Not completely sold on wide tires

On Saturday, May 22, 2021 at 6:55:50 PM UTC-4, John B. wrote:
On Sat, 22 May 2021 12:32:33 -0400, Frank Krygowski wrote:

On 5/21/2021 9:37 PM, jbeattie wrote:
On Friday, May 21, 2021 at 6:12:46 PM UTC-7, Frank Krygowski wrote:
On 5/21/2021 7:37 PM, Tom Kunich wrote:


To underscore that, I couldn't get the 28 mm tired wheel off of my Douglas Vector without letting the air out of the tire. Although there was plenty of side room front and back, the a 28 mm on the front would vertically interfere with the Campy brake so I could only use a 25 though it was pretty obvious that the frameset was designed for 23 mm tires. That is the chief reason it is up for sale now despite making a 16.5 lb. bike. With 23 mm tires and light wheels you could get it close to 15 lbs.
And as I've said repeatedly, there is no advantage to a frame with such
limitations on tire size. Yet they've made them, and people have bought
them. Such is fashion.

There is a modest aerodynamic advantage with tight tire clearance. There is slightly better braking with a shorter, stiffer caliper arm, and shorter fork blades produce an over-all stiffer front end. The tight clearance thing was for racing bikes, and those same benefits (real or imagined) can now be achieved with aero designs and disc brakes. Fashion was a reason but not the only reason for tight tire clearance racing bikes of yore.

I've heard the attempts at justification (or rationalization) for tight
clearance frames before. Aero advantage? Stiffer front end? "Modest" is
overstating it! And of what use to a non-racer on a club ride?

The braking benefits were attainable other ways. Example: Close
clearance frames with single pivot caliper brakes required more lever
force than large clearance frames with long arm versions of dual pivot
brakes. And to really mess with your mind: I rode yesterday with a guy
running deep section aero wheels and cantilever brakes. Properly set up,
cantis can have very low lever forces.

Even for top racers, the aero benefits and handling benefits were
probably unmeasurably small. Fashion was _the_ reason. Racers are not
immune.
I'm not sure your "fashion" argument is true in all cases. I designed
a bike and built it using the shortest straight seat stays possible
and while it did result in limited rear tire clearance the purpose
wasn't fashion. It was to use the smallest diameter, thus lightest,
seat stays while making them as stiff as possible within the limits of
the design.

I'm sure that I am not the only one who hit on this idea.

Any trend starts with one person's independent idea.

When one person does it, it's "innovative." When thousands copy him without analyzing
the magnitude of benefit (if any) it becomes "fashion."

Although few ever admit it.

- Frank Krygowski

On Sat, 22 May 2021 19:59:20 -0700 (PDT), Frank Krygowski
wrote:

On Saturday, May 22, 2021 at 6:55:50 PM UTC-4, John B. wrote:
On Sat, 22 May 2021 12:32:33 -0400, Frank Krygowski wrote:

On 5/21/2021 9:37 PM, jbeattie wrote:
On Friday, May 21, 2021 at 6:12:46 PM UTC-7, Frank Krygowski wrote:
On 5/21/2021 7:37 PM, Tom Kunich wrote:


To underscore that, I couldn't get the 28 mm tired wheel off of my Douglas Vector without letting the air out of the tire. Although there was plenty of side room front and back, the a 28 mm on the front would vertically interfere with the Campy brake so I could only use a 25 though it was pretty obvious that the frameset was designed for 23 mm tires. That is the chief reason it is up for sale now despite making a 16.5 lb. bike. With 23 mm tires and light wheels you could get it close to 15 lbs.
And as I've said repeatedly, there is no advantage to a frame with such
limitations on tire size. Yet they've made them, and people have bought
them. Such is fashion.

There is a modest aerodynamic advantage with tight tire clearance. There is slightly better braking with a shorter, stiffer caliper arm, and shorter fork blades produce an over-all stiffer front end. The tight clearance thing was for racing bikes, and those same benefits (real or imagined) can now be achieved with aero designs and disc brakes. Fashion was a reason but not the only reason for tight tire clearance racing bikes of yore.

I've heard the attempts at justification (or rationalization) for tight
clearance frames before. Aero advantage? Stiffer front end? "Modest" is
overstating it! And of what use to a non-racer on a club ride?

