Which tyres are best?

"Smudger" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
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Quoted message said:

Budget is £14 to £25 per wheel.

700x23c

Mainly road - fast leisure riding and training.

Michelin Axial Pro or Pro Race if you are feeling racey !

Graham

Smudger said:

Budget is £14 to £25 per wheel.

700x23c

Mainly road - fast leisure riding and training.

Vittoria Open Corsa CX TT ...I dunno if its the very best but it's excellent and fits the bill.

~PB

"Pete Biggs" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
"]news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

Smudger said:

Budget is £14 to £25 per wheel.

700x23c

Mainly road - fast leisure riding and training.

Vittoria Open Corsa CX TT ...I dunno if its the very best but it's excellent and fits the bill.

~PB

Good tyres ! But I found them a bit soft, though very comfortable.

Graham

Smudger <[email hidden]> wrote:
: Budget is £14 to £25 per wheel.

: 700x23c

: Mainly road - fast leisure riding and training.

That's a big range in cost.

At the top end, I'd go for some Axial Pro Race. Very, very nice tires. You can get them for 25quid
each mail order. Very fast, corner nicely and are very puncture resistant for race tyres.

At the bottom end, then I really like Vredistin Ricorsos as a good "training" type tyre.

Though my training wheels also have Axial Pro Race's on, cos I like them 🙂

--
Arthur Clune clune.orgclune.orgOpen ↗ Power is delightful. Absolute power is absolutely delightful -
Lord Lester

Round ones. Sorry, could'nt resist. I like Vredstein tricomps, about £16 from Parkers or similar.
Haven't tried any real upmarket stuff though. 23 seems to be the best compromise for comfort/rolling
resistance (See C+ old issue). The new Conti's look interesting, 22 front 23 rear with different
layers of puncture proofing. Niv. "Smudger" <[email hidden]> wrote in
message "]news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

Budget is £14 to £25 per wheel.

700x23c

Mainly road - fast leisure riding and training.

Arthur Clune said:

Though my training wheels also have Axial Pro Race's on, cos I like them 🙂

Was reading a thing on a rally driving course or somesuch once, and the=20 view was "a good car with
bad tyres is a bad car", and IMHO the same=20 applies to any vehicle with tyres. So while not
wishing to suggest the=20 Vreds Arthur mentioned are actually bad, it strikes me as making a lot=20
of sense to spend an extra =A320 or so on the pair for something you=20 really like, especially
considering they'll last the sort of time most=20 people can easily spread =A320 over and they're on
a machine which is=20 probably worth substantially more, so might as well do it full justice.

For what you get, bike tyres are insanely expensive compared to car=20 tyres, but a good one is
still relatively cheap compared to a lot of the =

other less essential things we're happy to fork out for.

Pete. --=20 Peter Clinch University of Dundee Tel 44 1382 660111 ext. 33637 Medical Physics,
Ninewells Hospital Fax 44 1382 640177 Dundee DD1 9SY Scotland UK net [email hidden]
dundee.ac.uk~pjclinchOpen ↗

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Vittoria Open Corsa CX TT ...I dunno if its the very best but it's excellent and fits the bill.

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Good tyres ! But I found them a bit soft

Pump them up more!! :-) Seriously, they can take 9 bar - and a little more if you like (although go
easy on the front - for grip).

A wider tyre is actually faster than a narrower tyre at the same pressure. As well as the
suppleness, that softness you feel is mainly due to the extra volume (they are a bit wider than
other 23's, yet inflate to similar pressure) - so it's a good thing.

~PB

Peter Clinch <[email hidden]> wrote in message news:<[email hidden]>...

Quoted message said:

So while not wishing to suggest the Vreds Arthur mentioned are actually bad, it strikes me as
making a lot of sense to spend an extra 20 or so on the pair for something you really like,
especially considering they'll last the sort of time most people can easily spread 20 over and
they're on a machine which is probably worth substantially more, so might as well do it full
justice.

Personally I'd go for the more expensive Vredesteins (Fortezza Tri-Comps), though when I say
'expensive', they don't cost that much more than the Ricorso model. Don't really have any bad things
to say about them - their strongest point is probably the high degree of puncture resistance (only
one flat in about 3 years of using them). Quite hard-wearing, too, and fine in the wet. For the
racing man, there are certainly lighter tyres out there, but the Fortezza is still nice and fast,
and good value for money.

