650B or 29er this helped me discuide so I thought I'd share!

http://youtu.be/oHGSrOu7-H0

good reasoned bit, especially go try some 🙂

Great hat!

Not exactly earth shattering, but a nice smary none the less.

Well its factually correct with apparantly no marketing BS.

Hooray.

I still don’t get the contact patch thing – for comparable wheels in terms of tyre, pressure, rim width, (& shape of course) how come 29 has a “bigger contact patch”? I don’t think size of the contact point between a circle and a plane is a function of the circle diameter.

Happy to be corrected on this!

@Matt… it’s because when you sit on a tyre it deforms and is no longer a circle…

That figures, thx.

Opinions are like arseholes. Everyone’s got one and they all stink.

Although what he says makes sense, I still prefer making my own mind up

how come 29 has a “bigger contact patch”?

‘s bollocks innit ?
Longer contact patch but narrower and same overall area if the pressure’s the same, no ?

No!

Bigger wheel bigger contact patch assuming the width of the tyre remains constant.

It might help to remember what psi stands for.

There may be second order effects, but if you are supporting 30lb on a tyre at 30 psi the contact patch is one square inch. Diameter doesn’t come into it.

Hijack – Roverpig – you don’t have an email. If you’re still dithering about selling your FF29 could you drop me an email pls. It’s in my profile. Ta

Nice brief summary.

I thought it was deep mud that increased the contact patch.

Oh its lovely he really looked liked he thouh it was a big deal

He even manage to say 26 at one point. Although of course they are out of the debate

He didn’t flinch when he said “650b spokes are allot shorter and stronger”.

Rover Pig I hate to sugest that say something that properly enters the debate but I think the theory is that 700c rim will give a longer thinner contact patch

But we won’t pause to wonder how people ever got round a corner on the ludicrously short contact patch of 26 inch wheel. Let alone became a world champion on one (what with the much lower top end speed)

He gets the most important advantage of 29″ which is rolling resistance. It knocks the acceleration of smaller wheels argument into a cocked hat.

That said he missed one rather important point… Geometry!

Which is why some 29″ feel a lot more like 650b than others and vice versa.