The braking benefits were attainable other ways. Example: Close
clearance frames with single pivot caliper brakes required more lever
force than large clearance frames with long arm versions of dual pivot
brakes. And to really mess with your mind: I rode yesterday with a guy
running deep section aero wheels and cantilever brakes. Properly set up,
cantis can have very low lever forces.

Even for top racers, the aero benefits and handling benefits were
probably unmeasurably small. Fashion was _the_ reason. Racers are not
immune.
I'm not sure your "fashion" argument is true in all cases. I designed
a bike and built it using the shortest straight seat stays possible
and while it did result in limited rear tire clearance the purpose
wasn't fashion. It was to use the smallest diameter, thus lightest,
seat stays while making them as stiff as possible within the limits of
the design.

I'm sure that I am not the only one who hit on this idea.

Any trend starts with one person's independent idea.

When one person does it, it's "innovative." When thousands copy him without analyzing
the magnitude of benefit (if any) it becomes "fashion."

Although few ever admit it.

- Frank Krygowski

Rather like the "Tactical" things, knives for example. Now, Strategic
is, essentially, what we are going to do and Tactics is how we are
going to do it.

What I'm wondering should I refer to my wife's paring knife as a
tactical knife? After all the strategy is to get supper and the
tactics are to slice the carrots. :-)
:-)

--
Cheers,

John B.

On 5/22/2021 6:57 PM, John B. wrote:
On Sat, 22 May 2021 13:58:24 -0400, Frank Krygowski
wrote:

On 5/22/2021 1:32 PM, jbeattie wrote:
On Saturday, May 22, 2021 at 9:32:38 AM UTC-7, Frank Krygowski wrote:
On 5/21/2021 9:37 PM, jbeattie wrote:
On Friday, May 21, 2021 at 6:12:46 PM UTC-7, Frank Krygowski wrote:
On 5/21/2021 7:37 PM, Tom Kunich wrote:


To underscore that, I couldn't get the 28 mm tired wheel off of my Douglas Vector without letting the air out of the tire. Although there was plenty of side room front and back, the a 28 mm on the front would vertically interfere with the Campy brake so I could only use a 25 though it was pretty obvious that the frameset was designed for 23 mm tires. That is the chief reason it is up for sale now despite making a 16.5 lb. bike. With 23 mm tires and light wheels you could get it close to 15 lbs.
And as I've said repeatedly, there is no advantage to a frame with such
limitations on tire size. Yet they've made them, and people have bought
them. Such is fashion.

There is a modest aerodynamic advantage with tight tire clearance. There is slightly better braking with a shorter, stiffer caliper arm, and shorter fork blades produce an over-all stiffer front end. The tight clearance thing was for racing bikes, and those same benefits (real or imagined) can now be achieved with aero designs and disc brakes. Fashion was a reason but not the only reason for tight tire clearance racing bikes of yore.
I've heard the attempts at justification (or rationalization) for tight
clearance frames before. Aero advantage? Stiffer front end? "Modest" is
overstating it! And of what use to a non-racer on a club ride?

The braking benefits were attainable other ways. Example: Close
clearance frames with single pivot caliper brakes required more lever
force than large clearance frames with long arm versions of dual pivot
brakes. And to really mess with your mind: I rode yesterday with a guy
running deep section aero wheels and cantilever brakes. Properly set up,
cantis can have very low lever forces.

Even for top racers, the aero benefits and handling benefits were
probably unmeasurably small. Fashion was _the_ reason. Racers are not
immune.

Well, no. Decreasing fork-tire gap was believed by some to improve aerodynamics. See e.g.:

Another important aerodynamic detail is the space between the fork and the front wheel, since the fork can be placed farther away from the wheel or closer to the wheel. Placing it farther away from the wheels was used for example by the UK team in the Olympic Games in 2012 (Boardman, 2015), whereas placing it closer was chosen for the bicycle used in the 2015 world hour record achievement by Wiggins (Cicli Pinarello Spa, 2015). The latter is described in a white paper of the manufacturing company, which states that a fork closer to the wheel generated less drag force for their bicycle (Cicli Pinarello Spa, 2015). It should be noted that this publication and the results reported in it were not peer reviewed and it refers to only one bicycle and one set of disc wheels. The present authors argue that a different behavior might likely be observed with different wheel types, e.g. disc or spoked wheels. Further CFD simulations and/or WTs tests with different bicycles and wheels are
therefore needed to understand the flow topology resulting from the interaction between wheel and fork and its effects on the aerodynamic performance.

