Stupid Question About Rollers

[Dead Man]

Howdy

I've been meaning to get rollers for a long time. One of my clients happens to be a cyclist (actually he's a client because we're both cyclists... always nice when that happens) and the topic came up and he happened to have a set of travel rollers and just GAVE em to me. Said he hates them, and more power to me.

I was able to get on them pretty well, actually. None of this wacky roller fail crap you see on youtube... but pretty freaken close. I mean, riding the thing is an exercise in not destroying myself or my bike.

I'm totally open to the idea (probably fact) that riding it more will increase my balance and stability in general, and it'll get better... but I'm also wondering if I don't have the thing set up right - my contact patch is like a solid 6" forward of the fork ends, and with my hands on the handlebars, the front wheel flops around like CRAZY. I'm more stable riding hands-free than in a proper riding position. And secondly, but probably related - I/my bike tend to shoot off the back of the thing when I come to a stop, or if I don't mount it and start peddling immedately... which also seems like it is likely caused by how far forward the front roller is.

So obviously the solution to a front roller being too far forward would be to adjust it backwards, right? But if I do that, my resistance band will be too long.

So to the dumb questions: Where should the front roller be in relation to front tire contact? None of the settings put it under the fork ends, and it seems like it OUGHT to be in front, just to lock the bike in place on the rollers, but where's best? I ride a 51cm TT bike - Probably at the smallest/shortest adjustment?

And appendix to that - so looks like I'm gonna need to acquire new resistance bands to do that?

[chuckred]

http://http://coachlevi.com/cycling/how-to-set-up-rollers/

Sorry botched the link, but quick google search will get you there

[velomateo]

A picture would help. It's hard to tell without seeing the bike on the rollers.

I was riding my bike backwards on the rollers when I first got mine, so I understand how easy it is to screw up.

I love having rollers as an option. Weather here is usually great, but we get some very strong winds in my area. As a contact wearer, it's a real pain - even with glasses. So rollers are great for days like that.

[thwart]

Well, there you are... just buy a 57 cm bike to ride on the rollers and you're good to go.

;)

But seriously... the front roller should be centered under the wheel. And a small amount can make a significant difference. Changing the front setting on my e-motions by 1 cm made no-handed riding much easier.

[Dead Man]

Looks like I'm wrong about sizing - I can definitely get it under fork ends

Guess I'll just spin my ass off till I can get new bands!

[Hindmost]

Yikes! That would be unridable. Roller should be under the contact patch or ever so slightly behind.

Your band should be fine unless it is old and rotted.

[thollandpe]

.

[velomateo]

Replacing the band is a good idea. Having it fail while riding can result in one of those "youtube fails" you spoke of earlier. Don't ask me how I know.

[Dead Man]

Yea.. I don't know why I assumed the band wouldn't work on closer settings.... guess I'll adjust and go from there. So to recap - I should center axle directly under axle, right?

[trener1]

I have those exact rollers, and they are pretty easy to ride, like others have already said, Yikes move that sucker back a couple of notches.

[11.4]

Ideally you should have the front hub perhaps 1 to 1-1/2 centimeters behind the front drum. If you're directly over the drum steering tends to be twitchy; with the hub in front of the drum it gets unstable. If you're too far in back it will feel like a bike with bad trail, which is basically what it is. Just pick the first hole for the drum that puts it in front of the hub and you're golden.

The band should be elastic enough that it'll do fine. There's no magic tension to make it work right or not. And those bands last forever. I've never seen one go unless it had been pinched and cut already from storage, folding, whatever. And they really don't stretch either. If you're worried that it stretched or if it has a nick, you can make a straight razor blade cut across the band and then either use some toluene (wet suit cement works as well because it's mostly toluene) or just use a flame to melt the ends and then marry them squarely together. There's not a lot of load on the joint, so you just want to be sure it's stuck nicely and the ends are butted to each other.

If you want to get a new band, I'd just get the diameter of the band (they vary) and get the matching one from Kreitler. Those are as cheap as any and are the best quality.

[jmal]

Ideally you should have the front hub perhaps 1 to 1-1/2 centimeters behind the front drum. If you're directly over the drum steering tends to be twitchy; with the hub in front of the drum it gets unstable. If you're too far in back it will feel like a bike with bad trail, which is basically what it is. Just pick the first hole for the drum that puts it in front of the hub and you're golden.

The band should be elastic enough that it'll do fine. There's no magic tension to make it work right or not. And those bands last forever. I've never seen one go unless it had been pinched and cut already from storage, folding, whatever. And they really don't stretch either. If you're worried that it stretched or if it has a nick, you can make a straight razor blade cut across the band and then either use some toluene (wet suit cement works as well because it's mostly toluene) or just use a flame to melt the ends and then marry them squarely together. There's not a lot of load on the joint, so you just want to be sure it's stuck nicely and the ends are butted to each other.

