Even though I think I have a pretty good basic understanding about bike geometry, I still get hung up somewhere between the columns of numbers and the feeling in the seat of my pants. Seems almost impossible for me to make "riding" sense out of all that data. Even when you can find different manufacturers that actually quote the same measurements, you can't be really sure they're done the same way. No matter how hard they try to explain it to you.(scroll down on that link)


Case in point - Just try to compare numbers on frame geometry between the Gary Fisher RIG and the C'Dale Caffeine :
















Fahgetabahdit

Absolutely impossible. Only 1 or 2 of the metrics are the same.

The proof of the puddin' is always in the ridin'.

It'd be nice to line up the bikes you're comparing or considering to buy next to each other live and in person, but that isn't practical for the most part. Heck, I wanted to line them up next to each other in my own home since I've had them, but couldn't seem to make the time. It's always more fun getting your RideOn than thinking about all this jibberish anyway.

Then I got a brainstorm!!!!!!! Well........................ Maybe not a full on storm, but more like a graupel laden thundershower :

Take pictures! Yeaaaaaa. That's the ticket.

Now I know a whole lot more about photography than I do about frame geometry, and I know the photo technique on these shots sucked. Better lighting and a longer focal length would be a big improvement. But bear with me, it's something I whipped up in a flurry last night.

The camera was on a tripod 30 inches high, and 92 inches away from the bikes. Those #'s are totally insignificant, but they were consistant and hence reproducible.


Throw up a green screen behind the bike and voila' :


















The green screen just makes it easier to clean up the background :





No, that isn't some fancy new double spoke pattern. It's just shadows, silly. I already told you my lighting was rushed and haphazard.









Then you (or me as the case may be) can draw lines, doodles, and other funny faces all over the image.

















Which can then be stripped, observed, and pondered. I'm overwhelmed by all the deep, intellectual, mind-numbing, thought processes that could be inspired.




All pretty cool stuff.

But not as cool as being able to overlay the metrics/geometry of your many bikes(s) on top of each other!


We'll do just that in part 2.

Now imagine, if you will, a standardized and AVAILABLE database of ALL two wheeled vehicles that you could (with a click or two of a mouse) - overlay, compare, and ANALyze ad nauseum.

My goodness - a veritable orgy of stripped down bicycle graphics and dimensions. Here I sit beside myself in awe of the potential ramifications.


RideOn

JB