ENVE advising LBSs to not support open tubular tires

[Calnago]

The term “Open Tubular” is nothing more than marketing speak, derived to convince the consumer that the clincher tires they are about to buy (yes, they are simply clinchers) are just like their tubular counterparts except in clincher form. Well, they may be of similar construction, except for one glaring defining fact... they are not tubulars in any way shape or form, they are clinchers. And they will never possess the handling/ride characteristics of their true tubular brethren. As long as they have to be supported by two hard rim sidewalls, and have structural beads to hold them within these sidewalls, they can never truly be expected to behave like a tubular, perfectly round and cradled gently within a rim bed of similar radius, allowing it much more leeway to conform to the contours of the road in all conditions, especially when leaned over in a hard turn. And because it’s cradled and glued to the rim bed, the tires' sidewalls can be made more supple since there is no hard edge they have to butt up against.
It’s the sharp carbon edges of the carbon clincher rims that are the problem, not the tires. If the carbon edges were nice and smooth, as @Ergott suggested, the propensity to cut the nice supple walls of a high quality (supple), and thus nice riding clincher (marketed as “Open Tubular”) would not be there. ENVE’s warning would like to make you believe it is the tires that are at fault, when in fact what they should be saying is “Please use a really awful riding thick walled clincher made of steel belts if possible, rather than soft and supple silks and cotton, because we’re pretty sure the sharp edges of our carbon clincher rims won’t be able to cut through those”.
I suspect it’s quite difficult to manufacture a nice super smooth clincher bead, otherwise they would do it. I still recall the clean deep gash in my hand caused by grasping the carbon spokes of a wheel to fix a flat. The edges of the spokes were very sharp. The edges of a carbon clincher bead can be similarly sharp.

[jtbadge]

Originally Posted by fignon's barber

Hey, you left out: disc brake hate, race organizer hate, doping hate, masters racing hate, carbon frame hate, gravel bike hate, aero bike hate, aero helmet hate, Rapha hate, Ebay hate, USPS rate hate,and,of course, Lance hate. I'm sure I missed a few dozen.

Hate of anything that's not a classic lugged steel racing frame with silver quill stem and Campy 10 and low profile 32 spoke tubulars or a Moots with matchy ti cockpit.

I want to put SRAM on my MXL that already has a threadless stem and "open tubular" tires.

[ergott]

Originally Posted by Blown Reek

I don't buy in to the fact that, for whatever reason, Enve rims aren't up to the standards that other "quality" rims are, and to think that they make an inferior product just seems a little personal-biased. After all, Old Potatoe hates Mavic rims with a passion and has had nothing but trouble, but I'm on the complete opposite end of the spectrum.

The only "sharp edge" rim I've ever seen was a Mavic Cosmic Carbone 40c, and that was by design, and not poor manufacturing. When they moved from the CC40 rim shape to the Pro Carbon SL C shape, the sharp edge was gone.

Nothing personal, and to even think that I'll hold my own in a wheel/wheelbuilding conversation with you is absurd, but with all the "hate" on the board (SRAM hate, Mavic hate, Enve hate, Campagnolo hate, tubeless hate, seat tube clamping hate... whichever "team" you identify with), unless I actually see actual proof, it's anecdotal at best. Keep in mind that I'm no Enve fanboy nor corporate shill, nor do I take any of this personally, either.

I've personally owned 3 different sets of Edge Composites wheels and Enve 4.5s, 6.7s, and 8.9s. I've built and sold more than my share. There's definitely no personal bias at all. I think they do a lot of things well and would own another set of tubular wheels in a heartbeat. I just know for a fact that the edges of their clincher rims aren't as well finished as other manufacturers. There are also more imperfections at the transition from tire bed to sidewall and they use a filler in some places. I haven't taken pictures of this and posted because I don't make bashing components a habit. I felt the need to point out this issue as they are advising against certain tires and I don't think it's an issue with the tires.

I buy components from any and every company that I think makes quality stuff. I make a habit of not stocking anything in bulk so it doesn't persuade me to sell someone on components just because I have them on hand. I will continue to work with Enve in other aspects when I see fit.

[Dave B]

^^^^^ First off, love the bikes, just fantastic.


Ok I live in a flat area where climbing is about as common as cyclists agreeing on what is the best gear.

So please any of you who are worried, send me your ENVE wheels and Vittoria tires or Veloflex and I'll risk riding them and take away any concerns from you.

