Your aero road bike is obsolete!

Not really 🙂 But it looks like the UCI are set to scrap the current 3:1 rule…

http://www.cyclingweekly.co.uk/news/latest-news/uci-set-to-scrap-rule-limiting-aero-bike-design-281563

Not sure what they’ll replace it with but could well see some quite different looking bike designs coming soon. I think the experts reckon about a 7:1 with a truncated foil is optimal for bikes.

Nestle have yet to comment on how this might impact the sizing of their confectionary.

Interesting, I wonder if this is in some way the UCI giving some ground after this summer’s abysmal competition trialling of disc brakes…

I hope we get to see some whacky NACA derived shapes in TT bikes by this summer.

Funny really as it’ll have a much greater impact on performance than disc brakes!

Think there still needs to be triangles but there’ll be much less open space.

“according a person familiar with the matter”

They should get rid of the tube attaching headtube to bb rule too.

more bikes like this please.

So what has happened to the disc brake trials?

Funny really as it’ll have a much greater impact on performance than disc brakes!

I agree.

Imagine if ITT stages in grand tours became a bit more of an aero shootout?

I would dread a gusty day on a Uber aero bike…

Will be interesting. With aero advances the smaller less powerful guys have been closing the gap on the bigger more powerful riders. This will further favour the smaller guys who already have a small CdA where the bike is a larger overall proportion of that CdA.

and the crashes will be hilarious as soon as the little guys get a cross wind

and the crashes will be hilarious as soon as the little guys get a cross wind

I suspect we’ll see thinner bikes.

cloudnine – Member
So what has happened to the disc brake trials?

Somebody fell off and was sliced up by the nearest disc brake bike which was about 1km and not involved with the crash. Then followed a long dance around some handbags and a couple of short Internet threads. They are restarting the trial I think. Imagine if mtb had been so restricted.

I have an uber aero bike (one which isn’t UCI legal – though I live in hope that they might scrap other rules and it becomes legal again 😉 ), and it’s fine. With normal section wheels that is – it’s deep section front wheels which cause problems in the wind. OK, so in a strong cross wind you do tend to lean into the wind, but then you do on any bike, and I swear there’s actually a sail effect propelling you forwards with the wind in the right direction.

Imagine if MTB introduced new components with no performance benefit simply for marketing purposes. Oh hang on…

Imagine if MTB introduced new components with no performance benefit simply for marketing purposes. Oh hang on…

yep like disc brakes… or wider bars or longer bikes or different angles. As much as people drone on about marketing a lot of stuff just works well these days, part of that is through the freedom to try it at the highest levels – take a look at the Hope bike that has been raced in EWS, only about 30% is probably off the shelf kit. SRAM seem to have owned the vastly expanding 1x market by starting with a clen bit of paper in many ways.

er, whoosh

yep like disc brakes… or wider bars or longer bikes or different angles. As much as people drone on about marketing a lot of stuff just works well these days, part of that is through the freedom to try it at the highest levels – take a look at the Hope bike that has been raced in EWS, only about 30% is probably off the shelf kit. SRAM seem to have owned the vastly expanding 1x market by starting with a clen bit of paper in many ways.

Disc brakes are a big change but I would think things like a couple of degrees of geometry, widers bars, 1X etc,. could be used within a UCI road event with no issue?

but I would think things like a couple of degrees of geometry,

Up unitl the end of 2015 things like seat angles had their own rules from the UCI!

First up, the UCI is providing a 5mm extension to the 300mm saddle length limit. This isn’t actually a change of the rulebook but it’s an allowance for a 5mm margin of error on either the front or back of the saddle. Minimum saddle length remains at 240mm, however.

The more interesting and important change to the saddle rules comes with updates to the tilt or “flatness rule.” Originally, saddles were not allowed to tilt more than 2.5 degrees and included a 0.5 degree margin of error. But the new rule extends the passable tilt angles to nine degrees with one degree margin of error either up or down.

Read more at http://velonews.competitor.com/2015/12/bikes-and-tech/ucis-ball-breaking-saddle-rules-updated_390652#gQj523ogXJuMTAUD.99

and some more
(not sure on effective dates)

1.3.013 The maximum height of the hand support point shall be level with or below a horizontal line passing through the horizontal plane of the saddle top. This point of support may not be situated behind the axis of the steering column.

The overall length [forward projection] of the handlebars may not exceed a limit set 15 cm forward of a vertical line passing through the front wheel spindle.

1.3.014 The distance between the lower bracket spindle and the ground (DA) shall be between 24 cm minimum and 30 cm maximum.

