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kudos100 - Member
You still haven't given any evidence to say why really wide rims are better, other than speculating the average mountain biker will find them more enjoyable (whatever that means)...
OK you've resorted to trolling now.
You said they were not better. Where's your evidence for that for the "everyday rider"?
At least I have tried both and can give an opinion based on practical experience.
Epicyclo, wide rims for a large volume tyre, better climbing ability, comfort etc I can understand...what I object to is being told that they're 'better' and then not really being given reasons for that blanket statement.
A common theme on this topic on STW seems to be that wide rims and plus size tyres equal more grip which equals more speed....but this isn't borne out in the racing fraternity, larger tyres create more grip which is more drag which can actually hinder speed...as a more enlightened poster said (maybe you?) a racer has to reach a compromise between speed and grip and to that end wide rims haven't (yet) taken off in gravity based riding.
The DH scene played around with 3 inch Gazalodis back in the 90s/early 00s and dropped them when people realised you could go faster on narrower tyres as suspension became more effective....and that's about where I feel we're at currently, my suspension works so well it feels like I could run narrower tyres not wider!...just slinging on a plus sized tyre seems a crude way to generate grip, on a bike without suspension I can understand having to find grip any way you can but some are advocating plus size tyres on full suspension AM bikes and I just don't think there's the need, when I put a big tyre on the back it feels horrible....sure it grips but it's draggy as hell and requires noticeably more effort than when I have a narrower tyre out back.
My comments about uplifts and BPW were to highlight the growing popularity of this kind of riding, loads of 6 inch travel bikes are sold each year and new venues are springing up each year...just what is the 'everyday rider' now?...in the circles I ride in it seems to be the full suss owner who takes a holiday in the Alps once a year, books an uplift day a few times a year and enters the odd enduro race, I don't think that kind of bike or that kind of riding is niche any more.
pedalling steadily up and then descending as fast as we can
I'm sure this is what I've done since I started MTBing in the 80s, it wasn't invented by EWS
Deviant - the kind of riding you describe matches what I see ad a group as well. I've also seen some solid sales data from a couple of brands and media houses backing this category up as the fastest growing sector of UK mountain biking.
Back on topic, I'd say it's less about plus size and more gaining volume on standard size tyres, as well as stiffness gains from a carbon, wide rim with shorter spokes due to deeper section.
Personal experience backed up by clock times by me and others I ride with (sad I know!!) has shown a wider rim with the right tyre improves traction when descending off camber, roots and rocks, improving stability and allowing more speed to be carried over the section. There's also probably an element of tracking accuracy gain too in there I imagine.
Ultimately, what we've all found is a net gain - the element of theory driving that is not certain as there's several variables at play, but I do know the important bit is that for me and people I know who've done it, the time gains are there to be had.
It'll be interesting to see how B+ sussers do at the fast end of the market. I think fatter rims and tyres are doing a chunk of the job of suspension on a rigid bike, ie they reduce rolling resistance and add comfort/control. Add good suspension to the mix and I'm not sure how far you'd want to go, the sus is allowing the tyre to perfrom differently under different stresses that demand different tyres, etc. There's a limit to all these things anyway. It's been said that the best design can come from going past the point of 'good' to find the limit then return to the optimum, there's a balance to be had with all things on a bike.
andyrm is spot on about overall wheel stiffness and design also. You need one part of a bike to back up the advantages of another so the package works together. No point having a wider carbon rim and really grippy tyre attached to a flexy, too-soft fork that you can't push hard in a corner.
As someone who only very recently tried a tyre that wasn't a high roller, i'm not qualified to join in this heated debate. I'm only posting as this raised a smile...
This is STW, the home of the slightly potbellied (but can suck it in), greying, generally sedentary forum bashers, and the odd posturing trail park hero refugee from MBUK.
😀
deviant - Member
Epicyclo, wide rims for a large volume tyre, better climbing ability, comfort etc I can understand...what I object to is being told that they're 'better' and then not really being given reasons for that blanket statement...
