Tag Archives: equipment

Oh no, oh no, oh no….my Zonda rims are cracked

Dear Rouleurs,

MMT had a dreadful trip to his friendly neighbourhood bike shop, Good Bikes’ last week.  MMT’s venerable Wilier was making a few awful noises from the vicinity of the bottom bracket.  May be it needed replacing as it had been ridden on for nearly six years.  Similarly the left pedal was behaving very weirdly under power.  All in all, it seemed high time for a service.

So MMT rode his Wilier to work and dropped the bike off.  A few minutes of explanation ensured.  The mechanic, Nathan, was advised to ring me if the price of repairs was exceeding $300.  Nathan called MMT a few hours later and his news left MMT aghast.  Apparently the rear rim was showing signs of cracking and needed replacing…..crap….Keep in mind that these were the $800 Campagnolo Zondas, bought just over 2 and half years ago.

Fortunately, MMT had kept the original Fulcrum rims.  MMT had spent a frustrating Saturday afternoon, a few weeks ago, fitting spoke reflectors and had intended to use these as his winter wheels.  So the Wilier stayed at the shop, until the old rims were retrieved and fitted. Nathan showed MMT the cracks and MMT was horrified at what he saw.

MMT reckons he’s done about 15,000km on these rims and can’t believe how these stress fractures have occurred. For starters, they are all on non-cassette side of the rim. One of them has cracked clean through, with clear daylight visible. MMT can only shudder at the thought of what may have happened had the spokes given way entirely.

MMT is not a happy camper…

Until next time, ride safe.

MMT

A better use for triathelete time trial handlebars….

Dear Rouleurs,

I’ve fallen out of love with Mr Zuckerberg’s social behemoth, Facebook.  It’s big brother use of my activity data just leaves me cold and wondering when Skynet will arrive.  Nevertheless, the occasional post from cycling magazines turns up a gem and this is one of them.  Can’t help but wonder if Aussie didn’t ‘invent’ this.

Not that I’ve advocating drink-riding or any other similar foolishness.

Until next time, ride safe and sober,

Marv

 

Cranksets and Cassettes…its a ratio thing.

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Dear Rouleurs,

I’ve been obsessing over gear ratios, drive trains and hill climbing.  As a 102 Kg Clydesdale, doing sportives this year, these things matter.  I’m riding the  60Km version of the Ballarat Classic in February and that course contains some serious gradient.  Certainly more than I’m used on my local Beach Road ride.

So I started out looking at triple chain ring. Straight away, I encountered two significant snags.  First, Campagnolo phased triple chain rings on their lower end groupsets, hence I wouldn’t be able to source a Veloce component.  Second, even if I had sourced an older Veloce triple, it would have meant changing over the front and rear derailleurs as well.  Essentially, that’s 3 out of 4 bits of drive train.  Given its Campag, that would be a costly trip to a bike shop.

Instead, I read a few blogs and landed on fitting a compact chain ring with a smaller 50/34t ratio and higher ratio 13-29t cassette.  Originally, I had 11-23t which I upgraded as part of Zonda rim package to 11-25t.  For everything I’ve done thus far 11-23/25t has fine.  I tend to do most of riding on the outer ring anyway.  The theory being I should be able to keep my cadence fairly high and not have to stand on the pedals to exert brute force.  So I’m swapping out the 11-25mm for the 13-29mm.

 11-25mm  To  13-29mm
 20160114-campy-veloce-cassette-10-speed-11-25  20160114-campy-veloce-cassette-10-speed-13-29

The compact chain ring is an interesting beast. Depending on what online cycling magazines Its being described as the ‘killer’ of the tripleset chain ring. Mainly because of its ability to provide similar ratios to the tripleset, whilst enabling manufacturers to avoiding extra tooling and production costs. Most likely, this is why Campagnolo doesn’t offer triples on the cheaper groupsets.

So these were the alternatives:

53-39 – Race -> I have one of these already
52-36 – Semi-compact –> the one I’m not sure about
50-34 – Compact -> the one I’ve decided on.

53-39t has been the standard chain ring for some time now. It’s used in races that are mainly flat and in timetrials, where the more powerful riders are using a 53 to 11 ratio to achieve maximum speed.

50-34t Compact crankset has been around since 2002 and has been used by the Pros to travel through mountain stages. The primary idea being that a smaller front chain ring allows a higher cadence which should reduce muscle fatigue. It also allows less powerful riders access to lower ration gears without ‘crossing’ the chain. Crossing the chain creates more friction and increases wear and tear on the drive train.