1.3.015 The distance between the vertical passing through the lower bracket spindle and the front wheel spindle (AB) shall be between 54 cm minimum (see article 1.3.019 below) and 65 cm maximum.

1.3.016 The distance between the vertical passing through the lower bracket spindle and the rear wheel spin-dle (AC) shall be between 35 cm minimum and 50 cm maximum.

1.3.017 The distance between internal extremities of the fork shall not exceed 10.5 cm and that of the rear stays shall not exceed 13.5 cm.
http://www.slowtwitch.com/mainheadings/techctr/ucirules.html
http://www.lambra.org/docs/BikeMeasureForCommissaires101.pdf

Meh, those aren’t aero road bikes – this is an aero road bike:

I suspect we’ll see thinner bikes.

Good, so we’ll finally start getting some decent 1″ steerer forks available……..

Of maybe even 7/8ths……

Quite likely. Probably see more stuff like this Argon 18 concept…

… but maybe without the pitot!

They should get rid of the tube attaching headtube to bb rule too.

Or maybe the top tube. This was also quite fabulous…

Again, very narrow, a 26mm wide head tube…

More about it here[/url].

cloudnine – Member
So what has happened to the disc brake trials?

They are going to trial them again next season apparently

mrblobby – Member

Quite likely. Probably see more stuff like this Argon 18 concept…

I think the UCI have a long way to go before they start allowing bikes with integrated guns

so we’ll finally start getting some decent 1″ steerer forks available……..

I hope not, the full carbon 1″ forks I had flexed more than a Flexstem. Bloody light though.

I’m not totally convinced loosening the aero regs is such a good idea, we’ll just end up with more stupidly expensive one off bikes that favour the people with more money.

Given the progress in the understanding of bike aerodynamics, it would be interesting to see whether the Lotus bike still stacks up against the latest research

As for the disc brake fiasco – I know the headlines were about the cut leg, I would place money on the real reason for the halting the trial was related to the perceived amount of time it took to change a wheel (pros lose their minds trying to change a rim brake q/r wheel following a puncture at an inopportune moment) and the fact that the ‘magic spanner adjusting the brake caliper’ could no longer be deployed after a puncture

That Lotus and GT bike are both vom!!! Vile…

If they keep going will they end up giving people their records back. 🙂

aracer – Member

mikewsmith » Imagine if mtb had been so restricted.

Imagine if MTB introduced new components Baggy clothing with no performance benefit simply for marketing purposes. Oh hang on…

FIFY given that this is an aero thread! wonder if skinsuits will be allowed back for DH?

As for the disc brake fiasco – I know the headlines were about the cut leg, I would place money on the real reason for the halting the trial was related to the perceived amount of time it took to change a wheel

If only they could conduct a trial and find out….

I hope not, the full carbon 1″ forks I had flexed more than a Flexstem. Bloody light though.

Oh, i don’t want to race them, i just want something to replace the aged, and now unrideable carbons in my old race bikes.

i just want something to replace the aged, and now unrideable carbons in my old race bikes.

Something like this?

http://www.wiggle.co.uk/columbus-minimal-road-forks/

If only they could conduct a trial and find out….

They did there was a concern and they stopped the trial to investigate. Once findings are in and understood then they will make a decision to continue or not. I really can’t see a problem with this approach.

On the Lotus bikes I’m sure Hutch said it was still okay performance wise, but not as good as the very latest bikes.

Pretty much, yeah. They go in and out of stock like nobodies business. That’s what i already have on one of the old bikes. But need a couple more.

I bet by the time i have the cash for them they’ll be out of stock again. Unless i’m the last luddite.

How are they unrideable, and what has age done to them?

They are ancient, chipped and scratched into the base carbon in several places (storage damage and some crash damage) and really really old. The one that i replaced, one of the bonded dropouts actually came away in my hands when i took the front wheel off. The others all creak and crack ominously. They are all bonded construction. All early/mid 90’s.

They’ve also had a really hard life, i’d guess that all of them are 50000km or more, and one or two seasons of racing then the same again training. That’s probably why i’ve still got the bikes, if they weren’t so knackered they’d have been sold on by the team.

Some of the new Orbea aero (and TT) bikes have 1 inch steerers, not sure how they would look on an older frame though. They tend to have the current vogue of bow legged forks, and I’m not sure how you would go about getting just a fork.

I’m not going to worry about it much now, riding is somewhat tricky at the moment, and the bikes that need new forks spend most of their time in storage…..

A glimpse of the future… 😯

http://road.cc/content/tech-news/204767-wow-diamondback-reveals-“-fastest-triathlon-bike-world”