David E. Belcher

Dept. of Chemistry, University of York

David E. Belcher <[email hidden]> wrote:
: For the racing man, there are certainly lighter tyres out there, but the Fortezza is still nice
: and fast, and good value for money.

Fortezza tri-comps are pretty much as light as any other road-race tyre (as opposed to a very light
weight TT or track tire).

Nice tires.

Arhtur

--
Arthur Clune clune.orgclune.orgOpen ↗ Power is delightful. Absolute power is absolutely delightful -
Lord Lester

"Pete Biggs" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
"]news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Vittoria Open Corsa CX TT ...I dunno if its the very best but it's excellent and fits the bill.

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Good tyres ! But I found them a bit soft

Pump them up more!! :-) Seriously, they can take 9 bar - and a little more if you like (although
go easy on the front - for grip).

You know what I mean ! The compound felt soft, I did use them with latex inner tubes so that
contributed to the "shag pile" type feeling. If you know what I mean !!

Graham

Quoted message said:

A wider tyre is actually faster than a narrower tyre at the same pressure. As well as the
suppleness, that softness you feel is mainly due to the extra volume (they are a bit wider than
other 23's, yet inflate to similar pressure) - so it's a good thing.

~PB

"Pete Biggs" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
"]news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

A wider tyre is actually faster than a narrower tyre at the same pressure. ~PB

I don't understand this Pete, can you explain more?

Mark

MSA said:

Quoted message said:

A wider tyre is actually faster than a narrower tyre at the same pressure. ~PB

Quoted message said:

I don't understand this Pete, can you explain more?

I have read that tests have shown, for example, that a 25mm tyre at 120psi has lower rolling
resistance than a 23mm version of an equal quality tyre at 120psi.

I might try and find out more about the theory (if no-one else explains it in the meantime) but it
mainly involves rubber deformation losses*. Friction from tyre to road is a much lesser factor in
rolling resistance (even on smooth roads) - so it doesn't matter that more rubber scrubs the road
with a wider tyre.

On the practical level, this doesn't usually matter because air pressure is such a big factor
(higher = faster, up to a point) and wider tyres tend not to practically take such high pressures.
But that is not always the case.

I know that narrower tyres are more aerodymamic and lighter but I think these are lesser factors for
*tyres* than RR, at typical speeds.

All this does make me wonder why professional racers still use such narrow tyres. Perhaps weight
plus the aerodymanics plus seemingly minor reasons (like ability to remove wheel extremely quickly,
and plain old tradition) keeps them popular. Either that or the "tests" and theory are rubbish
(???). Weight is probably a major influence for them, though.

* yarchive.netrolling resistance.htmlOpen ↗

~PB

Pete Biggs said:

MSA said:

Quoted message said:

A wider tyre is actually faster than a narrower tyre at the same pressure. ~PB

Quoted message said:

I don't understand this Pete, can you explain more?

I have read that tests have shown, for example, that a 25mm tyre at 120psi has lower rolling
resistance than a 23mm version of an equal quality tyre at 120psi.

I might try and find out more about the theory (if no-one else explains it in the meantime) but it
mainly involves rubber deformation losses*. Friction from tyre to road is a much lesser factor in
rolling resistance (even on smooth roads) - so it doesn't matter that more rubber scrubs the road
with a wider tyre.

I'm not getting involved in this because I have absolutely no idea which is the "correct" answer and
I suspect "it depends..." :-)

However, the "more rubber scrubs the road" is a popular misconception.

For almost all pneumatic tires, regardless of vehicle, the amount of rubber in contact with the road
is, to a very good approximation, load divided by tyre pressure.

This does break down for stiff sidewall tyres (run-flat) and I suspect that is it less good for low
profile tyres where the sidewall probably has a larger supporting role.

The principle reason why wide tyres give better road holding (on the straight[1]) on cars is due to
the change in the shape of the contact patch. On a wide tyre the contact patch becomes wider but
shorter front to back. This means that the rubber spends less time in contact with the road relative
to the time it can cool while rotating in the air. This in turn means that different compounds can
be used, generally softer, but with better "grip" characteristics.

