question about tubulars

On Oct 23, 6:21 pm, "David L. Johnson"
wrote:
Dan Gregory wrote:
David L. Johnson wrote:

Of course all this begs the question of why you would bother with
tubulars this day and age, anyway. If you are near enough to the edge
of the performance curve to see an advantage, make sure your team car
carries spare wheels.

If glued on properly they won't roll off as clinchers do
:-(

The idea of tires rolling off is exclusively related to tubulars, not
clinchers. I've used both, and have rolled two tubulars, zero clinchers.

Why don't you trot out the other usual advantages proclaimed for
tubulars: that you can ride with them flat (not high on my list of
advantages -- with clinchers, you can repair the flat, instead), that
they grip the road better (how is a matter of denial of physics), that
they don't pinch flat (I donno, I've only gone 10 years riding clinchers
with, let's see, zero pinch flats).

Look at ads for tubulars. The big selling points are that they are
"round and straight" --- meaning that many tubulars are neither, and
that you should buy this brand in order to get what most people take for
granted with clinchers.

I used to ride wonderful tubular tires, Clement Campionato del Mundo
(sp?), or Criterium Setas. Clinchers, then, were just awful. Now, very
nice, light, supple clinchers are $30, and a halfway-round tubular costs
twice that.

Sorry, unless you've got that team car following you, I just don't see
the advantages.

--

David L. Johnson

OK..press on!!

'Merika...f__k ya!!(to quote a moovie line).

David L. Johnson wrote:
Dan Gregory wrote:
David L. Johnson wrote:

Of course all this begs the question of why you would bother with
tubulars this day and age, anyway. If you are near enough to the
edge of the performance curve to see an advantage, make sure your
team car carries spare wheels.

If glued on properly they won't roll off as clinchers do
:-(

The idea of tires rolling off is exclusively related to tubulars, not
clinchers. I've used both, and have rolled two tubulars, zero clinchers.
My glum expression wass due to the fact that I blew a front clicher on
the descent of a col and it did roll off as well as snagging the front
forks. Onlookers said I did a perfect somersault.
When I raced I suffered several punctures and flats on tubs. Never had
one come off, except once when I hadn't glued it on properly as I was
only riding across town. It brought me down as I sprinted away from the
lights at the Place de la Concorde. Interesting experience that was.

Qui si parla Campagnolo-www.vecchios.com wrote:

Prelube the spare and after you put it on and pump up..ride but be
careful about high speed corners..not as safe as a well glued one.

No, no. You lube the tapers on your cranks, not your tires...

--

David L. Johnson

Deserves death! I daresay he does. Many that live deserve death.
And some that die deserve life. Can you give it to them? Then do not
be too eager to deal out death in judgement.
-- J. R. R. Tolkein

Qui si parla Campagnolo-www.vecchios.com wrote:
Prelube the spare and after you put it on and pump up..ride but be
careful about high speed corners..not as safe as a well glued one.

David L. Johnson wrote:
No, no. You lube the tapers on your cranks, not your tires...

Lube your rims. That way you go faster when you brake.

On Oct 22, 7:47 pm, "David L. Johnson"
wrote:
Pre-glue the spare. I always used a tire that had been ridden on
already --- usually one that had flatted --- as my spare. If it is
pre-glued it sticks pretty well. As you fold it up to carry it, first
fold it in half and stick glue to glue. I would always then fold it to
be about 6" long and stuff it in an old sock.

Definitely pre-glue. Another way to fold a spare is in half, base-tape
to base-tape then in thirds tread-to-tread. Then place in a sock. I
can get two spares side by side in a Jann bag (Tufo uses the same
design).

We always continued the race after repairing a flat, unless it was
hopeless, like it would be in a crit. Heck, you gotta get back to the
start/finish anyway.

Follow vehicles should have your spare wheels in a road race. Chasing
back on for me was usually hopeless but not always. Not so hopeless in
a crit now with the free lap rule.

Of course all this begs the question of why you would bother with
tubulars this day and age, anyway. If you are near enough to the edge
of the performance curve to see an advantage, make sure your team car
carries spare wheels.

I race on tubulars until they go flat, repair them myself (unless I
feel Tire Alert can do a better job) then use 'em as training tires.
When they can no longer be repaired (up to three patches sometimes)
then they're given to a friend that turns 'em into door mats. It's a
system that's worked for me these past 20 years.

