# Allez Cr-mo high speed wobble



## phil. (Aug 3, 2004)

Anyone else experience high speed wobble on their Allez Cr-Mo? I've got the Comp, completely stock and I get wobble above 35mph. I've tried the knees against the TT and that seems to help some but it still doesn't feel super stable. Any ideas/tips?

Thanks,
phil


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## TACSTS (Feb 4, 2004)

I doubt that your wobble has anything to do with the frame, sounds to me like it could be a loose headset, or severly out-of-balance wheels. Also I know that sometimes when people aren't used to going that fast on a bike, or maybe they've just recovered from a nasty spill and are still a little skittish of speed they'll stiffen up and make the bike handle poorly. After I had a particularly bad crash it took me a while to be comfortable at speed again, and I'd do just that, I'd stiffen up and have a death grip on the bars and it just made everything worse. After a while I realized what I was doing and if I'd just relax the bike handled great. But I'm not pretending to be an expert, just a thought. I have an Allez comp Cro-Mo and I LOVE it, and for the record I've been at 48mph on it and it was smoooth. Good luck and keep riding steel!


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## deluc6519 (Sep 21, 2004)

*i've found*

that almost everytime someone complains of shimmy it's user error or a position on the bike issue. we had a guy who complained of it above 40 on his roubaix i told him that maybe he needed to loosen up on the bike and he said oh it's so bad it will do it with you. so i did an extended test ride to this place i could get it up to 50ish. i soon as i got on it i could tell his position was too far forward putting too much weight on the front wheel (given we were close enough to the same size i didn't even have to change seat height). so when i came to the down hill i stayed loose and hit almost 50 shifting my weight back to a balanced position with no shimmy at all. we ended up doing a fit on him afterwards and haven't heard of any problems since. 

i would recomend first off making sure you stay loose, and if you are and it still does so get your postion checked, good chance you could be too forward.


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## phil. (Aug 3, 2004)

I'll check the headset before the next outting, I did flip the stem, do you know off hand if their are torque settings for the star nut? I know to loosen the stem and then tighten.

It could be a slight death grip as the last time it happened I got in a groove in the pavement. I gripped the TT w/ the knees and applied a little rear brake and finally it settled down.

Thanks, I was really wanting to hear from other cr-mo users to see if they had similar experiences or it was just me. I'd rather it be me than an inherent problem w/ the bike.

phil.


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## deluc6519 (Sep 21, 2004)

are you talking about the top cap or compression plug (takes the place of the star nut)? on the top cap it's just tight enough that it doesn't bind or have play (edit) it's really a feel thing more than anything. you want it to turn freely but at the same time not be so loose it's got play, if it's too tight the bike can devolp a mind of it's on and be a lot harder to ride in a straight line as for the compression plug i'll have to look and see if they have any numbers on that, it's got to be tight enough that it doesn't slip, but also not so tight it causes damage. 

enjoy the bike, we just got a frameset in for a guy yesterday and it surprised me. right at 4lbs for a 56cm steel bike and very nicely finished. now if i can just find one in my size.


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## phil. (Aug 3, 2004)

I might try a 10mm shorter stem to see if that helps any sometime. 4lbs for the 56cm frame, that doesn't seem too bad, I'm on a 58 but I got it as the complete bike and not just the frame. Thanks for the info, yeah I meant compression plug instead of star-nut (first carbon fork/steerer, not quite fully adapted to thinking about a fork w/ no star-nut).


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## iDFeat (Sep 10, 2004)

I've had my Comp Cr-Mo up to 52 MPH and it was rock solid. The other guys above had pointed out some of the most likely culprits, so check those items first. Let us know how things go.


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## bc165 (Aug 5, 2003)

*Two thoughts...*

I had a Lemond Zurich - 02 853 steel frame - and I used to get some nasty shimmy on that bike going over 40. could have been my position, but it happened with me a lot more on that bike than it did on my Abici (aluminum/carbon) or roubaix comp (all carbon). I believe there is a writeup on shimmy at Spectrum ??? cycle website... insightful, but doesn't change a whole lot.

Second, I've had several nasty experiences when I've ridden to the top of a big climb, stopped and waited for the others to regroup, eat powerbars, etc., then ridden down the other side after cooling off. As soon as I headed downhill, the windchill would cause my muscles to shake and that would cause the front end to wobble something fierce. Now when I get to the top of a climb I wait no longer than 5, at most 10 minutes, put a vest on - at minimum - and then head down.


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## stumpjumper69M4 (May 14, 2005)

*Shimmy on E5 S-Works*

undefined
I've got a 200 S-Works and back this January I was in a training race and tried to avoid a crash and sound came from the front end of bike after hitting a pot hole like a 3lb cannon! I immediately thought my tubular had blown as my bike started to jerk fierce from side to side. Upon examination there was no flat, no broken spokes, but my handle bar had dropped several centimeters and my fork was as loose as a goose! I then decided to have the fork examined by several folks including the Specialized sale rep for our area. After he stated the expansion bolt had a "burr" that neded to be removed, it was fixed for a short time. My shimmy problems are infrequent but are severe when they occur. Thursday night our bike club had our usual club ride and at miles an hour going down hill it started up again. Mind you I had gone down half a dozen hills around the same speed by this point but without the comotion. I tried to get the LBS to replace the fork or ask for good faith warranty replacement before the rep checked it out. I called Specialized directly today to complain and had no luck. If this issue is not resolved soon as it has been going on since January, I am going to disassemble the frame and ship to Specialized demanding a warranty. Keep in mind I have three bikes made by the company now, and I really love my s-works. But I have replace four expansion bolts since January now and i am now concerned that the bike could do this at any time and the steere tube could snap or something. Has anyone else had similar problems? To the starter of the thread, I feel your pain and what you are going through may have nothing to do with positioning but may be from the fork itself. Oh, I forgot to mention this force from hitting the initial pot hole crushed a few of the FSA bearing in the headset so you tell me if the headset absorbed that much of a blow that the fork didn't? At least the Specialized Rep didn't think so....
I need you folks opinion!
Sincerely,
bryan


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## phil. (Aug 3, 2004)

Well I've switched from a 120 to a 110 stem. This was done for fit reasons rather than trying to solve the wobble problem. I was in the LBS switching stems myself as they were busy, but I had the shop mechanic double check everything to make sure I didn't adjus tthe HS too tight or too loose, no problems. Earlier this week I had decided to test it out for wobble on the same hill it's happened two times on previously. I was able to get up to about 40mph and had no problems. 

I think my wobble was b/c I was too tense and a possibly the headset was a little loose and that caused some wobble. I'm glad it's finally stopped b/c I was always uneasy on decents when my speeds were approaching mid 30's.

Thanks all for the help/advice guys,
phil



iDFeat said:


> I've had my Comp Cr-Mo up to 52 MPH and it was rock solid. The other guys above had pointed out some of the most likely culprits, so check those items first. Let us know how things go.


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