Stiff wheels or light wheels?

[sailaholic]

All the wheel discussion of late reminded me of this article, took a while to find it again though.


option_test1 by sailaholic, on Flickr


option_test2 by sailaholic, on Flickr


option_test3 by sailaholic, on Flickr


option_test4 by sailaholic, on Flickr


option_test5 by sailaholic, on Flickr

[Apu]

Great article and thanks for sharing sailaholic! Interesting points made about cornering and braking which I hadn't realised before.

[StuwieP]

Nice read although it seems an obvious outcome in terms of cornering. I wasn't expecting the braking to be affected though.
Anyone who has ridden a pushbike can volunteer that information - cornering exerts force that flexes the wheel. touch the brakes (on a bike) mid corner and you'll straighten up because the brakes pull the wheel back to centre. logic would say that if a wheel bends under 60kg at 30km/h then a 1000+kg car will do the same under 1g cornering forces.

The article offers no clear reason why a wheel cannot be built that is both lightweight and stiff, only that shaving metal away from a rim will reduce the weight and strength of that wheel (no, really?). I get that shaving the wheel down controlled other variables in terms of wheel construction to clearly demonstrate the effect of wheel flex on performance.

I suppose the cycling adage holds true here: light, stiff, cheap. pick two.

The main point I'd take away is that if you want a lighter wheel, buy one designed for the weight rather than take chunks out of your existing rims. And that Enkei wants you to buy their wheels (but not shave them down?)

I know that all sounds really critical (of the article, and nothing else I hope!) so I need also to say thank you sailaholic for sharing, must've taken some time to dig that up!