You're approaching this from the viewpoint of faster is better, I'm approaching it from the viewpoint of the reassurance of more grip and more comfort is better.
Reasons have got to be subjective. No one does tyre testing on a bicycle tyre in the way that is done for performance motorbikes. Feel is all we have to go on, and having tried the wider rims and tyres, I I think they are better.
Roll down hills freewheel seem to be faster, but really that would need to be tested on identical bikes with different wheels and the same hubs to be able to be objectively measured. My 26" bike with wide rims and 2.8" tyres rolls faster down a hill than my mate's 26" wheeled bike with normal skinny tyres, but I have no idea of the details of difference in tyre construction, so it's not possible to claim they are faster based on that.
I still think your subset is much smaller than you think. Because your activity involves clustering and queuing you're going to see lots of like minded people, and the income required for what you are describing takes it out of the everyday realm for most folk on this island.
You really have to try the difference to appreciate it, but I doubt wide tyres are being made yet that would be stout enough for your chosen activity.
Part of the the problem with wide rims in the past was that the tyres were not there. A wide rim on a narrow tyre gets hammered because the tyre is squared off and there's no protection for the rim from the sidewall. A narrow tyre designed for a narrow rim but put on a wide rim is not very pleasant to ride because its profile is all wrong.
Epicyclo, I came into the thread to read opinion on the subject as although I'm unconvinced by wider rims I've been trying to keep an open mind.
Your riding seems to be more of the long and along style (which is cool) but you keep mentioning comfort over speed, I'm more interested in speed over comfort and don't know anyone that isn't, all of my riding mates (and people I see racing) want to go fast. My comment above was because you dismissed ENDURO/DH etc instantly as a niche subset when it's really not. I don't know anyone that's hacking along bridleways for hours on end, that includes friends of friends etc that I don't even ride with, I've yet to see an uber wide rim do well at an ENDURO or DH race and I've not even seen one at an XC race. Due to this thread (and mainly your comments actually) I've been almost convinced there's nothing in wider rims unless you're more interested in comfort over speed and/or riding in places that wouldn't interest the Stravaists/racers.
Here’s an interesting thought though – is the wider rim/increased volume of standard tyre “faster” not because of the physics of the rim/tyre being faster, but because it delivers a greater feeling of stability, therefore allowing a rider to push harder before hitting the cutoff point where they back off due to feeling unstable/losing grip? Thinking about it relative to my own experience, I wonder if that is what it is. Obviously + sizes are an extension of principle but I imagine they are on the opposite side of the bell curve of volume vs speed gain, in much the same way as Chris Porter recently found the tipping point for long/low/slack geometry and pushed it to a point where it was actually slower on the clock.
So many variables, so many perceived sensations of grip/speed/stability and of course so many other factors such as ride style, rider weight, suspension setup preference, etc etc etc. What we end up with is that for some riders (myself included), a wider carbon rim and standard tyre (of the right casing and tread pattern) works well to make us faster. For others, they don’t notice a gain. For others still, the gain is comfort or traction as a way of riding up things.
If the “industry” was driving this and all the pros were on them rather than just a smaller number as it’s so far been a bit of a boutique brand thing, there would be accusations of the lizard rulers of the earth forcing the paid riders to use the product to “prove” to us that we needed to buy them. But because there’s not a lot of big brands (who are the ones with money to pay riders) on it yet, we don’t have a lot of top guys on it. Which leads to the opposite argument of “well the top pros aren’t on wide rims yet so they must be no good”. Brilliant!!!
I think the big takeaway is to try for yourself and see how you get on. Sorry. Sensible post and all that.
I'm more interested in speed over comfort and don't know anyone that isn't, all of my riding mates (and people I see racing) want to go fast.
Fair enough, but you tend to hang around with people with the same interests as yourself. I don't know anyone who races DH or Enduro! I know a few XC racers though, because guess what - I've XC raced, and never DHed or Enduroed.