https://www.sciencedirect.com/scienc...67610520300441

Shorter calipers provided more positive braking -- and the trend towards reduced tire clearance was part of an over-all trend in racing bikes to shorten wheel bases, the early apotheosis being the Rigi. http://www.classicrendezvous.com/Italy/RIGI_main.htm

This tight geometry/tight clearance trend trickled down to mass-market racing bikes, but at the same time, one could always buy a bicycle with more generous tire clearance -- but it wasn't going to be a racing bike. The racing bike of yore with enough clearance for fenders and 32mm tires went the way of the dodo.

It was "fashion" in the sense that a Shelby Mustang was fashion. Certain racing conventions were packed into a mass-market product which, like you said, were probably unnecessary or even counter-productive to many purchasers. But it was not fashion in the sense that it was just an aesthetic decision.

About the aerodynamics: I haven't read that particular article, and I
will. But apart from top level time trialing, how much difference would
the tiny purported drag reduction make?

In pro racing, the advantage applies to the domestique pulling at the
front. Everyone else sees much reduced relative air speed in a turbulent
flow regime where the difference is much tinier. ISTM it would make a
practical difference only in the case of a breakaway with a very few
riders, in which the winning margin is measured in fractions of a
second. That's a rare event.

In amateur racing, the same applies, but the benefits are even less.
"Woo hoo! Because my frame requiring a 19mm tire, I got a water bottle!"

I think a modern racing bike, but designed to take up to 32mm tires plus
fenders, would win exactly as many races as one limited to 23s. For
amateurs, it might win more by virtue of allowing more training miles on
that bike. Train even in the wet on large tires with fenders, switch to
your racing wheels on race day. Remember when?

----

About the dodo reference: Our school was once under an administrator who
claimed we needed to evolve! Our methods were antiquated! That
administrator put the argument into a mandatory-attendance lecture
called "Mammals vs. Dinosaurs" or something similar.

The point was dinosaurs didn't evolve so mammals took over. But the
muttering among the many PhDs in attendance was that the dinosaur age
was three times as long as the mammal age, so far, and was ended by a
catastrophic random event, not by evolutionary superiority. It's a bit
early to judge which animal type was really most successful.

----

Which doesn't disprove your dodo statement, of course. Yes, we agree the
racing bikes of yore went the way of the dodo. We disagree on why, and
whether it was a good thing.

It's a change in subject but didn't dinosaurs evolve? I'm sure that
I've read about fishie sort of things that were said to have evolved
into land creatures.


Some posit the dinosaurs' progeny are chickens.

https://paleontologyworld.com/explor...aurs-and-birds

--
Andrew Muzi
www.yellowjersey.org/
Open every day since 1 April, 1971

On 5/22/2021 10:11 PM, John B. wrote:
On Sat, 22 May 2021 19:59:20 -0700 (PDT), Frank Krygowski
wrote:

On Saturday, May 22, 2021 at 6:55:50 PM UTC-4, John B. wrote:
On Sat, 22 May 2021 12:32:33 -0400, Frank Krygowski wrote:

On 5/21/2021 9:37 PM, jbeattie wrote:
On Friday, May 21, 2021 at 6:12:46 PM UTC-7, Frank Krygowski wrote:
On 5/21/2021 7:37 PM, Tom Kunich wrote:


To underscore that, I couldn't get the 28 mm tired wheel off of my Douglas Vector without letting the air out of the tire. Although there was plenty of side room front and back, the a 28 mm on the front would vertically interfere with the Campy brake so I could only use a 25 though it was pretty obvious that the frameset was designed for 23 mm tires. That is the chief reason it is up for sale now despite making a 16.5 lb. bike. With 23 mm tires and light wheels you could get it close to 15 lbs.
And as I've said repeatedly, there is no advantage to a frame with such
limitations on tire size. Yet they've made them, and people have bought
them. Such is fashion.

