Steel Frames and Tire Wear

On 05/12/2016 4:55 PM, wrote:
On Monday, December 5, 2016 at 10:10:21 AM UTC-8, Duane wrote:
On 05/12/2016 12:54 PM, wrote:
On Monday, December 5, 2016 at 10:51:20 AM UTC-6, wrote:
On my carbon fiber frames the tires would wear flat on the road surfaces. But on the steel frames they appear to wear round. Would you suppose because the steel frames give you more confidence in cornering so that the tires are banked over a good deal of the time going through turns?

For the last 25 years or so all professional bike riders have been using carbon bikes. Steel has not been used since the 1980s I think. All the pros go 50 mph down the mountains cornering through the switchbacks. If you go watch a local criterium in your town you will see all the riders using carbon bikes. Maybe one aluminum too. Never any steel bikes, ever. How can they get around all the turns in a criterium race if their bikes corner so poorly?

You are just making up, imagining nonsense.


Yeah, I sort of missed that part. I thought he was saying it was
something to do with cornering that made the tire wear flat not that the
CF bikes were so poor in cornering that people didn't use them the same.
This bike corners better than any bike I've had including the steel
one I just sold.

My "guess" would be the wheels and tire choices have more to do with how
a bike corners than what the frame material is.

Well, that sounds good but I tore down two carbon bikes and used the parts and wheels on the steel bikes so that the wheels and tires are the same.

Another point of reference - On a couple of hills there is a fairly sharp turn about 100 yards below where a steep drop starts. On the CF bikes I had to "set up" for this turn and would be shaking when I got around them at 40 mph or so. But on the steel bikes I don't even have to set up and just ride around them.

Possibly this is because I am used to steel bikes after riding for some 40 years. But I don't think it is. The stiff bikes hoping all over the road are not conducive to a lot of relaxation.


I'm much faster on my CF bike than my CroMoly bike. There are too many
variables for me to know if there's any causal connection to the frame
material.

If you're looking to find someone to support your hypothesis that steel
frames corner better good luck. I can see no valid reason that the
frame material alone would make a difference in cornering.

On 05/12/2016 4:57 PM, wrote:
On Monday, December 5, 2016 at 1:00:43 PM UTC-8, Duane wrote:
On 05/12/2016 2:19 PM, DATAKOLL MARINE RESEARCH wrote:
On Monday, December 5, 2016 at 1:10:21 PM UTC-5, Duane wrote:
On 05/12/2016 12:54 PM, wrote:
On Monday, December 5, 2016 at 10:51:20 AM UTC-6, wrote:
On my carbon fiber frames the tires would wear flat on the road surfaces. But on the steel frames they appear to wear round. Would you suppose because the steel frames give you more confidence in cornering so that the tires are banked over a good deal of the time going through turns?

For the last 25 years or so all professional bike riders have been using carbon bikes. Steel has not been used since the 1980s I think. All the pros go 50 mph down the mountains cornering through the switchbacks. If you go watch a local criterium in your town you will see all the riders using carbon bikes. Maybe one aluminum too. Never any steel bikes, ever. How can they get around all the turns in a criterium race if their bikes corner so poorly?

You are just making up, imagining nonsense.


Yeah, I sort of missed that part. I thought he was saying it was
something to do with cornering that made the tire wear flat not that the
CF bikes were so poor in cornering that people didn't use them the same.
This bike corners better than any bike I've had including the steel
one I just sold.

My "guess" would be the wheels and tire choices have more to do with how
a bike corners than what the frame material is.

? maybe.....take another look at the geometry's geometry


Well yeah, but if you have a different geometry, different wheels and
different tires and think the cornering is different because of the
frame material...

My C40 and my Eddy Merckx Corsa Extra have almost identical geometry. So again that sounds good but doesn't seem to be the case.


Ok, so now you have exactly the same bikes except the different frame
material. Amazing.

On Monday, December 5, 2016 at 5:26:57 PM UTC, Doug Landau wrote:
On Monday, December 5, 2016 at 8:51:20 AM UTC-8, wrote:
Hey, remember that this is a bicycle group? We don't need Lieberman telling us that rounding off isn't close enough or Frank who is a good engineer telling us about global warming that he doesn't understand or DATATROLL telling us the liberal lines over and over.

One of the things I'm been noticing and the thing that you people are more likely to know something about is the following:

On my carbon fiber frames the tires would wear flat on the road surfaces. But on the steel frames they appear to wear round. Would you suppose because the steel frames give you more confidence in cornering so that the tires are banked over a good deal of the time going through turns?

Yesterday I did a quick (relatively) 32 miles ride with about 1/3rd of that climbing over 6% - 13% climbing. As I was returning home I started wondering how long before my tires wore out and much to my surprise the tires are round still. And I have to have 1,500 miles on them which is about as much as I've gotten out of them (Gatorskins) since I came-to in 2012. The only thing I remember from before my injury concerning tire wear was that Specialized Armadillos were much better because they wore slightly better but they cornered a hell of a lot better.