[1] Aparently there are other dynamics that come into play when cornering on a car tyre which give
wide tyres an additional advantage but I don't know what they are.

Regards,

Tim.

--
God said, "div D = rho, div B = 0, curl E = - @B/@t, curl H = J + @D/@t," and there was light.

tjw.hn.orgtjw.hn.orgOpen ↗ locofungus.btinternet.co.uklocofungus.btinternet.co.ukOpen ↗

Pete Biggs <[email hidden]> wrote:

: All this does make me wonder why professional racers still use such narrow tyres.

Most racers have moved from 20mm to 23mm for road racing at least. Going to a 25mm is a little
excessive. 23mm is a nice balance (for my money at least) between weight, rolling resistance,
comfort, aerodynamics and handling. No one size is ideal for all of these criteria of course 🙂

Arthur

--
Arthur Clune clune.orgclune.orgOpen ↗ Power is delightful. Absolute power is absolutely delightful -
Lord Lester

MSA said:

Pete Biggs said:

A wider tyre is actually faster than a narrower tyre at the same pressure. ~PB

I don't understand this Pete, can you explain more?

I'm not Pete, but this is a Hardy Perennial among we Dark Siders, and the theory goes like this:

It revolves (sorry...) around the notion that rolling resistance is caused by the flexing of the
tyre casing around the edge of the contact patch, ergo the shorter the circumference of the contact
patch, the less the rolling resistance if all other things - pressure, load, construction etc. - are
equal. The wider tyre's contact patch is more nearly circular than the skinny one. A certain amount
of practical testing by Ian Sims and John Lafford seems to bear this out - for example the 47-406
Tioga Comp Pool has less rolling resistance than the 28-406 Continental Grand Prix, and the fatter
version of the Conti Avenues performed better than its skinnier sibling. Of course, *overall* speed
is dictated by aerodynamic considerations as well, so a fat-tyred bike may well not be as fast
overall as an otherwise identical one on skinnies.

Dave Larrington - legslarry.beerdrinkers.co.uklegslarry.beerdrinkers.co.ukOpen ↗
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Editor - British Human Power Club Newsletter
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Pete Biggs said:

All this does make me wonder why professional racers still use such narrow tyres.

I suspect so that they can run them at higher pressures. Your argument sounds plausible for the
same pressure, but higher pressure will, in the useful range of pressures, allow lower rolling
resistance. A smaller tyre will allow a higher pressure to be achieved before the tyre blows
off the rim.

--
Jim Price

jimprice.dsl.pipex.comjimprice.dsl.pipex.comOpen ↗

Conscientious objection is hard work in an economic war.

Aye!.

Jim Price said:

Pete Biggs said:

All this does make me wonder why professional racers still use such narrow tyres.

I suspect so that they can run them at higher pressures.

But there now are 23mm tyres that can be inflated to what is normally used with 20mm. Arthur has
pointed out that 23's are now used in pro racing: I didn't realise that.

~PB

Pete Biggs said:

Jim Price said:

Pete Biggs said:

All this does make me wonder why professional racers still use such narrow tyres.

I suspect so that they can run them at higher pressures.

But there now are 23mm tyres that can be inflated to what is normally used with 20mm. Arthur has
pointed out that 23's are now used in pro racing: I didn't realise that.

Which would suggest that there is a pressure beyond which there is no useful gain, and what has
happened is that we now have the technology to make tyres which can handle that pressure in larger
sizes than previously possible.

--
Jim Price

jimprice.dsl.pipex.comjimprice.dsl.pipex.comOpen ↗

Conscientious objection is hard work in an economic war.

Aye!.

Jim Price said:

Which would suggest that there is a pressure beyond which there is no useful gain, and what has
happened is that we now have the technology to make tyres which can handle that pressure in larger
sizes than previously possible.

That seems to be the case. I have it from a Person at Schwalbe that there is nothing to be gained
from banging their Stelvios - the current Informed Dark Side Racer's Tyre of Choice - up higher than
the recommended pressure writ large upon the side, and lab testing seem to indicate confirm this. To
say nothing of the cost of the necessary remedial dental work ;-)

Dave Larrington - legslarry.beerdrinkers.co.uklegslarry.beerdrinkers.co.ukOpen ↗
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Editor - British Human Power Club Newsletter
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