I would be happy to help anyone out who is concerned. I am happy to run that set up every day, it is just the problem of affording ENVE wheels that is getting in my way.

[Calnago]

Originally Posted by Mark McM

Tubulars also use inner tubes - however in this case, the inner tube is already installed before the casing is sewn shut. Repairing a punctured tubular tire involves un-sewing the casing near puncture, pulling out that portion of the inner tube, patching the inner tube just like you'd patch any other inner tube, and then re-inserting the inner tube back into the casing and re-sewing the casing shut. This is one reason that tubulars lost popularity - they are much more of a pain to fix. Most people either end up discarding the tire, or paying to have a professional tire repairer to fix it.

With the advent of sealants such as Orange Seal, tubular repair is about as easy as it gets... about 10-15ml of sealant and voila, you're off and running again, no tire removal, no mess. I don't use it as a preventative measure like you really need to do in a tubeless setup (mostly just to get it to initially seat and seal properly), but rather only when/if I get a puncture. Super easy, and I can't remember the last time I had to resort to using my spare tubular, and I run tubulars all year round, exclusively.

[pdmtong]

Originally Posted by Calnago

The term “Open Tubular” is nothing more than marketing speak, derived to convince the consumer that the clincher tires they are about to buy (yes, they are simply clinchers) are just like their tubular counterparts except in clincher form. Well, they may be of similar construction, except for one glaring defining fact... they are not tubulars in any way shape or form, they are clinchers. And they will never possess the handling/ride characteristics of their true tubular brethren. As long as they have to be supported by two hard rim sidewalls, and have structural beads to hold them within these sidewalls, they can never truly be expected to behave like a tubular, perfectly round and cradled gently within a rim bed of similar radius, allowing it much more leeway to conform to the contours of the road in all conditions, especially when leaned over in a hard turn. And because it’s cradled and glued to the rim bed, the tires' sidewalls can be made more supple since there is no hard edge they have to butt up against.
It’s the sharp carbon edges of the carbon clincher rims that are the problem, not the tires. If the carbon edges were nice and smooth, as @Ergott suggested, the propensity to cut the nice supple walls of a high quality (supple), and thus nice riding clincher (marketed as “Open Tubular”) would not be there. ENVE’s warning would like to make you believe it is the tires that are at fault, when in fact what they should be saying is “Please use a really awful riding thick walled clincher made of steel belts if possible, rather than soft and supple silks and cotton, because we’re pretty sure the sharp edges of our carbon clincher rims won’t be able to cut through those”.
I suspect it’s quite difficult to manufacture a nice super smooth clincher bead, otherwise they would do it. I still recall the clean deep gash in my hand caused by grasping the carbon spokes of a wheel to fix a flat. The edges of the spokes were very sharp. The edges of a carbon clincher bead can be similarly sharp.

Is the "sharper edge" of an enve carbon rim also a result of the rim being designed for tubeless?
The edges of my Bora One carbon clinchers do not feel sharp at all (they are not designed/recommended for tubeless)

[CSTRider]

On pg 20 of the Bicycle Wheel, Jobst Brandt described the deflection in an alloy rim just above the tire contact point. This deflection effectively distributes the contact point load across a (relatively) long segment of the rim and tire casing.

Since modern deep dish carbon rims don't deflect as much as an older alloy box rim, a carbon rim would transfer tire contact point loads to a much smaller portion of the tire casing. Combine this with comments from others that some of Enve's clincher rims have a sharper "edge" than usual - and it's easy to understand why fragile "race day" tires may have problems with these rims.

[Mark McM]

Originally Posted by Calnago

The term “Open Tubular” is nothing more than marketing speak, derived to convince the consumer that the clincher tires they are about to buy (yes, they are simply clinchers) are just like their tubular counterparts except in clincher form. Well, they may be of similar construction, except for one glaring defining fact... they are not tubulars in any way shape or form, they are clinchers. And they will never possess the handling/ride characteristics of their true tubular brethren. As long as they have to be supported by two hard rim sidewalls, and have structural beads to hold them within these sidewalls, they can never truly be expected to behave like a tubular, perfectly round and cradled gently within a rim bed of similar radius, allowing it much more leeway to conform to the contours of the road in all conditions, especially when leaned over in a hard turn. And because it’s cradled and glued to the rim bed, the tires' sidewalls can be made more supple since there is no hard edge they have to butt up against.