There is a modest aerodynamic advantage with tight tire clearance. There is slightly better braking with a shorter, stiffer caliper arm, and shorter fork blades produce an over-all stiffer front end. The tight clearance thing was for racing bikes, and those same benefits (real or imagined) can now be achieved with aero designs and disc brakes. Fashion was a reason but not the only reason for tight tire clearance racing bikes of yore.

I've heard the attempts at justification (or rationalization) for tight
clearance frames before. Aero advantage? Stiffer front end? "Modest" is
overstating it! And of what use to a non-racer on a club ride?

The braking benefits were attainable other ways. Example: Close
clearance frames with single pivot caliper brakes required more lever
force than large clearance frames with long arm versions of dual pivot
brakes. And to really mess with your mind: I rode yesterday with a guy
running deep section aero wheels and cantilever brakes. Properly set up,
cantis can have very low lever forces.

Even for top racers, the aero benefits and handling benefits were
probably unmeasurably small. Fashion was _the_ reason. Racers are not
immune.
I'm not sure your "fashion" argument is true in all cases. I designed
a bike and built it using the shortest straight seat stays possible
and while it did result in limited rear tire clearance the purpose
wasn't fashion. It was to use the smallest diameter, thus lightest,
seat stays while making them as stiff as possible within the limits of
the design.

I'm sure that I am not the only one who hit on this idea.

Any trend starts with one person's independent idea.

When one person does it, it's "innovative." When thousands copy him without analyzing
the magnitude of benefit (if any) it becomes "fashion."

Although few ever admit it.

- Frank Krygowski

Rather like the "Tactical" things, knives for example. Now, Strategic
is, essentially, what we are going to do and Tactics is how we are
going to do it.

What I'm wondering should I refer to my wife's paring knife as a
tactical knife? After all the strategy is to get supper and the
tactics are to slice the carrots. :-)
:-)


Modern usage = 'tactical' knives have black handles and
black phosphate blades and cost more than shiny ones.

--
Andrew Muzi
www.yellowjersey.org/
Open every day since 1 April, 1971

On Saturday, May 22, 2021 at 3:46:45 PM UTC-7, Frank Krygowski wrote:
On 5/22/2021 4:21 PM, Tom Kunich wrote:
On Saturday, May 22, 2021 at 10:58:30 AM UTC-7, Frank Krygowski wrote:
On 5/22/2021 1:32 PM, jbeattie wrote:
On Saturday, May 22, 2021 at 9:32:38 AM UTC-7, Frank Krygowski wrote:
On 5/21/2021 9:37 PM, jbeattie wrote:
On Friday, May 21, 2021 at 6:12:46 PM UTC-7, Frank Krygowski wrote:
On 5/21/2021 7:37 PM, Tom Kunich wrote:


To underscore that, I couldn't get the 28 mm tired wheel off of my Douglas Vector without letting the air out of the tire. Although there was plenty of side room front and back, the a 28 mm on the front would vertically interfere with the Campy brake so I could only use a 25 though it was pretty obvious that the frameset was designed for 23 mm tires. That is the chief reason it is up for sale now despite making a 16.5 lb. bike. With 23 mm tires and light wheels you could get it close to 15 lbs.
And as I've said repeatedly, there is no advantage to a frame with such
limitations on tire size. Yet they've made them, and people have bought
them. Such is fashion.

There is a modest aerodynamic advantage with tight tire clearance. There is slightly better braking with a shorter, stiffer caliper arm, and shorter fork blades produce an over-all stiffer front end. The tight clearance thing was for racing bikes, and those same benefits (real or imagined) can now be achieved with aero designs and disc brakes. Fashion was a reason but not the only reason for tight tire clearance racing bikes of yore.
I've heard the attempts at justification (or rationalization) for tight
clearance frames before. Aero advantage? Stiffer front end? "Modest" is
overstating it! And of what use to a non-racer on a club ride?

The braking benefits were attainable other ways. Example: Close
clearance frames with single pivot caliper brakes required more lever
force than large clearance frames with long arm versions of dual pivot
brakes. And to really mess with your mind: I rode yesterday with a guy
running deep section aero wheels and cantilever brakes. Properly set up,
cantis can have very low lever forces.

