Hmmm, It's all kind of relative to ones weight and the load carried. I'm riding the 700x47 Schwalbes now at around 60 psi probably only 50 psi today and I currently weigh 257. When I get to hills I gear down....flats find me in the 44x18 or 44x16.....not sure what that is right now. Not sure of my speed either. I took my speedo off a couple years ago. I do use a wrist watch and I seem to get where I want to in about the same amount of time. In the spring and summer I run 700x40 Supremes and they feel a little faster on the hills. I find I can use a cog higher gear with them. My Simple One sports lighter rims and T- Serve 700x35's and its definitely easier to pedal up hills until I run out of "gearing" (51" and 66") I sure do feel (my) added weight when I approach hills but I don't worry about wheel weight that much. I end up breaking lightweight rims and popping skinny tires plus my bike takes a beating if I ride them too much. For me there is a certain confidence that I get when using parts that are a little overbuilt. Go wide with pride ! Oh yea ! I always wanted a bike with disc brakes living in rainy Washington State but I haven't thought of the drawbacks now that you mention bent discs.
On Mar 10, 2:48 pm, PATRICK MOORE <bertin...@gmail.com> wrote: > I just pushed the Fargo 19 rolling-hilly miles around Rio Rancho, NM > with the SnoCat/Big Apple wheelset at about 30/35 -- much higher and > the bumps start feeling as if I'm riding 23s at 120 (that is a slight > exaggeration, but seriously, I've found that the fatter the tire, the > harsher the ride if you overinflate); this after having let the > heavyweight wheelset sit for weeks while I rode the Rhyno Lites with > the new 330 gram, 35 mm Kojaks. I must say that the combination of 800 > gram rims with 800 gram tires (both rim and tire are the "Lite" > versions) and 200 gram tubes makes a, ahem, difference -- a 3 1/2 lb > difference between the two wheelsets, I estimate. This wheelset is > wonderful on sandy terrain and it rolls very well on the flats, both > on pavement and on choppy but firmish dirt, but as soon as you > encounter an incline, man do you feel that weight! I emphasize: the > Big Apples roll very, very will for such a wide carcass with a > protective belt -- I push along on the flats on firm surfaces in a > 46/20 for a 67" cruising gear, compared to 70 to 75 for a road bike > with nice tires. But again, tilt upward, and wham, gravity intervenes. > (Btw, Newton posited "gravity" as a placeholder for his theory; a mere > name to signify that one body moved toward another in proportion to > their respective masses; but he said quite explicitly that he had no > idea what cause, if anything, was behind this word and, further, he > says explicitly in the Principia that "action at a distance" -- ie, > physical action without actual contact of bodies -- was, quite > literally, unthinkable.) Whatever "gravity" may or may not be, those > BA and SnoCats sure feel like cold molasses on uphills. > > Long windup. Those of you who ride 60 mm Big Apples or similar tires: > how do you find them on hills? What pressures do you use on pavement, > and what is your weight? -- of course, that decides how firm the tire > has to be. Would I be better off with lighter and narrower rims (wish > I hadn't sold those Salsa P35s!) at the expense of less sidewall > support? > > The new 42 Noodles felt noticeably more "natural" than the 46s they > replaced. More generally, the Fargo is set up very nicely: it feels > very "natural" even though the bar is some 4 to 5 cm higher than on > the benchmark Rivs. On pavement I spend most of my time in the hooks, > for with the bars this high, even the hoods seem rather "tippy" unless > I bend my elbows, a natural inclination. > > The BB7s are powerful but lack the nice, smooth and easily modulated > control that good cantis have -- by good cantis I mean either old > Shimano wide profiles or those IRCs that Riv sells. And you have to > keep bending the g-d disks back into plane, at least if, as I do, you > very frequently carry the wheels off-bike in the back of your car. I'd > prefer a bit more weight and thickness for disks that didn't bend out > of plane so easily. OTOH, with riding in sandy soil and swapping > between 44 and 27 mm wide rims, the disk system makes up for its > defects, at least for my taste. > > -- > Patrick Moore > Albuquerque, NM > For professional resumes, contact > Patrick Moore, ACRWhttp://resumespecialties.com/index.html -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "RBW Owners Bunch" group. To post to this group, send email to rbw-owners-bunch@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to rbw-owners-bunch+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/rbw-owners-bunch?hl=en.