True, the bead areas of the clincher are held very firmly against the rim sidewalls, but it's not like tubulars have no constraint. The portion of the tubular that is bonded to the rim also is constrained. However, edges of the tubular aren't held as rigidly to the rim as with clincher, which has several effects: On the plus side, the tubular tire casing can flex a bit more, which may allow the to conform to rough surfaces better; On the minus side, the extra casing flex (and the hysteresis in the glue which also flexes a bit) results in extra rolling losses, which is why tubular tires have more rolling resistance than clinchers.

Also, tubulars are not completely immune to issues of tire damage caused by chafing against the rim. This is part of why tubulars have base tapes - they are intended to protect the tire casing from chafing against the rim, just like the chafing strips on clincher tires. If the base tape does not extend past the edge of the rim, the casing will eventually fail by rubbing against the edge of the rim (however because tubular rim edges are generally not nearly as sharp as on clincher rims, the chafing will happen more slowly).

Tubulars may ride a bit differently than clinchers, but do they actually handle better? There's really no objective data showing that they do. And if they do, the differences must be quite small, since clincher riders don't seem to suffer in the handling department compared to tubular riders.

[Mark McM]

Originally Posted by CSTRider

On pg 20 of the Bicycle Wheel, Jobst Brandt described the deflection in an alloy rim just above the tire contact point. This deflection effectively distributes the contact point load across a (relatively) long segment of the rim and tire casing.

Since modern deep dish carbon rims don't deflect as much as an older alloy box rim, a carbon rim would transfer tire contact point loads to a much smaller portion of the tire casing. Combine this with comments from others that some of Enve's clincher rims have a sharper "edge" than usual - and it's easy to understand why fragile "race day" tires may have problems with these rims.

This is perpetuation of any old myth that has already been put to bed. The rim deflections on any tension spoke wheel is so very small, that the rim might as well be perfectly rigid. It is seriously doubtful that the stiffness of the rim matters much here.

[sfo1]

I thought it was simply hate for change/progress in general?

We should all still be on Simplex shifters and 7-speed!

Originally Posted by fignon's barber

Hey, you left out: disc brake hate, race organizer hate, doping hate, masters racing hate, carbon frame hate, gravel bike hate, aero bike hate, aero helmet hate, Rapha hate, Ebay hate, USPS rate hate,and,of course, Lance hate. I'm sure I missed a few dozen.

[HTupolev]

Originally Posted by EDS

Is there a difference between a clincher tire (non-tubeless) and an open tubular, or just different name for the same thing?

It's marketing speak for clinchers that use natural (typically cotton or silk) casing fabric with the tread cold-glued to the tire.

There was a long period of time where that kind of construction was used only on quality tubular tires. So when the high-performance clincher market grew, and that casing style started getting used on clinchers, the companies thought it would sound cool to call them "open tubulars."

Originally Posted by Iansir

Does this apply to Compass Extralight sidewalls as well?

No, Compass tires are vulcanized.

They use a synthetic casing fabric, and the tread is bonded to the tire casing in a hot mold (which also presses the tread pattern into the tread rubber).

Originally Posted by benb

The whole Open Tubular thing is basically a tubular with the internal tube but with flaps sewn on so you can mount it on a clincher rim AFAICT

No, that's a Tufo "tubular clincher." They're silly and make no sense for any purpose.

[Calnago]

Originally Posted by Mark McM

Tubulars may ride a bit differently than clinchers, but do they actually handle better? There's really no objective data showing that they do. And if they do, the differences must be quite small, since clincher riders don't seem to suffer in the handling department compared to tubular riders.

Yes, they absolutely handle better. You talk in terms of "ifs" and "musts" and "don't seem to", which leads me to believe that perhaps you have never ridden tubulars for any length of time. I'm sure you know that tubulars are pretty much exclusively used at the Pro Tour level, save for a few individuals using some clinchers here and there in time trials perhaps, for the most part pretty flat, non technical courses, just put on your go fast face and pedal. But when the course gets sketchy and fast as it might on a mountain descent, I doubt you would find any pro saying "Can I have clinchers please". So why do Pros still use them. They're a lot safer for one, but primarily it's the handling. Or are pros just resistant to change? Ha.... not if the change is better. If new technology is truly better, it is adopted quickly and completely, sponsorships allowing. On the flip side, sometimes they have to ride less than ideal stuff as well due to sponsor commitments or marketing reasons. Tubulars are a relatively niche market in the real world of you and I's however, so if manufacturers could get the pros to showcase their clinchers, they would. It's not like tubulars are easier for teams to deal with. The pros ride tubulars because they are superior to clinchers, period. The ride quality, handling and safety aspects are unsurpassed by any clincher. And those things far outweigh any rolling resistance difference that anyone would be hard pressed to notice in real life. Do you think the mechanics find tubulars easier to maintain for a pro team... hardly... I'm quite sure if pro mechanics never had to scrape or glue another tubular wheel in their lifetime they would be much happier. It's a thankless job, and one I am happy to do for myself, but really don't care doing for others. It's as if they want the nice clean car but want you to always wash it for them. No thanks. Bottom line is, tubulars are the supreme interface between the man/machine and the road, have been for a long time, and continue to be to this day. Are they worth the effort for the average rider, probably not. Are they worth the effort for the discerning rider, absolutely. If you don't care, that's fine too. And there you have my contribution to the debate, sometimes it just has to be reiterated.
(I know you guys like dancing bananas over here).