Even for top racers, the aero benefits and handling benefits were
probably unmeasurably small. Fashion was _the_ reason. Racers are not
immune.

Well, no. Decreasing fork-tire gap was believed by some to improve aerodynamics. See e.g.:

Another important aerodynamic detail is the space between the fork and the front wheel, since the fork can be placed farther away from the wheel or closer to the wheel. Placing it farther away from the wheels was used for example by the UK team in the Olympic Games in 2012 (Boardman, 2015), whereas placing it closer was chosen for the bicycle used in the 2015 world hour record achievement by Wiggins (Cicli Pinarello Spa, 2015). The latter is described in a white paper of the manufacturing company, which states that a fork closer to the wheel generated less drag force for their bicycle (Cicli Pinarello Spa, 2015). It should be noted that this publication and the results reported in it were not peer reviewed and it refers to only one bicycle and one set of disc wheels. The present authors argue that a different behavior might likely be observed with different wheel types, e.g. disc or spoked wheels. Further CFD simulations and/or WTs tests with different bicycles and wheels are therefore needed to understand the flow topology resulting from the interaction between wheel and fork and its effects on the aerodynamic performance.

https://www.sciencedirect.com/scienc...67610520300441

Shorter calipers provided more positive braking -- and the trend towards reduced tire clearance was part of an over-all trend in racing bikes to shorten wheel bases, the early apotheosis being the Rigi. http://www.classicrendezvous.com/Italy/RIGI_main.htm

This tight geometry/tight clearance trend trickled down to mass-market racing bikes, but at the same time, one could always buy a bicycle with more generous tire clearance -- but it wasn't going to be a racing bike. The racing bike of yore with enough clearance for fenders and 32mm tires went the way of the dodo.

It was "fashion" in the sense that a Shelby Mustang was fashion. Certain racing conventions were packed into a mass-market product which, like you said, were probably unnecessary or even counter-productive to many purchasers. But it was not fashion in the sense that it was just an aesthetic decision.
About the aerodynamics: I haven't read that particular article, and I
will. But apart from top level time trialing, how much difference would
the tiny purported drag reduction make?

In pro racing, the advantage applies to the domestique pulling at the
front. Everyone else sees much reduced relative air speed in a turbulent
flow regime where the difference is much tinier. ISTM it would make a
practical difference only in the case of a breakaway with a very few
riders, in which the winning margin is measured in fractions of a
second. That's a rare event.

In amateur racing, the same applies, but the benefits are even less.
"Woo hoo! Because my frame requiring a 19mm tire, I got a water bottle!"

I think a modern racing bike, but designed to take up to 32mm tires plus
fenders, would win exactly as many races as one limited to 23s. For
amateurs, it might win more by virtue of allowing more training miles on
that bike. Train even in the wet on large tires with fenders, switch to
your racing wheels on race day. Remember when?

----

About the dodo reference: Our school was once under an administrator who
claimed we needed to evolve! Our methods were antiquated! That
administrator put the argument into a mandatory-attendance lecture
called "Mammals vs. Dinosaurs" or something similar.

The point was dinosaurs didn't evolve so mammals took over. But the
muttering among the many PhDs in attendance was that the dinosaur age
was three times as long as the mammal age, so far, and was ended by a
catastrophic random event, not by evolutionary superiority. It's a bit
early to judge which animal type was really most successful.

----

Which doesn't disprove your dodo statement, of course. Yes, we agree the
racing bikes of yore went the way of the dodo. We disagree on why, and
whether it was a good thing.

On smooth roads the aerodynamic and rolling resistance advantage of a 19 mm tired bike with the shortest fork and tightest clearances was pretty substantial.
"Pretty substantial" is too vague to be meaningful.

Here's a pertinent coincidence: Today I did something very unusual. I
stopped at the library (not unusual) and found that they'd recently
re-opened the magazine section! So I took out three issues of
_Bicycling_ magazine (unusual) to see what I'd been missing.

Son of a gun, "Issue 4, 2020" has an article titled "Aerodynamics
benefits are real - they're just not always realistic."

