gpelpel said:
I saw about 3 images of failures in races published many times on the web, the actual comments about what happened is not always listed but all involved hitting something (racer or object as the cause of the crash). There's also a racer who posts in bikeforums.net (from Southern California) and uses the R-Sys. He has broken spokes several times, in all instances he explained what happened and said the wheels were not at fault.
Ok, so that covers three wheels and one racer. What about all of the others? Visit Weight Weenies for opinions on R-SYS wheels that differ from yours. They also cite instances of wheel failure.
gpelpel said:
Mind is surely powerful but I am not the only one saying what I posted about the R-Sys. Instead of trying to use some theory to hide the fact that you haven't given these wheels even a test ride, you should try to be helpful to this forum with comments that have real value.
Wow. So others state that, too, eh? Does that make it a fact? No. It doesn't. As an example, I'll cite the hundred or so times that I've read on forums about some guy buying aero wheels, and on his first with 'em, how he went 5 mph faster or summat. People read that all of the time. The fact is that the best of the best aero wheels add only 0.4 or so mph at 25 mph. Hmmm.
Using theory to hide that I haven't ridden the wheels? MMmm, no. That's a stupid assumption and clearly shows that you don't know how the physical laws govern wheel dynamics and what the various models used say. I actually didn't use any theory. I didn't need to. I used the laws that are the foundation of Newtonian mechanics, the same laws that have been vetted over 400+ years of experimentation. There is zero in those laws that shows that R-SYS wheels would make any perceptible change in performance at all.
As for me helping or not helping, I am helping. Too often people post their reports on how a product functions as if those reports were all fact. The only fact is that the human body is a lousy sensor when it comes to accuracy and precision. What "signal" a rider gets is dependent on fatigue, wellness, mood, hydration, bias toward the product, and on and on and on. That is why scientists came up with that crazy thing called "Scientific Method." See, scientific method is designed to remove human bias from the measurement process.
Example: I have read some rider reports saying that the R-SYS wheels felt slow or sluggish; yet, you say they accelerate like the dickens. So, who's right, eh?
gpelpel said:
My own observations of these wheels is that they really help my climbing. Their acceleration is due to momentum, you are right on this point, but momentum can come from different factors. The R-Sys are lighter than my previous wheels so starting at the same speed they have less momentum. However due to their stiffness the forces I apply on the pedals are quicker and better transferred as wheel rotation resulting in higher momentum.
If you think the wheels aid your climbing, that's good for you. I've always said people should ride what motivates them or puts pep in their step. However, that doesn't make what those people or you feel fact. It's you opinion, your response to what you felt. That's all.
As for your ideas of momentum......no. It actually takes a force to change momentum, so it takes an acceleration of some sort to change momentum. You cannot say with any accuracy at all whether at some given speed your R-SYS have less or more total momentum, unless you also know the moment of inertia for each of the wheels in question. As for you forces applied at the pedal and any "quicker" forces and "higher" momentum......no. You don't have nearly enough information to say that. It sure seems, though, that you don't have a full understanding of the constitutive equations that would govern the bike/rider system.
gpelpel said:
I wish I had them in July when I rode the California Death Ride, they would have helped a great deal on some of the steeper section. I do not know if you are familiar with Mt. Diablo in Northern California but the climb ends with a 200 yard, 18 to 20% ramp after a 10.5 mile ride and a 3,400 feet rise. This ramp has never felt so easy and I have made the climb several times on the R-Sys so my mind should have overcome the honeymoon period by now.
Nope. Not at all. Where, in the course of all that time, would your mind have necessarily had an objective epiphany? All that's happened is your opinion hasn't changed. There are climbs around my area that range from 12-24% over anything from a quarter of a mile to longer. I've used wheels with significantly different masses and MOI (weights: 830ish g vs. 1380g), and do you want to know what the difference was between the wheels? Nothing significant at all.
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