s. What would should I expect if I fit a pair to my Anthem for general XC and trail centre duties…other than it might look better with barends, which is one of the mail reasons I’m thinking of doing it!

Any noticable handling changes?

you might be further over the front of the bike with flat bars..

I’m presuming that your use of the internet and hence this forum means you are tall enough to reach the keyboard, which is presumably set at a height at which adults are able to access it. I would also assume that, given your adult status, you could work out that riser bars are a bit higher than flat bars, so changing to flat bars will lower the bits that you hold on to by a couple of centimeters.

So, no, no major handling changes.

go for the flat Salsa 17 deg bend ones — wouldn’t work with bar ends, tho

I use flat bars on my h/tail – speeds the steering up a bit & puts me(& maybe others)more in the “attack position”….so I feel like a racer …

i put a set of flat-ish atlas bars on my ht not too long ago, not sure if theyre working out?

Do your riser feel a bit high?
Do you have a load of spacers under the stem?

These are the only two questions you need to ask yourself.

Your weight will be more over the front wheel. you will be more bent over on climbs. Git bar ends for climbing leverage and more comfortable wrists when climbing.

Can change wrist angle a bit depending on what angle your risers were swept at and so force your elbows out more as your arms try to maintain a straight wrist-forearm alignment.

At least that’s my experience as I find that toward the end of long rides I’m wishing my flat bars were much more swept back so I could just lock my arms out straight on the final road section home.

Don’t discount wacky/semi wacky bars either

Dusty singletrack by rOcKeTdOgUk, on Flickr

Can change wrist angle a bit

That’s nothing to do with risers or flats.
That’s just the amount of sweep.
In general flatbars are available in a much wider range of sweeps* than risers are.
*Anything from straight to 45 degrees

Feels great. 740s.. Did get a few odd looks in the car park, but that’s probably down to the ancient frame (Patriot LT 2000) than the bars..

You will loose a bit of height as the riser lifts the hand position (hence the name riser!)…so your bar will feel a bit lower – depending on your current riser it might be a very small height difference or a lot.

Flat bars (that are very wide), tend to have a larger sweep on them, but they are very comfy…slap some bar-ends on and enjoy good climbing again.

You may want to replace your existing stem with a slightly higher rise one to return the bar height to how it is with risers…risers work but I suspect they are more a marketing ploy than any advantage over flats…it does tend to mean you need a higher rise stem to keep bar height the same but if you don’t mind the lower position then it will turn your bike into a rather fast looking weapon.

it does tend to mean you need a higher rise stem to keep bar height the same

So no point in changing then. 😐
The reason flatbars have come back into fashion is so that long travel forks/ 29ers can get the bar height back down to a reasonable level.

They never went out of ‘fashion’, just the marketing teams worked us into a froth for bent bars so they became less common.

singlespeedstu – Member
The reason flatbars have come back into fashion is so that long travel forks/ 29ers can get the bar height back down to a reasonable level.

Exactly the reason I fitted flat bars to my 16″ Scandal 29er. 😆

The reason flatbars have come back into fashion is so that long travel forks/ 29ers can get the bar height back down to a reasonable level.

This is also why my 5 sports flatbars, I find the front end too high so have a 0deg stem and flats. Risers were just a fashion thing for a start and the fact that flatbars at the time rarely came in widths above 580-600mm.

Flat bars on my 140mm hardtail, just balances things out nicely.

Mackem those bars seem to sweep forward rather than back. Am I imagining that or are you on to something no one else has thought of.

As an aside would a flat bar made of the same material with the same tube thickness and the same width be more flexy than the equivalent riser bar?

Mackem those bars seem to sweep forward rather than back. Am I imagining that or are you on to something no one else has thought of.

Would a flat bar made of the same material with the same tube thickness and the same width be more flexy than the equivalent riser bar?

looks like a ‘fish-eye’ effect thats causing the reverse sweep on those bars – unless they are on the wrong way! 😯

Aye, it’s a lense effect.

As an aside would a flat bar made of the same material with the same tube thickness and the same width be more flexy than the equivalent riser bar?

No, it’ll be fractionally stiffer.

No, it’ll be fractionally stiffer.

Is this because the bending process will stretch one side of the bend while compressing the opposite side?

Wow, Mackem, your riding 87 years in the future…

Are 29ers still around ? Is the petrol crisis still on ?

I tried 762mm & 711mm flats on my Niner but didn’t like them. Too stiff. Went back to good old non oversize low rise carbon bars. They flex a bit more, which I like running a rigid fork.

i’ve always thought risers make no sense from an engineering POV, you’re better getting the height from the stem and keeping everything straight (you can also use a long fork steerer but that’s slightly worse as longer path). that said, i run risers because i have an older frame and need the position, very few nice high rise stems around (Hope 25deg is one). also a riser gives a protected area in middle of bar for gubbins when you flip bike over or crash.

so risers are essentially a bodge fix for a frame geometry problem.
ideally, if you could custom make a frame for yourself, you want long steerer tube and the top of the steerer where the bars go?

note: all above is my own uneducated thoughts and could be bollocks.

I usually have my riser bars rotated slightly so the ends have a slight positive rise. This was the wierdest things going to flats – it feels like the ends sag downwards. Feels like my hands are going to slide off the ends of the bars… But you do get used to it. If your risers are horizontal at the grips then this wouldn’t be an issue. Just match the sweep…

Exactly the reason I fitted flat bars to my 16″ Scandal 29er.

Ditto. Just fitted some 710mm X-lites from CRC. Have a nice 9deg of back sweep which is the same as my Easton bars which fit me perfect.

I have Havoc carbon 20mm risers but 20mm rise over 750mm wide is not exactly a big rise. In fact it’s basically a flat bar with a few degrees of upsweep which feels just right for my wrists. All my stems are now 0deg rise so I only have the spacers to adjust the height. I just hate having a 10mm spacer above my stem at the moment as I refuse to cut my steerer any shorter than 200mm.

They never went out of ‘fashion’, just the marketing teams worked us into a froth for bent bars so they became less common.

Less common, less fashionable? Surely the same thing in this instance?