If you want to get a new band, I'd just get the diameter of the band (they vary) and get the matching one from Kreitler. Those are as cheap as any and are the best quality.

This is the correct answer. Front axle 1-1.5cm behind the center of the front drum.

[Dead Man]

Seems right- just seems like you'd want the thing slightly in front to help lock the bike in place, if no other reason

Thanks gents! Super helpful

[thwart]

And those bands last forever. I've never seen one go unless it had been pinched and cut already from storage, folding, whatever.
Good to know... was thinking about ordering one to have around since the rollers are now 7 or 8 yrs old, and didn't want to wait 7-10 days for one during roller season.

[Dead Man]

Adjusted the front so's it's about 1cm forward of the hub axle. Definitely rides way better.. did my first real "ride" tonight, no problem.

I did have to stretch the band all the way back to the rear roller, though... had to fold the thing up to get it to go back there, and was afraid it would snap when I unfolded it... but it did not. Still - wasn't enough resistance! There's grooves on the other side of the rollers also... doesn't really seem like adding another band would increase resistance, the way they roll.. but why else have grooves on that side - is that the way to go, to increase resistance? Had it in top gear and was still floating around 100-110RPM to keep my HR up

[happycampyer]

I may be mistaken, but I don't think the band provides any resistance. All it's doing is transferring the work from the rear wheel to the front wheel, to get it to spin. The resistance is provided by the rear rollers. Something's not right if you are in your tallest gear and you aren't getting enough resistance.

Who is the manufacturer of the rollers? If you can find an owners manual online or can contact the company, you should be able to troubleshoot the problem.

[onomic]

Yes the band is just to keep the front roller spinning and does not provide resistance. That's determined by the diameter of the rollers themselves. Smaller rollers equal greater resistence.

[thwart]

I may be mistaken, but I don't think the band provides any resistance. All it's doing is transferring the work from the rear wheel to the front wheel, to get it to spin.


This.

To get the resistance you are seeking you may need smaller diameter rollers, or a model that allows you to add resistance.

With your current rollers there are some 'jury rig' ways to increase resistance a bit... such as a blanket, a piece of carpet or something similar pushed up against the rear roller, or lowering tire pressure slightly (although see recent thread about roller squeaking and tire pressure). Remember most use rollers primarily to work on achieving 'souplesse', to get a smoother pedal stroke, as well as balance on the bike... and go to their trainer for real resistance work.

[Pastashop]

Here's a calibration table from Kreitler:

1697913545

You should be able to extrapolate [Edit: interpolate - thanks, marciero!] from the table how much power it's taking to maintain a particular speed.

Using Sheldon Brown's gear calculator I'm getting that at 100 rpm in your highest gear (52x12?..) on a 700c wheelset would put you at 34.8 (~35) mph.

The drums look to be about 3" diameter, which would put your wattage at 35 mph at ~337 Watts, give or take, depending on tire pressure, width, and rider weight.*

Props!

*The power calibration table is for a 160 lb rider on 25c tires at 110 psi, I believe.

Adjust from there. :-)

(I've been looking at FTP guidelines lately... A Cat.3 should be able to produce 2x their weight in lbs the number of watts for an hour, which corresponds to about 4 Watts per kg. Since I'm 15-20 lbs over good riding weight, and 15 years over any kind of training, I'm way below those numbers. Sad...)

[onomic]

Yes the band is just to keep the front roller spinning and does not provide resistance. That's determined by the diameter of the rollers themselves. Smaller rollers equal greater resistance. If you're spun out you're a stronger man than I. Maybe look into a fan unit to add resistance and also keep you cool, kreitler makes one. Speaking of bands you may want to put the band back into its original position because if you really have it stretched it just might snap on you. Good luck and welcome to the roller club.

[onomic]

Great chart, I'm going to have to save that one. Very interesting, thanks for sharing.

[marciero]

Yes, nice chart and comments. The "2x weight" is a nice quick-and-dirty benchmark, Thanks for posting.
A couple of remarks- using gear ratio to compute speed is of course tire size dependent, and estimating power between given speed values (rather than outside the range of values) would be interpolating rather than extrapolating. Sorry couldn't resist!

[11.4]

Adjusted the front so's it's about 1cm forward of the hub axle. Definitely rides way better.. did my first real "ride" tonight, no problem.