It's a short article, but its main point is that companies test for aero
benefit at 40 - 50 kph or 25 - 31 mph. The really accurate wind tunnels
can't go slower than that. Those high speeds allow measuring high values
for aero improvements. But, and I quote, "A significant 15-watt savings
at 50km/h translates to a measly 1-watt savings at 20km/h, which is
hardly substantial enough to build a marketing campaign around."

And the author also notes the possibility that different flow regimes at
different speeds may make real benefits even less.

This doesn't mean no improvement is possible. If you're trying to go
fast, it doesn't make sense to ride in really flappy clothes. Riding the
drops certainly helps, and aero bars help much more when you can use
them. Big wide square panniers don't help. But anything else is toying
with negligible improvements.
Isn't this what I've been saying about most of these aero "improvements"? I can tell a difference with aero wheels - I coast much further than people without them and when I am using my Campy aluminum wheels despite having better bearings, they do not coast as easily or as far. But the main object of aero wheels I like is that they are a lot stronger and less likely to fail. The spokes are shorter and hence stiffer for their diameter and the deep rims are far less likely to break. Now they have had failures of these wheels but all of those I've seen were the super-light American wheels like Enve.

On Sunday, May 23, 2021 at 7:19:16 AM UTC-7, AMuzi wrote:
On 5/22/2021 6:57 PM, John B. wrote:
On Sat, 22 May 2021 13:58:24 -0400, Frank Krygowski
wrote:

On 5/22/2021 1:32 PM, jbeattie wrote:
On Saturday, May 22, 2021 at 9:32:38 AM UTC-7, Frank Krygowski wrote:
On 5/21/2021 9:37 PM, jbeattie wrote:
On Friday, May 21, 2021 at 6:12:46 PM UTC-7, Frank Krygowski wrote:
On 5/21/2021 7:37 PM, Tom Kunich wrote:


To underscore that, I couldn't get the 28 mm tired wheel off of my Douglas Vector without letting the air out of the tire. Although there was plenty of side room front and back, the a 28 mm on the front would vertically interfere with the Campy brake so I could only use a 25 though it was pretty obvious that the frameset was designed for 23 mm tires. That is the chief reason it is up for sale now despite making a 16.5 lb. bike. With 23 mm tires and light wheels you could get it close to 15 lbs.
And as I've said repeatedly, there is no advantage to a frame with such
limitations on tire size. Yet they've made them, and people have bought
them. Such is fashion.

There is a modest aerodynamic advantage with tight tire clearance. There is slightly better braking with a shorter, stiffer caliper arm, and shorter fork blades produce an over-all stiffer front end. The tight clearance thing was for racing bikes, and those same benefits (real or imagined) can now be achieved with aero designs and disc brakes. Fashion was a reason but not the only reason for tight tire clearance racing bikes of yore.
I've heard the attempts at justification (or rationalization) for tight
clearance frames before. Aero advantage? Stiffer front end? "Modest" is
overstating it! And of what use to a non-racer on a club ride?

The braking benefits were attainable other ways. Example: Close
clearance frames with single pivot caliper brakes required more lever
force than large clearance frames with long arm versions of dual pivot
brakes. And to really mess with your mind: I rode yesterday with a guy
running deep section aero wheels and cantilever brakes. Properly set up,
cantis can have very low lever forces.

Even for top racers, the aero benefits and handling benefits were
probably unmeasurably small. Fashion was _the_ reason. Racers are not
immune.

Well, no. Decreasing fork-tire gap was believed by some to improve aerodynamics. See e.g.:

Another important aerodynamic detail is the space between the fork and the front wheel, since the fork can be placed farther away from the wheel or closer to the wheel. Placing it farther away from the wheels was used for example by the UK team in the Olympic Games in 2012 (Boardman, 2015), whereas placing it closer was chosen for the bicycle used in the 2015 world hour record achievement by Wiggins (Cicli Pinarello Spa, 2015). The latter is described in a white paper of the manufacturing company, which states that a fork closer to the wheel generated less drag force for their bicycle (Cicli Pinarello Spa, 2015). It should be noted that this publication and the results reported in it were not peer reviewed and it refers to only one bicycle and one set of disc wheels. The present authors argue that a different behavior might likely be observed with different wheel types, e.g. disc or spoked wheels. Further CFD simulations and/or WTs tests with different bicycles and wheels are
therefore needed to understand the flow topology resulting from the interaction between wheel and fork and its effects on the aerodynamic performance.

