WHAT DOES MY BIKE REALLY WEIGH??

[Karma]

Hi Weenies,
Have any of you run into the following situation? I custom specified my Giant carbon bike and the store did all the assembly. When I received it I had no chance to weigh the individual components. At that time, I did not have a scale that could handle up to 16 to 20 lbs. to weigh the full bike.

So I took the bike to my local high end bike store and asked if they would weigh it. They had a spring scale hung in the middle of the sales area which looked like if could do the job. The weight came out to 15.5 lbs. I was happy because I expected closer to 16 lbs. A few weeks later, I bought a digital hanging scale (see my post, "Scales, I Need Scales") after a fair amount of research. I took my new scale to work to test its accuracy and found it to be right on the money.

You know the next part of the story. I weighed my bike and found it actually weighed 16.12 lbs. In other words, the bike store scale was over .5 lb optimistic. I called the store and related my sad tale. They were indifferent claiming the scale was offered as a customer convenience and accuracy was not guaranteed. OK, granted.

Here's the bottom line: be careful of scales of which are not of confirmed accuracy. At least I now know how much my bike actually weighs even if it is not as little as I would like.[/b]

[popawheelie]

What good is a scale if it's wrong? You could take down to the local bar and have them guess. I guess the only thing dumber is the people who keep the stupid thing.
I think where I weighed mine was accurate. I took it to the post office.
I took the front wheel off and changed the angle of the seat so it would sit upside down on the seat.

[Glia]

I went online and bought a scale on EBAY for $25 that can handle up to 30lbs. It is made to handle postal stuff and you can convert it from lbs/oz to grams. Resolution is 2g up to 1000g and 5g above. It is called a
"My Weigh LS-30" and there is lots of them new on Ebay for that price. Next I modified an old microphone stand that I had from Radio Shack (these go for less than $20 also) that has a round heavy metal base and I put a clamp on it to hold the frame. In fact, you could use one of those cheap microphone clamps for that purpose. I put the stand on the balance, press the TARE button to zero the display then hang my bike on it. Its a bit ticky to balance the whole thing but once you have it you have a reall accurate weight. I used several calibration weights that I took home from work and the scale performs to specs. That is even with the bike on, if I add a 100g calibration weight the displayed weight goes up by 100g.
It is true that essentially ALL manufacturers lie about the component weights. They are an average of 20% off. So beware.

[Xterra Racer]

Glia.....can you post a picture of the system you rigged up???

[Glia]

Hope this works
<img src="http://prod.bsis.bellsouth.net/coDataImages/p/Groups/26/26548/folders/89604/782814balance-1copy.JPG" width="470" height="327">
<img src="http://prod.bsis.bellsouth.net/coDataImages/p/Groups/26/26548/folders/89604/782825balance-3copy.JPG" width="470" height="215">

[Glia]

Here's a closeup