So can anyone explain this?

We don't believe a word of it in the first place. Send measurements of the roundness of the wear on the steel bike, and the flat spot on the tire on the CF bike, and get your measuring device in the pix.

Send also proof of the mileage of the bikes, and that the tires that are on them have been on them for their entire lives so far.
And explain what the fact that you rode 32 miles relatively quickly the other day has to do with anything whatsoever.

I hope you're joking, Doug. You're sounding much too close to the fascist Frank Krygowski for comedy.

Andre Jute
Snowflake. Where's my safe space?

On Monday, December 5, 2016 at 9:21:32 PM UTC, James wrote:
On 06/12/16 05:10, Duane wrote:
On 05/12/2016 12:54 PM, wrote:
On Monday, December 5, 2016 at 10:51:20 AM UTC-6,
wrote:
On my carbon fiber frames the tires would wear flat on the road
surfaces. But on the steel frames they appear to wear round. Would
you suppose because the steel frames give you more confidence in
cornering so that the tires are banked over a good deal of the time
going through turns?

For the last 25 years or so all professional bike riders have been
using carbon bikes. Steel has not been used since the 1980s I think.
All the pros go 50 mph down the mountains cornering through the
switchbacks. If you go watch a local criterium in your town you will
see all the riders using carbon bikes. Maybe one aluminum too. Never
any steel bikes, ever. How can they get around all the turns in a
criterium race if their bikes corner so poorly?

You are just making up, imagining nonsense.


Yeah, I sort of missed that part. I thought he was saying it was
something to do with cornering that made the tire wear flat not that the
CF bikes were so poor in cornering that people didn't use them the same.
This bike corners better than any bike I've had including the steel one
I just sold.

My "guess" would be the wheels and tire choices have more to do with how
a bike corners than what the frame material is.

They are all connected. Frame material and how it's used, design angles
and such, wheels, spokes, tyres, pressure - everything.

Brings me to a slightly off topic point. We recently finished an
extension to our house. The original building is built on a concrete
slab. The new kitchen/dining room has brick piers, hardwood bearers,
joists and hardwood floor boards. The last few floorboards overlap the
concrete slab and are glued to the concrete. As you walk from the
concrete slab supported floor boards to the bearer & joist supported
floor boards, there is an obvious perceivable difference in give or
bounce in the floor. I'm sure if you could measure the deflection of
the floor boards over joists and bearers that it would be lucky to reach
1mm. More likely fractions of a mm.

Makes me wonder about the "stiff but compliant" frame claims and how
much riders can feel through their hands and butt.

--
JS

Those planks are likely to be discovered to be cantilevered from the glued end, with consequences... But imagine finding even a useful hypothesis if you left out the crucial detail of the glued end.

Bicycle tube materials is an example of a near-subliminal difference in the perceived results of various material applications that hasn't yet been assigned a measurable cause, but in due course will. I'm convinced of it.

Andre Jute
The Art of Science

On Monday, December 5, 2016 at 8:31:51 PM UTC, Tosspot wrote:
On 05/12/16 17:51, wrote:
snip

So can anyone explain this?

I've just got back from the pub, and I can confirm my tyres are still
round...ish...

You'll get arrested for floating in charge of a bicycle. The evidence: your admission of round tyres. When you're sitting solidly on the bike, there is a flat spot where each tyre meets the road.

Andre Jute
A chum was arrested at Cambridge for being drunk in charge of a bicycle. Top that.

On Tuesday, December 6, 2016 at 5:13:17 AM UTC-8, Duane wrote:

I'm much faster on my CF bike than my CroMoly bike. There are too many
variables for me to know if there's any causal connection to the frame
material.

If you're looking to find someone to support your hypothesis that steel
frames corner better good luck. I can see no valid reason that the
frame material alone would make a difference in cornering.

I don't know how you measure this speed Duane. I do it via time checks. I know that the very stiff frames FELT a lot faster which was what I was talking about.

I don't know if it is actually a valid hypothesis but it does appear to me that the steel frames actually corner better because they feel more in contact with the road due to the very slight "give".

And as above I appear to be setting new records on my usual routes except those that include long, steep climbs in which the addition 3 lbs makes a difference I can feel.

On Tuesday, December 6, 2016 at 5:17:01 AM UTC-8, Duane wrote:
On 05/12/2016 4:57 PM, wrote:
On Monday, December 5, 2016 at 1:00:43 PM UTC-8, Duane wrote:
On 05/12/2016 2:19 PM, DATAKOLL MARINE RESEARCH wrote:
On Monday, December 5, 2016 at 1:10:21 PM UTC-5, Duane wrote:
On 05/12/2016 12:54 PM, wrote:
On Monday, December 5, 2016 at 10:51:20 AM UTC-6, wrote:
On my carbon fiber frames the tires would wear flat on the road surfaces. But on the steel frames they appear to wear round. Would you suppose because the steel frames give you more confidence in cornering so that the tires are banked over a good deal of the time going through turns?