[Mark McM]

Originally Posted by Calnago

Yes, they absolutely handle better. You talk in terms of "ifs" and "musts" and "don't seem to", which leads me to believe that perhaps you have never ridden tubulars for any length of time. I'm sure you know that tubulars are pretty much exclusively used at the Pro Tour level, save for a few individuals using some clinchers here and there in time trials perhaps, for the most part pretty flat, non technical courses, just put on your go fast face and pedal. But when the course gets sketchy and fast as it might on a mountain descent, I doubt you would find any pro saying "Can I have clinchers please". So why do Pros still use them. They're a lot safer for one, but primarily it's the handling. Or are pros just resistant to change? Ha.... not if the change is better. If new technology is truly better, it is adopted quickly and completely, sponsorships allowing. On the flip side, sometimes they have to ride less than ideal stuff as well due to sponsor commitments or marketing reasons. Tubulars are a relatively niche market in the real world of you and I's however, so if manufacturers could get the pros to showcase their clinchers, they would. It's not like tubulars are easier for teams to deal with. The pros ride tubulars because they are superior to clinchers, period. The ride quality, handling and safety aspects are unsurpassed by any clincher. And those things far outweigh any rolling resistance difference that anyone would be hard pressed to notice in real life. Do you think the mechanics find tubulars easier to maintain for a pro team... hardly... I'm quite sure if pro mechanics never had to scrape or glue another tubular wheel in their lifetime they would be much happier. It's a thankless job, and one I am happy to do for myself, but really don't care doing for others. It's as if they want the nice clean car but want you to always wash it for them. No thanks. Bottom line is, tubulars are the supreme interface between the man/machine and the road, have been for a long time, and continue to be to this day. Are they worth the effort for the average rider, probably not. Are they worth the effort for the discerning rider, absolutely. If you don't care, that's fine too. And there you have my contribution to the debate, sometimes it just has to be reiterated.
(I know you guys like dancing bananas over here).

Yes, these are the many of the same arguments we've heard before, but they are largely full of logical fallacies (in particular Argument from Authority), not to mention a lot of anecdotes. Sure, the pros still use them, but that could be for lots of reasons. The greater ability to ride a flat tire is probably enough reason. There's also the "legacy" factor ("that's what we've always done.). Just because pros tend to use a product doesn't prove that is the best, even for them (remember when pros wouldn't use aerobars during time trials because they thought they'd slow them down? Or how they didn't start using wider tires until a bunch of "amateur" riders showed that on wider tires can actually be faster?)

Being an empiricist, I'm all about evidence. We've seen time and time again that riding impressions can be biased, so I look for objective evidence. And that evidence just isn't there when it comes to the absolute superiority of the handling of tubulars. When Tour Magazine tested the wet cornering traction of a group of tires (both tubular and clincher), there was no clear trend that the tubulars were better. In fact, if you averaged the performance of the tubulars in their test, it was slightly worst than the average of the clinchers - but that was probably more about the tread material than how the tire was attached to the rim.

Go ahead, keep riding tubulars if that's what you like. You just won't convince me they handle better without showing me objective evidence.

[Lionel]

Oh good, this is turning into a tubular vs clincher. Always entertaining.

[m4rk540]

Originally Posted by fignon's barber

Hey, you left out: disc brake hate, race organizer hate, doping hate, masters racing hate, carbon frame hate, gravel bike hate, aero bike hate, aero helmet hate, Rapha hate, Ebay hate, USPS rate hate,and,of course, Lance hate. I'm sure I missed a few dozen.

McDonalds makes the best hamburger in America.