In lockdown I bought a trendy gravel bike of eBay with a 72.5 degree head angle. There’s lots of things I like about it- ability to run big tyres and guards, straight line stability, disc breaks, but I’m not in love with the way it corners.
On my road bike you pick a line, lean into it and it feels like the bike pulls you round the corner.
There are a bunch of other variables other than head angle. The gravel bike has longer chain stays, more bb drop, a very slightly shorter top tube, fork with slightly more rake. But all of those are hard/impossible to change so I thought I’d try an angleset first.
Anyone have any experience steepening things up?
Thanks
Hummmm... looks like I’m going to have trouble finding an angleset that’ll work on a 200mm headtube. Most only go up to 140mm or so. Can’t find any specs on the Cane Creek, does that work in a different way?
Thought about moving the saddle fwd, maybe +10mm on the stem? Might give you a more road-like cornering feel. 72.5 should corner well enough as it is.
What does the offset work out as compared with your road bike?
Higher rake should go some way to offset slacker headtube.
72.5 is already pretty steep, especially for a gravel/tourer. As others suggest, have you looked at other comparisons to your road bike? Rake ,wheelbase, stem, etc.
As per jameso - I'd try and get forward with a longer stem, slide the seat forward a bit if needed.... and drop the bars lower if possible. 200mm is a long headtube, especially if there's spacers and or a big conical headset top cap under the stem. What size is the bike?
On the other hand, that's making it more like a road bike than a gravel bike. As it's a gravel bike it will handle differently as it's got different intent.
I am not gravel biker but hopefully you tried if offroad and in its element as it may have been designed around this.other answer is you will get used to it.i have zero gravel bike experience though.
It is built to be a bit less responsive/more stable as most people prefer this on a looser surface.
You are after the same things I like and a road bike than takes big tyres would probably do it for you. I just don't bother with the large tyres.
Is it the size of the tyres and psi that's making cornering feel different? As above, it's not radical.
What size stem and width bars do you have?
Thanks all, yes it's a big bike, but I am 194cms.
I wanted a road bike for South West Scotland where the roads can get suddenly quite off-roady, especially if you're out exploring. So essentially I am trying to make the bike more road friendly. Sliding the saddle forward and maybe dropping the bars a bit do sound like a good ideas. I think I'll see how I go with 32mm tires, as opposed to the 40s that are on there at the moment.
First check the headset bearings
Good point big John, I will. I had a bike with a speed wobble that was caused by a bad headset.
Bars higher?