Introducing and looking for advice on a Cannondale Synapse

[n3bur]

Hi guys,

Looking for some weight-saving advice on a 2014 Cannondale Synapse Hi-MOD 3 Ultegra. I recently bought it second hand and it's been a great ride so far, although I was surprised and a bit disappointed after weighing it: 8.35kg. I'm a bit puzzled why it weighs this much. For example, this is the non Hi-Mod version and weighs less (7.8kg): http://road.cc/content/review/100210-cannondale-synapse-carbon-3-ultegra (it's a smaller frame size and is without the pedals but still)
Is it really necessary to go Dura Ace or Sram Red to really lose some weight? The Ultegra shifting to me is absolutely great.

Here are the main specs:

Frame & Fork: Hi-MOD 3 Carbon, size 58
Crank: Cannondale HollowGram SI
Chainrings: FSA
Group: Shimano Ultegra 6800
Wheels: Mavic Ksyrium Equipe s
Handlebars & stem: Cannondale c1
Seatpost : FSA SL-K Carbon, 25.4mm
Pedals: Ultegra

The mavics are an obvious first thing to replace (around 1700g) but even replacing it with 1300g wheels will only get me just below 8kg. Was also thinking about the c’dale spidering, even just for aesthetics.. I'm not going for superlight, getting it to 7kg would be great. What would you guys suggest, advice? Guess I'd better start removing that bell

thanks a lot
n3bur

[Frankie - B]

Welcome to the forum,

I'd go for the usual suspects first: Wheels, bars, stem, and maybe the septets. It might be hard to find a light one in that 25.4 size though.
after that look at the bottle cages.

May i suggest tubeless ready wheels? I've just put my first ride in on Reynolds assaults with Schwalbe one tubeless tires and I think they are seriously good.

[mrgray]

it is a tad heavy but the bike looks beautiful.

i echo comments from above but emphasise again the rubber. so light wheels (say 1.1 kg) with light rubber and you've saved 700 g. that's huge. handlebars and stem must be ridiculous for it to be 8.3 kg as must be pedals. (this for tubulars but similar story for clinchers except numbers not as good).

keywin pedals are like look and are 161 g for example. that's probably half what you have there.

whats the seat weigh? must be a tonne. lots of options out there that aren't bare carbon for !40 g or so.

what you need to do is know weight of your components, put it in a spreadsheet and then look at what could replace each component (as you go, not all at once) and what the unit cost is (how much money per gram of weight saving).

for me a light bike is about feel and it feels good! of course it is most important to not undermine the usability of the bike. thats sacrosanct! but yes, nice fun to try and lose a little weight and given it is 8.3 kg now almost anything will be an improvement.

however nothing wrong with ultegra i would have thought. mucking about with groupset might be the last thing you do. brakes have pretty high cost per gram i find and lets face it, they are important! and other stuff typically needs to coordinate. it is true however that for some coin you could save 200 g with lighter cranks.

[gilco]

beautiful bike, very nice colour

[kulivontot]

Wheels, cockpit, pedals, crank, and maybe the saddle are opportunities to shave big chunks of weight. You can always go with some of the smaller stuff that also adds up to surprising savings, ie: skewers, tubes, cable housing, bottle cages. When I switched from ultegra 6700 to sram it was about 300-400g. I'm guessing that monster cassette weighs a good 100-150g more than a xg sram 11-28 cassette.

[Powerful Pete]

Welcome. And yes, the list others have provided is what will knock the weight off. If budget allows, changing your wheelset will make a real difference.

[nonamed]

I have the same bike but my frame size is 54.

Recently I have replaced Ultegra 6800 for Sram RED22 (rear/fron derailler, cassette 11-25, brakes + shifters). I stick with SI crankset. I also have different saddle than stock - Fizik Ardea (264g) , 3T ergonova 38cm bar (I guess heavier than stock Cannondale C1 bar and Fizik Superlight bartape). Now my bike with two bontrager xxx cages & look keo blade pedals weight total 7.28kg .

Next step are wheels

[Tbird]

Interesting, i have the regular Synapse ultegra 3 in size 54, only thing altered is bars (Zipp Vuka Sprint) , wheels (Fulcrum Racing Quattro) and Tires (Specialized Turbo).

Weight = 7.49kg. (wo pedals)
Have a set of Shamal but never weighted the bike with them on, should be 300 gram less (7.19kg).

B.t.w. your bike is without a doubt the best looking Synapse i've seen.

Sent from my Sanwa M12

[n3bur]

Thanks a lot everyone for the kind replys and advice!
As mrgray suggests, it's a good idea to weigh and list every component and start from there. I'm just a bit hesitant to take the bike completely apart

@mrgray handlebars and stem are c’dales top of the line c1 components. Did not weigh them myself yet but from what I’ve found the stem should be 128gr and the bars around 240gr.
Seat is a Speci Romin evo, 274gr.
Pedals are Ultegras: 260gr
@kulivontot That is quite a big cassette indeed 11-32T at 292gr..

Already did some no-cost weightsaving by removing the double bar tape. I live near the Tour of Flanders area and any ride over cobbled hills is a torture for me anyway no matter how many layers of bar tape applied
Ok I'm off to the "everything wheels" section..

[mannequinforce]

Any updates or weight savings found on this rig? It's beautiful!

[n3bur]

Any updates or weight savings found on this rig? It's beautiful!

Well, I have been replacing some parts but mainly to get a good fit ->40cm handlebars instead of 44, also tried various saddles because of some back issues. Weight was not my primary focus, was just trying to find something that worked.
I did get some second hand Mavic SLE's last week, they were 1year old at half the price, seemed like a pretty good deal. Lighter and looks a whole lot better
It's now down to 7,42kg. That's almost a kilo and at least something I can really feel when riding.
Now on to searching the forum for some light rubber!

[stormur]

2014-2017 Synapse hiMod frameset is generally heavy.
Hard to believe that non HM frames came lighter. But on this forum even 58cm bikes on alu frame with Ultegra and 1.7kg wheels are below 7kg, so ...



Can't find any reason for such weight, disappointing were also paint quality ( clearcoat peeled off from looking at it ) and mess inside the frame ( wrinkled fiber, not cleaned from molding leftovers ) . generally quality of frame which I had was below any acceptable level. So get rid of it.

Mine Synapse with Record/SR and Dt Spline 38T + Veloflex Arenberg, 120g stem, 200g bar, 200g saddle 200g post + keo max weight around 7.5kg .