For the last 25 years or so all professional bike riders have been using carbon bikes. Steel has not been used since the 1980s I think. All the pros go 50 mph down the mountains cornering through the switchbacks. If you go watch a local criterium in your town you will see all the riders using carbon bikes. Maybe one aluminum too. Never any steel bikes, ever. How can they get around all the turns in a criterium race if their bikes corner so poorly?

You are just making up, imagining nonsense.


Yeah, I sort of missed that part. I thought he was saying it was
something to do with cornering that made the tire wear flat not that the
CF bikes were so poor in cornering that people didn't use them the same.
This bike corners better than any bike I've had including the steel
one I just sold.

My "guess" would be the wheels and tire choices have more to do with how
a bike corners than what the frame material is.

? maybe.....take another look at the geometry's geometry


Well yeah, but if you have a different geometry, different wheels and
different tires and think the cornering is different because of the
frame material...

My C40 and my Eddy Merckx Corsa Extra have almost identical geometry. So again that sounds good but doesn't seem to be the case.


Ok, so now you have exactly the same bikes except the different frame
material. Amazing.

Duane - what would you find amazing in a racing bike's geometry that has been developed over 120 years? Would you believe that there are large differences that you can measure from bike to bike?

On Tuesday, December 6, 2016 at 8:08:50 AM UTC-8, Andre Jute wrote:
On Monday, December 5, 2016 at 8:31:51 PM UTC, Tosspot wrote:
On 05/12/16 17:51, wrote:
snip

So can anyone explain this?

I've just got back from the pub, and I can confirm my tyres are still
round...ish...

You'll get arrested for floating in charge of a bicycle. The evidence: your admission of round tyres. When you're sitting solidly on the bike, there is a flat spot where each tyre meets the road.

Andre Jute
A chum was arrested at Cambridge for being drunk in charge of a bicycle. Top that.

Certainly Andre, but I'm talking about the unloaded surfaces with the bike in a repair stand. It it wasn't much difference from the CF bikes I would mark it off to insufficient wear on the tires.

On 2016-12-05 08:51, wrote:
Hey, remember that this is a bicycle group? We don't need Lieberman
telling us that rounding off isn't close enough or Frank who is a
good engineer telling us about global warming that he doesn't
understand or DATATROLL telling us the liberal lines over and over.

One of the things I'm been noticing and the thing that you people are
more likely to know something about is the following:

On my carbon fiber frames the tires would wear flat on the road
surfaces. But on the steel frames they appear to wear round. Would
you suppose because the steel frames give you more confidence in
cornering so that the tires are banked over a good deal of the time
going through turns?

Yesterday I did a quick (relatively) 32 miles ride with about 1/3rd
of that climbing over 6% - 13% climbing. As I was returning home I
started wondering how long before my tires wore out and much to my
surprise the tires are round still. And I have to have 1,500 miles on
them which is about as much as I've gotten out of them (Gatorskins)
since I came-to in 2012. The only thing I remember from before my
injury concerning tire wear was that Specialized Armadillos were much
better because they wore slightly better but they cornered a hell of
a lot better.

So can anyone explain this?


I can't, unless you ride a lot of curvy roads out there. I have a
Gazelle Trim Trophy frame made of good old Reynolds 531 steel tubes and
I use Gatorskin wire bead tires since about two years. They always wear
flat in back. The front doesn't wear but the sidewall weakness in those
Gatorskins takes its toll.

If my road bike ever fails on me I'd replace it with a titanium
cyclocross bike.

--
Regards, Joerg

http://www.analogconsultants.com/

On 06/12/2016 11:10 AM, wrote:
On Tuesday, December 6, 2016 at 5:13:17 AM UTC-8, Duane wrote:

I'm much faster on my CF bike than my CroMoly bike. There are too many
variables for me to know if there's any causal connection to the frame
material.

If you're looking to find someone to support your hypothesis that steel
frames corner better good luck. I can see no valid reason that the
frame material alone would make a difference in cornering.

I don't know how you measure this speed Duane. I do it via time checks. I know that the very stiff frames FELT a lot faster which was what I was talking about.


Time trials. Or my Garmin. Or both.

I don't know if it is actually a valid hypothesis but it does appear to me that the steel frames actually corner better because they feel more in contact with the road due to the very slight "give".

I judge how much better this bike corners by the speed I can take a turn
that I know well( at the bottom of a 12% grade and just before a 10%
climb) and the lean I can get into the bike without the tires breaking.
Largely subjective but subjective is what I care about.

And as above I appear to be setting new records on my usual routes except those that include long, steep climbs in which the addition 3 lbs makes a difference I can feel.


Maybe you're pushing more on the steel bike because you're less worried
about it breaking. I have no idea.