It’s expensive and needs careful setup but the Apex 35 is top-quality, will easily see years of service, and is a great stem for trail, enduro, and even XC use. Bike stems connect the handlebars to the steering tube of the bike frame. Getting the right stem is essential for customising height and ensuring you feel comfortable on your bike. The height of your handlebars is one of the components that dictates your stance in the saddle, whether you’re more upright or seating more forward. Road Bike Stems You can get stems under 100g and they might survive for months if you’re a very light and careful rider. However, given that even the heaviest stems here are only a smidge over 200g and that most short stems are under 150g, whatever the price/design we really wouldn’t worry about weight. Especially if going too light compromises safety. How long are stems? With a rainbow palette of anodised colours, the Race Face Turbine R stem indulges your creative side. Whether you choose to go mild or wild, the sturdy forged and CNC’d body is stiff enough for the widest of bars and burliest of builds and even comes in a stubby 32mm length if you’re looking for a truly direct steering response. The gapless clamp holds bars securely and spreads loads evenly, while the rounded-off edges of the steerer clamp keep the opposing bolts away from your knees.

Best mountain bike stems 2023 – the best stems to sharpen up

When we talk about stem standards here, we’re primarily talking about compatibility with the streerer tube on your bike (measured in inches), but also the handlebar clamp (measured in millimetres).Old-school bikes had a quill stem. This was an inverted L-shape, with the shaft of the stem slotting down into the top of the fork’s steerer tube, and secured by an expander bolt with an (in most cases) Allen key head at its top. The Hixon, and the lighter, narrower bar Frazer XC combo, add an instantly futuristic look to your front end. They’re available to mimic fashionably short stem reaches and the latest versions extend span from 760 to 780mm. If the angle of sweep and rotation works for you the actual bar feel is really nicely balanced between accuracy and buzz damping control. Cutting straight to the chase, the pinstripe and crisp CNC vibe is either your thang or it isn’t. Truth be told, even if it is your thang, it may just simply not suit your bike. The swoopy, candy colour, gloss finish of certain carbon frames doesn’t lend itself to being paired with a chunk of lasered alloy. The standard size for most modern mountain and road bikes, with typical lengths of between 35mm and 80mm for MTB stems, 80mm and 100mm for gravel bikes and 90mm to 140mm for road bikes. 1 1/4in steerer, 31.8mm bar clamp Interestingly while carbon stems are a thing in the road world, very few have dared creep onto the dirt and even then they’ve stayed firmly on the lightweight mountain bikes. What are specialist stems?

Bike Handlebar Stems | MTB Stems | Chain Reaction

While a basic cold-forged stem with a bar clamp at one end and a handlebar clamp at the other is all anyone needs, some people like to be different. If that’s you, then USE’s ingenious jigsaw puzzle stem is a light and trail-worthy way to bolt your bars on. The steering response with the Apex is very good and we found it feels solid on the bike. There’s a slight amount of torsional flex, especially when really wrenching on the bar, but on a stiff, carbon-framed e-MTB with carbon wheels, a little bit of flex is no bad thing as it improves ride feel. Using a clever preload system you can adjust your headset preload without the need for a top cap or star nut. It may seem like a catastrophe waiting to happen, but if the EDC stem is burly enough for Rémy Métailler, it's burly enough for any of us. The Squamish-based BC outfit is only currently offering the EDC stem for 35mm bars and in 30 or 50mm lengths. How to choose the best mountain bike stems How much should I spend?The Giant has a 100mm stem on just now and longer reach bars, you can see with getting a 60mm stem I would get the reach down to 510mm and with compact bars the hoods would be closer too, I think 10mm here and there will be fine, I'm not an inflexible cripple yet...

60mm stem..will I die? | Forum | road.cc 60mm stem..will I die? | Forum | road.cc

What we really like about the Race Face Turbine R35 is that it’s pretty stiff for a lightweight machined stem. Even with a matching 800mm Next R bar fitted, the steering feels precise and immediate, with just the right amount of resilience. Perhaps the main USP of the Burgtec Enduro MK3 is that it is available in a 42.5mm length. It may sound daft and all rather Princess-and-the-pea, but a couple of mm here and there with stems can certainly be felt by experienced riders. So if you’ve tried 40mm and 45mm stems and not quite gelled with them, here’s the (42.5mm length) stem for you! On that note, you can also change your stem length to adjust the reach from the saddle to the handlebar. A shorter stem will reduce the reach and provide a more upright position, which might help if you’re feeling too stretched out. On the flip side, if you’re feeling cramped on the bike, using a slightly longer stem will increase the reach. Mountain bike stems are typically around 50-80mm long, while road bike stems are longer, starting at around 80mm and extending to 120mm or longer as the frame size increases. Gravel bike stems typically sit somewhere between the two.We’ve covered stems that are available in lengths from 25mm up to 100mm. We concentrated mostly on shorter reach units as that’s the most common upgrade switch for more responsive, lighter feeling steering. We’ve covered both 31.8mm and 35mm handlebar diameter stems too. Are shorter MTB stems better? On that note I think I could cope with a 70mm stem if you think the handling would be mad with a 60mm.