They do the Antares and Galaxa, the latter being more expensive but are sort of suspended allowing things to rock abckwards and forwards. So:

1) Does this make much difference? Might the cheaper ones encourage you to pedal more smoothly? I’ve used normal rollers and couldn’t sprint flat out on them anyway, not enough resistance, so I probably would not be doing so on these.

2) Do rollers knacker your rear tyre like a turbo does?

1) no idea I have the basic ones not sure why you would need anything more.
2) in my case more so than the turbo, never had any tyre wear issues on the turbo, rollers really shredded it so bought a training tyre.

Bump?

1) Yes. I pedal extremely smoothly (150+rpm with no bouncing, near enough 200 max, 30+ years of practice on the track and road, helps). The galaxia STILL rocks backwards and forwards about 1cm. On a normal roller i can see (on video footage) the bike rocking back and forth a small amount, you can’t actually feel it either way, but i suspect some one with a choppy pedalling style might have issues at higher cadences. Friends have actually maxed out the movement on the galaxia. Flat out, out of the saddle sprinting is possible, but not advised unless you have room to fall off 😉

2) Rollers aren’t as bad as turbos on your tyres as you move around a lot more. You don’t get the “hot stripe” down the middle of the tyre.
I still use a roller tyre as a) i had one and b) it’s quieter than normal tyre. I use a knackered old almost bald tyre on the front.

I only paid about €110 for the galaxia thanks to a pricing error. I was going to get the basic model (that was €10 more expensive!) glad i didn’t. In hindsight, i should have budgeted for the galaxia anyway.

I have the Galaxia rollers and don’t find that the setup adversely affects the pedalling rhythm. If anything it stabilises the whole thing as any shift in body position is absorbed slightly by the rockers. In relation to excessive tyre wear I’ve not noticed this particularly, that said I’ve just changed over to a new set of 4 seasons for winter so will keep an eye on this.

I’ve used normal cheap rollers and they were fine – I assume the Galaxia would be better if you were going for it but I don’t see myself doing that on rollers anyway.

So you think it’s worth paying the extra, basically? That’s what I want to know.

Re tyres.. hmm.. wonder if I should put trainer tyres on my track bike and use that since I don’t currently have spare wheels…

Not had experience of anything else but decided to get the Galaxia. If you’re used to rollers maybe the rocking thing is no big deal – supposedly for newbies its more forgiving of any faltering, I find it just makes the movement of the bike a bit more naturalistic, it seems to help the bike move naturally under you. When you’re ‘going for it’ it maybe, but even just sitting up a bit to scratch your nose, shuffling about in the saddle, changing your hand positions and so on, any shifts in weight feel more like riding and less like being on a fixed bit of apparatus.

Hmm… thanks.