https://www.sciencedirect.com/scienc...67610520300441

Shorter calipers provided more positive braking -- and the trend towards reduced tire clearance was part of an over-all trend in racing bikes to shorten wheel bases, the early apotheosis being the Rigi. http://www.classicrendezvous.com/Italy/RIGI_main.htm

This tight geometry/tight clearance trend trickled down to mass-market racing bikes, but at the same time, one could always buy a bicycle with more generous tire clearance -- but it wasn't going to be a racing bike. The racing bike of yore with enough clearance for fenders and 32mm tires went the way of the dodo.

It was "fashion" in the sense that a Shelby Mustang was fashion. Certain racing conventions were packed into a mass-market product which, like you said, were probably unnecessary or even counter-productive to many purchasers. But it was not fashion in the sense that it was just an aesthetic decision.

About the aerodynamics: I haven't read that particular article, and I
will. But apart from top level time trialing, how much difference would
the tiny purported drag reduction make?

In pro racing, the advantage applies to the domestique pulling at the
front. Everyone else sees much reduced relative air speed in a turbulent
flow regime where the difference is much tinier. ISTM it would make a
practical difference only in the case of a breakaway with a very few
riders, in which the winning margin is measured in fractions of a
second. That's a rare event.

In amateur racing, the same applies, but the benefits are even less.
"Woo hoo! Because my frame requiring a 19mm tire, I got a water bottle!"

I think a modern racing bike, but designed to take up to 32mm tires plus
fenders, would win exactly as many races as one limited to 23s. For
amateurs, it might win more by virtue of allowing more training miles on
that bike. Train even in the wet on large tires with fenders, switch to
your racing wheels on race day. Remember when?

----

About the dodo reference: Our school was once under an administrator who
claimed we needed to evolve! Our methods were antiquated! That
administrator put the argument into a mandatory-attendance lecture
called "Mammals vs. Dinosaurs" or something similar.

The point was dinosaurs didn't evolve so mammals took over. But the
muttering among the many PhDs in attendance was that the dinosaur age
was three times as long as the mammal age, so far, and was ended by a
catastrophic random event, not by evolutionary superiority. It's a bit
early to judge which animal type was really most successful.

----

Which doesn't disprove your dodo statement, of course. Yes, we agree the
racing bikes of yore went the way of the dodo. We disagree on why, and
whether it was a good thing.

It's a change in subject but didn't dinosaurs evolve? I'm sure that
I've read about fishie sort of things that were said to have evolved
into land creatures.

Some posit the dinosaurs' progeny are chickens.

https://paleontologyworld.com/explor...aurs-and-birds

The similarity in construction of scales and feathers is unquestionable.

On Sun, 23 May 2021 06:57:25 +0700, John B.
wrote:

It's a change in subject but didn't dinosaurs evolve?

Yes, depending on how you define evolve. Humans share some dinosaur
activities:
https://www.google.com/search?q=dinosaur+on+bicycle&tbm=isch

--
Jeff Liebermann
PO Box 272 http://www.LearnByDestroying.com
Ben Lomond CA 95005-0272
Skype: JeffLiebermann AE6KS 831-336-2558

On Sunday, May 23, 2021 at 3:13:53 PM UTC-7, wrote:
On Sun, 23 May 2021 06:57:25 +0700, John B.
wrote:
It's a change in subject but didn't dinosaurs evolve?
Yes, depending on how you define evolve. Humans share some dinosaur
activities:
https://www.google.com/search?q=dinosaur+on+bicycle&tbm=isch

They are not extinct in Portland. https://miro.medium.com/max/4000/1*q...CtYI5i1gw.jpeg Part of the Ladd's 500 -- 500 laps around a traffic circle in SE Portland. https://medium.com/the-coffeelicious...n-a62131340fa2 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vvcr...alAixeDjela l

-- Jay Beattie.