Greg Hall

On Oct 24, 7:45 am, "Qui si parla Campagnolo-www.vecchios.com"
wrote:
On Oct 22, 4:45 pm, "KV" wrote:

I'm new to tubulars and have a question about carrying a spare-is it
necessary to preglue the spare, and if so, how is it best to carry it?

Yes and just fold it up. I am sure there is a diagram somewhere..hold
end of tubies, turn each siude 90 degrees and fold..hard to describe,
easy if you see it..then secure with as toe strap under your saddle.

Or,

can you put the spare on using the residual glue on the rim-would this allow
you to continue with the ride/race, or are you pretty much done and have to
limp back? Any pointers/opinions appreciated.

Prelube the spare and after you put it on and pump up..ride but be
careful about high speed corners..not as safe as a well glued one.


Hi there.

The best thing about clinchers is that once you have repaired the flat
or changed the tube and reinflated it you are set just like you were
at the beginning of your ride and you do *NOT* have to *WORRY* about
cornering. This means you can ride the same way as you have been
unlike the in-the-field-changed tubular where you need to be very
careful in cornering and braking lest the tyre roll off the rim.

I like the feel of tubulars but like the no hassel ease of repair of
clinchers more.

Cheers from Peter

The best thing about clinchers is that once you have repaired the flat
or changed the tube and reinflated it you are set just like you were
at the beginning of your ride and you do *NOT* have to *WORRY* about
cornering. This means you can ride the same way as you have been
unlike the in-the-field-changed tubular where you need to be very
careful in cornering and braking lest the tyre roll off the rim.

Well, maybe yes, maybe no. For you & I, maybe yes. There's a good number of
people who don't bother (or can't figure out) with the required detective
work to figure out what caused their flat in the first place. So they put in
a new tube and have another flat down the road. And then possibly another.
Can't tell you how many people come into the shop complaining that "This is
the 4th flat I've had on this wheel in two days"...

--Mike-- Chain Reaction Bicycles
www.ChainReactionBicycles.com


"Sir Ridesalot" wrote in message
oups.com...
On Oct 24, 7:45 am, "Qui si parla Campagnolo-www.vecchios.com"
wrote:
On Oct 22, 4:45 pm, "KV" wrote:

I'm new to tubulars and have a question about carrying a spare-is it
necessary to preglue the spare, and if so, how is it best to carry it?

Yes and just fold it up. I am sure there is a diagram somewhere..hold
end of tubies, turn each siude 90 degrees and fold..hard to describe,
easy if you see it..then secure with as toe strap under your saddle.

Or,

can you put the spare on using the residual glue on the rim-would this
allow
you to continue with the ride/race, or are you pretty much done and
have to
limp back? Any pointers/opinions appreciated.

Prelube the spare and after you put it on and pump up..ride but be
careful about high speed corners..not as safe as a well glued one.


Hi there.

The best thing about clinchers is that once you have repaired the flat
or changed the tube and reinflated it you are set just like you were
at the beginning of your ride and you do *NOT* have to *WORRY* about
cornering. This means you can ride the same way as you have been
unlike the in-the-field-changed tubular where you need to be very
careful in cornering and braking lest the tyre roll off the rim.

I like the feel of tubulars but like the no hassel ease of repair of
clinchers more.

Cheers from Peter

On Oct 23, 10:06 pm, Dan Connelly
wrote:
Tom Kunich wrote:
1) They are really expensive and a couple of spare tubulars are heavier
and take up more room than a couple of spare innertubes.

Tubulars are generally race wheels, where you don't carry spares.



2) Finding good tubulars is a problem though not as bad as it used to be
before the advent of the internet.

Not a problem, at all, with the internet.



3) Unless you really know how to sew them back up after a repair, there
will be a hard spot in the tire that feels like a lump. And the tire
won't corner as well because of that.

4) Repairs of a sewup is a time consuming pain in the butt that no one
in their right mind would take on. Racing teams want the feel of
tubulars because they do ride smoother and that might translate into
less fatigue in a long race. But they also toss out tubulars that have
flatted - they don't take chances with a repair.

Generally, tubulars are restricted to race wheels, so the expense of replacing tires is considered acceptable.



The fact is that you can race better on $30 Michelin tires than you can
on $100 Clements.