52-36t Semi-compact is the new kid on the block. Its reason d’etre is that it provides the best of both worlds means a 52-tooth chainring for attacking descents and sprints, while maintaining a smooth chain line from the big ring when riding on flat roads, and a 36-tooth inner ring which, of course, offers a lower gear for climbing than a 39-tooth ring.

My decision on which crankset was made easier…again…sigh…by Campagnolo not having Veloce 52-36 crankset. So I’m swapping this 53-39 for this 50-34.

 53-39t  To  50-34t
 20160114-campy-veloce-crankset-53-39  20160114-campy-veloce-crankset-50-34

So circling back to where I started, in about 2 weeks I’ll find out how all of this tinkering in my drive train worked. The Cadel Evans Peoples ride is fairly flat with the exception of a couple nasty little hills on the back end of the course. Hopefully this will all ‘gel’ together and provide a really efficient ‘gearbox’ for my 46 year old legs.

Until next time

Marv

Product Review: Campagnolo Zonda Clincher Wheelset

 

Dear Rouleurs,

I’ve almost recovered from the dizzy flu and the national disgrace of our male cricket team. This meant, I’ve finally spent some quality time on my bike and the new Campagnolo Zonda clincher wheels, I purchased in mid-July. As my readership would know, I’ve been suffering from severe upgraditis triggered by SBS cycling coverage. I’ve previously swapped out my pedals and shoes.

Marv's Wilier with Zondas fitted.

Marv’s Wilier with Zondas fitted.

After much ‘umming’ and ‘ahhing’ I decided that I really needed new wheels. As an aside much of what is written about wheel weight borders on twaddle. However, Leonard Zinn at Velonews seems to have a good grasp of the physics. For the record, lighter means faster…period and in wheels, heavier rims means they are harder to accelerate. So I swapped out the Fulcrum 7s for Campy Zondas. In theory, I should have reduced the overall weight of the bike by 300g.

I bought the wheels last month from Cecil Walker’s Elizabeth St for $750. As, the wag in the bike shop said, ‘Mate, you’re swapping fake Campy’s for real ones’. I didn’t have the courage to attempt the fitting of a new cassette and the bike needed a service. So I forked out the $250 difference on Wiggle price. Unfortunately, the maintenance order I put at the front desk must have been communicated via ‘chinese whispers’ and the mechanic didn’t fit the Gatorskin tyres that I wanted. I changed over the tyres later.

After 4 weeks of riding, I can say they were a good purchase. Initially, I had the tyres over inflated, so the combination of the new rigid rims and new tyres, gave a very harsh ride. The handling experience felt very jitterly. I was feeling amplified road conditions transmitted up the seat post, out of the rear frame geometry. It was only when the bike was travelling over smooth bitumen did the ride improve. Initially, I was thinking that I had wasted my money and was a bit grumpy.

Happily as the Gatorskin tyre pressure decreased, the ride quality improved. I’m inclined now to inflate the tyre to 5-7 kPA lower than suggested by the manufacturer. In the last week, I’ve felt that bike is much quicker. The times on my Garmin seem to evidence this.

 

Here’s the tech specs:

 20150814-Zondas-BR Front wheel weight: 670g
Rear wheel weight: 880g Campagnolo hub
Rim height: 26mm (front), 30mm (rear)
Rim width: 20.5mm
Spoke count: 16 (front), 21 (rear)
Compatibility: 9/10/11 speed.

Here’s what I think the pros and cons of the wheelset are:

Pros:

  • Quite light 1550g or there abouts.
  • Very robust, the moulded rim looks and has so far been indestructible.
  • The sealed rim doesn’t require a rim strip.
  • There was visible build quality difference between the Fulcrum 7s and Zondas.
  • They seem to accelerate well and thanks to the hubs spin very smoothly.
  • The front rim is slightly shallower than the rear, this seems to provide more responsive, windproof steering.
  • The G3 spoke pattern on the rear wheel is IMHO aesthetically pleasing and seems to keep the rear wheel very stiff.
  • The paint scheme also matched the silver, black and red scheme of my Wilier’s frame.

Cons:

  • Harsh ride if your tyres are over-inflated.
  • If you break a spoke, you’ll need to have it fixed by your bike shop mechanic. The sealed rim means the use of magnet to re-thread a spoke.
  • The spokes are proprietary, can only be sourced from Campy re-sellers.
  • Being Campy, replacement parts are pricey, particularly compared to the Shimano.

And for what its worth, if you need further proof, via wisdom of online reviews

Wiggle buyers rate them – 4.8 / 5
BikeRadar gave them – 4/5
Chain Reaction buyers them – 4.8 / 5

I’m giving them 4 Marvs.

Until next time,

Marv