On Sun, 23 May 2021 09:27:10 -0500, AMuzi wrote:

On 5/22/2021 10:11 PM, John B. wrote:
On Sat, 22 May 2021 19:59:20 -0700 (PDT), Frank Krygowski
wrote:

On Saturday, May 22, 2021 at 6:55:50 PM UTC-4, John B. wrote:
On Sat, 22 May 2021 12:32:33 -0400, Frank Krygowski wrote:

On 5/21/2021 9:37 PM, jbeattie wrote:
On Friday, May 21, 2021 at 6:12:46 PM UTC-7, Frank Krygowski wrote:
On 5/21/2021 7:37 PM, Tom Kunich wrote:


To underscore that, I couldn't get the 28 mm tired wheel off of my Douglas Vector without letting the air out of the tire. Although there was plenty of side room front and back, the a 28 mm on the front would vertically interfere with the Campy brake so I could only use a 25 though it was pretty obvious that the frameset was designed for 23 mm tires. That is the chief reason it is up for sale now despite making a 16.5 lb. bike. With 23 mm tires and light wheels you could get it close to 15 lbs.
And as I've said repeatedly, there is no advantage to a frame with such
limitations on tire size. Yet they've made them, and people have bought
them. Such is fashion.

There is a modest aerodynamic advantage with tight tire clearance. There is slightly better braking with a shorter, stiffer caliper arm, and shorter fork blades produce an over-all stiffer front end. The tight clearance thing was for racing bikes, and those same benefits (real or imagined) can now be achieved with aero designs and disc brakes. Fashion was a reason but not the only reason for tight tire clearance racing bikes of yore.

I've heard the attempts at justification (or rationalization) for tight
clearance frames before. Aero advantage? Stiffer front end? "Modest" is
overstating it! And of what use to a non-racer on a club ride?

The braking benefits were attainable other ways. Example: Close
clearance frames with single pivot caliper brakes required more lever
force than large clearance frames with long arm versions of dual pivot
brakes. And to really mess with your mind: I rode yesterday with a guy
running deep section aero wheels and cantilever brakes. Properly set up,
cantis can have very low lever forces.

Even for top racers, the aero benefits and handling benefits were
probably unmeasurably small. Fashion was _the_ reason. Racers are not
immune.
I'm not sure your "fashion" argument is true in all cases. I designed
a bike and built it using the shortest straight seat stays possible
and while it did result in limited rear tire clearance the purpose
wasn't fashion. It was to use the smallest diameter, thus lightest,
seat stays while making them as stiff as possible within the limits of
the design.

I'm sure that I am not the only one who hit on this idea.

Any trend starts with one person's independent idea.

When one person does it, it's "innovative." When thousands copy him without analyzing
the magnitude of benefit (if any) it becomes "fashion."

Although few ever admit it.

- Frank Krygowski

Rather like the "Tactical" things, knives for example. Now, Strategic
is, essentially, what we are going to do and Tactics is how we are
going to do it.

What I'm wondering should I refer to my wife's paring knife as a
tactical knife? After all the strategy is to get supper and the
tactics are to slice the carrots. :-)
:-)


Modern usage = 'tactical' knives have black handles and
black phosphate blades and cost more than shiny ones.

Goodness!

I also found a site selling "tactical pants" - trousers - but they
aren't black :-) The "classy" ones have names like "Men's Vertx
Phantom Lightweight Tactical Pants" and sell for $55.99 but for those
who may be a bit less "tactical" they also off the "TRU-SPEC 24-7
Series Simply Tactical Cargo Pants" for only $39.95.

They same site is selling a "Men's Propper OCP Combat Shirt" for only
$54.99.

Just think, one could swank around in one's $110.98 tactical pants and
combat shirt.... Or, for poor folks they could just join the army and
get the shirt and pants for free.
--
Cheers,

John B.

On Sun, 23 May 2021 15:13:43 -0700, Jeff Liebermann
wrote:

On Sun, 23 May 2021 06:57:25 +0700, John B.
wrote:

It's a change in subject but didn't dinosaurs evolve?

Yes, depending on how you define evolve. Humans share some dinosaur
activities:
https://www.google.com/search?q=dinosaur+on+bicycle&tbm=isch

Well, I assume that "evolve" is a verb derived from the word
"evolution" which seems to described as:
evolution ~ noun - a process in which something passes by degrees to a
different stage (especially a more advanced or mature stage)
--
Cheers,

John B.