Your mates are not a good sample for analysing trends in MTBing as a whole, neither are mine.
Personally, I'm glad that different styles of riding are well catered for now. This is a fantastic situation for MTBing to be in, and much better than the old days when everything was XC race orientated. Something you've benefited from too, for sure because back then, DH was the fringe activity.
[i]You're approaching this from the viewpoint of faster is better, I'm approaching it from the viewpoint of the reassurance of more grip and more comfort is better. [/i]
And more grip and comfort usually results in been safer at the same speed - win/win for your 'average Joe'.
And more grip and comfort usually results in been safer at the same speed - win/win for your 'average Joe'.
More grip with reduced feel due to the larger volume tyre (and potentially lower pressures) isn't exactly a winner though. All the grip in the world is much good if you can't feel what's going on under you
[quote=andyrm ]Deviant - the kind of riding you describe matches what I see ad a group as well. I've also seen some solid sales data from a couple of brands and media houses backing this category up as the [b]fastest growing[/b] sector of UK mountain biking.Aye - but that could be 100% annual growth from a starting point of 2%. I'm sorry, but I'm just not buying the idea that 160mm FS bikes are the norm (even if we assumed that buyers were using their capability). The overwhelming majority of MTBs are used on simple tracks and never see air time.
Your mates are not a good sample for analysing trends in MTBing as a whole, neither are mine.
No, but opening my eyes and having a look around at the various DH/ENDURO/XC races I've been at, seeing what friends of friends etc are riding and looking around whenever I'm getting my trail centre on gives me a good idea about what works well for those of us interested in speed opposed to mincing about.
I love the tech side of bikes and if I thought it would offer an advantage I'd be onboard hence me being in this thread, for what it's worth I've tried things on bikes that were considered a bit different at the time, flat wide bars on a DH bike, anglesets before they were mainstream and was running Flows when everyone was convinced they'd die within 3 runs. I'm yet to be convinced uber wide rims are a real benefit.
monkeyfudger - Member
...Due to this thread (and mainly your comments actually) I've been almost convinced there's nothing in wider rims unless you're more interested in comfort over speed and/or riding in places that wouldn't interest the Stravaists/racers.
Actually I do think they are faster in practice (for me), but I haven't timed myself on a loop with them against the same bike with skinny rims etc, so it's not something I can state with sure knowledge.
My preference is based on comfort and better handling as felt by me - ie subjective. But I'm never likely to get to the speeds a gravity bike gets up to, so I have no idea how they would handle that.
[url= http://www.schwalbe.com/en/balloonbike.html ]I found this on the Schwalbe site.[/url] You may find it interesting.
(I use 2.35" Schwalbe Big Apples on my road bike, and it did not affect my average time on a day tour loop of 120 miles. I'm comparing this to the same ride on my fixie with 23mm high pressure tyres. They're a darned sight more comfortable on our chopped up roads, and hard braking is brilliant, no more skidding tyres. But that's riding at tour speeds and not trying to go fast. So I'm a fat tyre convert on the road as well.)
scotroutes - Member
...The overwhelming majority of MTBs are used on simple tracks and never see air time.
Bearing in mind scotroutes has extensive bike shop experience in various places, I think we can take his opinion as the definitive statement on what is everyday.
If I was to base my opinion on when I am mixing with other mtbers, I would think everyone rode singlespeeds or fatbikes, but I realise this is not a perfect world. 🙂
Too late to add to my previous post, but I remember a technical paper done in the 1960s regarding the benefit of using very narrow high pressure tyres on small diameter wheels on a bike with dual suspension.
It approaches the narrow/wide from the narrow side and with the emphasis on rolling resistance.
The bike was the Moulton, the wheels were 16", and the tyres used were I think silk tubulars.
What I took from it was that extremely compliant tyres are needed if they are narrow, and supple suspension is important to make a narrow tyre work effectively.
It's been a very long time since I saw it, but it's probably somewhere on the internet by now. I'll try and track it down. (It may have been written by Dunlop or Moulton.)