Personally, the best riding clinchers I've tried are Vittoria Open Corsa Evo CX.

But the #1 argument for clinchers is, when paired with latex tubes, they have lower rolling resistance:http://www.biketechreview.com/tires/AFM_tire_crr.htm

The Vittoria's scored very well.

This is a quantitative advantage which is hard to argue against. Given this, why did I just get some Reynolds tubular wheels? They were much lighter than the clincher version, but hardly worth the difference in rolling resistance. I did buy Veloflex Carbon tubulars, which scored lowest for 20mm tubulars in the Tour rolling resistance test (different test data), but still, significantly more RR than the Open Corsa's. I suppose I succumbed to the usual arguments, and the lower weight.

Dan

The quantitative advantage isn't really that hard to argue against, if
you put it in terms of significance. In other words, just because the
difference is measurable doesn't mean it'll matter. For example, I
recently read a thread on another forum discussing the value of moving
the spoke nipples from the rim to the hub (ala Cane Creek wheels).
Everyone was yammering on and on about how much it affected the
rotational mass, etc... Someone took the time to crunch the numbers
and guess what, it saved less than a 1/4 of a watt of power during a
standing start acceleration. Falls clearly smack dab in the middle of
BFD!

Minimally measurable differences in rolling resistance is much the
same thing. BFD

Fred

On Oct 24, 12:04 pm, wrote:
On Oct 23, 10:06 pm, Dan Connelly
wrote:



Tom Kunich wrote:
1) They are really expensive and a couple of spare tubulars are heavier
and take up more room than a couple of spare innertubes.

Tubulars are generally race wheels, where you don't carry spares.

2) Finding good tubulars is a problem though not as bad as it used to be
before the advent of the internet.

Not a problem, at all, with the internet.

3) Unless you really know how to sew them back up after a repair, there
will be a hard spot in the tire that feels like a lump. And the tire
won't corner as well because of that.

4) Repairs of a sewup is a time consuming pain in the butt that no one
in their right mind would take on. Racing teams want the feel of
tubulars because they do ride smoother and that might translate into
less fatigue in a long race. But they also toss out tubulars that have
flatted - they don't take chances with a repair.

Generally, tubulars are restricted to race wheels, so the expense of replacing tires is considered acceptable.

The fact is that you can race better on $30 Michelin tires than you can
on $100 Clements.

Personally, the best riding clinchers I've tried are Vittoria Open Corsa Evo CX.

But the #1 argument for clinchers is, when paired with latex tubes, they have lower rolling resistance:http://www.biketechreview.com/tires/AFM_tire_crr.htm

The Vittoria's scored very well.

This is a quantitative advantage which is hard to argue against. Given this, why did I just get some Reynolds tubular wheels? They were much lighter than the clincher version, but hardly worth the difference in rolling resistance. I did buy Veloflex Carbon tubulars, which scored lowest for 20mm tubulars in the Tour rolling resistance test (different test data), but still, significantly more RR than the Open Corsa's. I suppose I succumbed to the usual arguments, and the lower weight.

Dan

The quantitative advantage isn't really that hard to argue against, if
you put it in terms of significance. In other words, just because the
difference is measurable doesn't mean it'll matter. For example, I
recently read a thread on another forum discussing the value of moving
the spoke nipples from the rim to the hub (ala Cane Creek wheels).
Everyone was yammering on and on about how much it affected the
rotational mass, etc... Someone took the time to crunch the numbers
and guess what, it saved less than a 1/4 of a watt of power during a
standing start acceleration. Falls clearly smack dab in the middle of
BFD!

Minimally measurable differences in rolling resistance is much the
same thing. BFD

Fred

some will argue that 1/4 watt IS significant but it is in the middle
of BFD...

Qui si parla Campagnolo-www.vecchios.com wrote:


Minimally measurable differences in rolling resistance is much the
same thing. BFD

Fred

some will argue that 1/4 watt IS significant but it is in the middle
of BFD...


The difference between the best tubulars and the best clinchers is on the order 5 watts at 50 kph.

Rolling resistance is typically 10% of power. So a 20% difference in Crr is 2% of power. If your bike weighs 2% more of total weight, that's 1.6 kg or so. How many would buy a frame weighing 2.6 kg instead of 1.0kg?

Dan