Skibumleg

I have a specialized ruby with 25mm wheels, the guy at the bike shop said I could go up to 28. Is that really going to make that much of a difference?

caloso

Yes.

indyfabz

28c tires will make a difference.

Nachoman

I agree. You'll easily notice the difference.

mulveyr 

You're increasing the volume of air by about 35%. So heck yes, you'll notice the difference, as long as you're not going to something like Gatorskins, which ride like rocks. :-)

Jarrett2

Why ride a carbon road bike on gravel?

garciawork

Why not?

Jarrett2

Here's why:

"CONDITION 1: Bikes designed for riding on a paved surface where the tires do not lose ground contact.
• INTENDED:
To be ridden on paved roads only.

• NOT INTENDED:
For off-road, cyclocross, or touring with racks or panniers.
• TRADE OFF:
Material use is optimized to deliver both light weight and specific performance. You must understand
that (1) these types of bikes are intended to give an aggressive racer or competitive cyclist a performance advantage
over a relatively short product life, (2) a less aggressive rider will enjoy longer frame life, (3) you are choosing light weight
(shorter frame life) over more frame weight and a longer frame life, (4) you are choosing light weight over more dent
resistant or rugged frames that weigh more. All frames that are very light need frequent inspection. These frames are
likely to be damaged or broken in a crash. They are not designed to take abuse or be a rugged workhorse"

https://service.specialized.com/colla...0037057_r1.pdf

People think carbon fiber road bikes are tougher than they are.

garciawork

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7ZmJtYaUTa0

I have seen plenty of videos of riders taking carbon road bikes offroad. Would I do it? No, that is what a mountain or gravel bike is for. Is it as dangerous as the lawyers at big S state in their legalese manual? I really doubt it.

ThermionicScott 

The rims on that wheelset have a decent width (22mm) and 28mm tires will be an improvement for sure. Ray Hosler and his gang ride 25's and 28's on gravel all the time: https://rayhosler.wordpress.com/2016...aks-tradition/

Jarrett2

I've seen online videos of people doing a lot of stupid stuff, doesn't mean it was a good idea

In other words, why mess up your nice road bike doing something that the manufacturer said explicitly not to do with it? Get a ride specific bike for that kind of thing. The ride will be more enjoyable.

garciawork

Doesn't mean it won't work, or is even a bad idea either. There is no reason to believe it will mess up with bike, in my opinion. I do not disagree with you that a bike designed for it will be more enjoyable, but if you want to hop on a gravel road for a few miles, the bike isn't going to disintegrate because the manual says not to. If we really read all of the warnings and didn't do anything outside of the carefully worded parameters listed, for any bike or component, we would probably never ride our bikes!

mulveyr 

Yup, I've been in a couple of gravel races, and I bet more than half of the riders were using carbon bikes. The truly competitive ones were on cross and monstercross bikes, but certainly "Ride what you have" works out very well for most people.

One thing I noticed is that a lot of the carbon riders installed temporary packing tape/stickers/etc to protect the forks from sharp gravel being flung around, but a couple of bucks of tape and a couple of seconds work to get it on and off seem like a small price to pay for peace of mind. :-)

Jarrett2

Well the OP is informed now.

garciawork

I knew a bike shop owner a few years back who was convinced that carbon bikes, even designed for mtb, were completely unsafe for that very reason. He was sure that rocks hitting the downtube would eventually weaken it to the point of failure. Seemed a little off on his logic to me, as I am sure that more than a couple of people on the engineering side had already looked into that. However, for a road bike, I wouldn't mind the piece of mind either. Has anyone actually heard of a downtube failing due to prolonged exposure to gravel flung up at it?

fietsbob

Tour De France was run on gravel roads for decades before the Roads began to be paved.

PepeM

Somebody let this guys know that they're doing it wrong!

dr_lha

They made carbon bikes stronger back in the 30s.

mpath

Completely anecdotal. I see it the opposite.

caloso

It's true. Every rider in this photo died when his bike disintegrated.

Seattle Forrest

Holy crap your obsession is taking over you.

Seattle Forrest

Yes it's huge.

mpath

Lol.

I'm pretty sure Specialized's Roubaix - their homage to Paris-Roubaix - with the Zertz inserts is steel and not carbon, otherwise they're not heeding their own advice.

garciawork

May they rest in peace.

Seattle Forrest

You cherry picked one specific bike. My carbon frame was meant for gravel and tame single track. Here's a picture GT made and put on their site to market the bike:



You're definitely not.