I did have to stretch the band all the way back to the rear roller, though... had to fold the thing up to get it to go back there, and was afraid it would snap when I unfolded it... but it did not. Still - wasn't enough resistance! There's grooves on the other side of the rollers also... doesn't really seem like adding another band would increase resistance, the way they roll.. but why else have grooves on that side - is that the way to go, to increase resistance? Had it in top gear and was still floating around 100-110RPM to keep my HR up

The band just has to be tight enough to make the front wheel spin when you're riding the rollers. It doesn't contribute resistance or tension to the system. It seems that you're trying to create training resistance rather than just make the front wheel spin? I definitely wouldn't put it on the rear-most drum. And a second band doesn't do anything. It's an old tradition to put grooves on both sides of the roller drums -- at one time the bands were latex and broke so often that one put bands on both sides so it would keep the front wheel spinning long enough to get off and replace the broken band (and latex bands broke incessantly; today's bands are synthetic polymer and indestructible). You can use either side for the band -- I prefer to mount on a side without the band so I don't snag it while getting going or ending a ride.

As for getting more resistance, the options on rollers aren't all that great. A towel or carpet under the rear roller is a bit problematic because they tend to slip out, you can't get reproducible levels of resistance, and if they jam up, you can crash. I've had all three issues with them. There are bolt-on flywheels to create more resistance, but the flywheels are small and poorly machined and don't give a smooth ride. The fan resistance systems like the Kreitler Killer headwind fan aren't really ideal in my book either. They are quite noisy, they don't produce as much air flow as a good standard fan will do, they are expensive, and the resistance is still limited. Plus, they are klutzy -- if you have to pick up and store your rollers, they are in the way and have to be disconnected or are in the way. Smaller drum sizes do increase resistance, but as pointed out in this thread, the best use of rollers is to develop souplesse and leg speed. Spin at 160 rpm and you can get a great aerobic workout as well. You got a deal on your rollers so by all means use them, but see if you can try out some TruTrainers -- they feature an internal flywheel drum that makes them quite heavy but gives unparalleled road feel with higher resistance, and you can add a magnetic resistance unit for even harder workouts. For the rollers you have, I'd use them without attachments and focus on doing your workouts at +/- 160 rpm. The real wattage isn't linear on rollers and you'll be getting a hard workout at higher cadence, plus improving your pedaling. For high resistance power workouts, use a trainer instead. Or, arguably even better, do weights plus a roller workout. One can convert the improvement of a weights workout to road power fairly well with a limited amount of actual winter road riding.

I wouldn't trust those Kreitler tables, by the way. Al Kreitler did those once, years ago, and it is completely dependent on the rider, tire pressure, and many other variables, plus, as mentioned, the wattage is anything but linear with respect to cadence. And as mentioned in other threads here, power on a trainer has no serious relationship to power on the road and has no serious relationship to power on rollers. They are simply different.

[Dead Man]

Or, arguably even better, do weights plus a roller workout. One can convert the improvement of a weights workout to road power fairly well with a limited amount of actual winter road riding.

Yes... I like this.

The band does not spin the front roller, at the new setting... to get the front to spin at all, I had to put it on the back

[Dead Man]

So sounds like unless I can manage to get some outside time in, I'm not gonna be able to go trainer-free. Just plain isn't enough resistance on the rollers. However - I did pump up my 25mm tires to 110 PSI for the roller ride last night - just seemed like it would keep tire wear down, I guess. I usually ride at 95 or even 90 psi, at 155lbs (tubulars).. so I could increase resistance by going down 15psi

How does tire wear compare to road? I know it's not supposed to be even close to as bad as the trainer, but surely there's SOME kind of wear on rollers?

[FlashUNC]

Ride in the 53x11 at 140 rpm. It'll be plenty of resistance.

And the added benefit of fixing whatever chop exists in the pedal stroke.

If they're good enough for Eddy....

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_BcHekNAfOo

[Dead Man]

50:11 is as big as I can manage

Wool long sleeve, on the rollers, inside??

[marciero]

The band just has to be tight enough to make the front wheel spin when you're riding the rollers. It doesn't contribute resistance or tension to the system. It seems that you're trying to create training resistance rather than just make the front wheel spin? I definitely wouldn't put it on the rear-most drum. And a second band doesn't do anything. It's an old tradition to put grooves on both sides of the roller drums -- at one time the bands were latex and broke so often that one put bands on both sides so it would keep the front wheel spinning long enough to get off and replace the broken band (and latex bands broke incessantly; today's bands are synthetic polymer and indestructible). You can use either side for the band -- I prefer to mount on a side without the band so I don't snag it while getting going or ending a ride.

As for getting more resistance, the options on rollers aren't all that great. A towel or carpet under the rear roller is a bit problematic because they tend to slip out, you can't get reproducible levels of resistance, and if they jam up, you can crash. I've had all three issues with them. There are bolt-on flywheels to create more resistance, but the flywheels are small and poorly machined and don't give a smooth ride. The fan resistance systems like the Kreitler Killer headwind fan aren't really ideal in my book either. They are quite noisy, they don't produce as much air flow as a good standard fan will do, they are expensive, and the resistance is still limited. Plus, they are klutzy -- if you have to pick up and store your rollers, they are in the way and have to be disconnected or are in the way. Smaller drum sizes do increase resistance, but as pointed out in this thread, the best use of rollers is to develop souplesse and leg speed. Spin at 160 rpm and you can get a great aerobic workout as well. You got a deal on your rollers so by all means use them, but see if you can try out some TruTrainers -- they feature an internal flywheel drum that makes them quite heavy but gives unparalleled road feel with higher resistance, and you can add a magnetic resistance unit for even harder workouts. For the rollers you have, I'd use them without attachments and focus on doing your workouts at +/- 160 rpm. The real wattage isn't linear on rollers and you'll be getting a hard workout at higher cadence, plus improving your pedaling. For high resistance power workouts, use a trainer instead. Or, arguably even better, do weights plus a roller workout. One can convert the improvement of a weights workout to road power fairly well with a limited amount of actual winter road riding.

I wouldn't trust those Kreitler tables, by the way. Al Kreitler did those once, years ago, and it is completely dependent on the rider, tire pressure, and many other variables, plus, as mentioned, the wattage is anything but linear with respect to cadence. And as mentioned in other threads here, power on a trainer has no serious relationship to power on the road and has no serious relationship to power on rollers. They are simply different.

Good points (but note that the chart was for stated rider weight and tire pressure). There is nothing on rollers where friction is part of the design. The bearings, for example, are designed to minimize friction. Wheel-on-drum is about as friction-free as you can get-only rolling resistance. Belt-turning-roller is also a design that minimizes friction. Adding a flywheel would seem to mostly make a difference when accelerating, for the same reason heavy aero wheels are not disadvantageous at constant speed on flat terrain, the difference being that the flywheel adds friction where the aero wheel does not. But again, the friction the flywheel introduces is through designs (bearings, belt) that inherently minimize friction.

[FlashUNC]

50:11 is as big as I can manage

Wool long sleeve, on the rollers, inside??

Still plenty tall gearing. I've got the 4.5" drums, and while I'd prefer the smaller drums, its still plenty of a spin workout.

[11.4]

To various points:

There's almost no tire wear on rollers. You can ride very light tires and short of Dugast Pinks, they last forever. The only thing that happens sometimes is that if you are using very nice tubulars with hand-glued treads (like light FMBs or Dugasts in the light time trial or track range), the constant flexing of the tread can lift it loose. Then in a second the whole tread can strip off and you're riding on fairly slippery fabric with your rubber down on the floor. (OK, keep the smutty comments out of this, ok?) This isn't a problem with anything but ultra-light tires though.

The thing about rollers is that they have the rolling resistance of a line of rumble strips on the highway. They cause a lot of depression of the profile of the tire, which is at the heart of rolling resistance. So rollers can create quite a bit and the faster you go, the more resistance you accumulate. All this means you can get to quite a bit of wattage, but it's at high speed. And on rollers this comes down to high cadence.

I wouldn't recommend lowering pressures. First, that puts a lot more torque on the casing and tread of the tires (in case you have nice tires on). Second, it's a ····ty ride. Third, there's always a risk (because you are flexing the casing more) of burping an inner tube from under the casing and getting a blowout. This doesn't happen at higher pressures, but at lower pressures it becomes an issue. And at lower pressures a little bounce on the bike can create a snakebite on rollers (like how snakebites are most likely when hitting curbs and speed bumps and other such hazards), with the same result. Keep the pressure up, even a little higher than normal, and rely on speed and cadence to give you the workout you need.

[shovelhd]

If your rollers have steel bolts in the spinning assembly, some guys add neodymium magnets nearby which adds predictable resistance.

[Dead Man]

I'm thinking about a felt pad on a block, bolted to the floor

[11.4]

I'm thinking about a felt pad on a block, bolted to the floor

I'm guessing it'll wear down fast, or polish the center of the drum fast.

A lot of people have tried solutions to get more resistance on rollers and the discovery has pretty much always been that it needs an engineering solution -- a modification to the rollers. Read about TruTrainers just to see how that's been done well. I hate to see you spending time and money on various solutions that are in the end kinda like someone getting gimmicks to improve their golf swing. You got some free rollers; I'd say to ride them and get the benefit they offer. Don't try to make them do what they aren't really designed to do.