Originally Posted by
WhyFi
I'm curious to try 'em. I guess I see 20mph get tossed around, but it's a little too neat of a number, if you know what I'm saying.
"Fast enough" is a red herring. Absolute time savings are higher at lower speeds for a given distance, though the percentage is lower than when you ride faster. The question is, how much do you care how much faster you go? You're not shooting for a Kona slot. You're not trying to qualify for TT. Your paycheck doesn't depend on your speed. This is bike jewelry. Which is fine, but clarity of purpose is good. You'll finish your training rides a little faster, but the looks are more important. "20mph" is cited because... yep, it's a round number, and it's where people tend to think of cycling "feeling fast". Dollars to doughnuts that over in Europe it magically turns into "30kph".
Originally Posted by
WhyFi
Aesthetically, I don't think that I'd want to go much deeper than 40. I guess that I want something more along the lines of a good all-arounder, but with some aero benefit. Stupid velomine has a set of Reynolds 46 Aeros at $1200 that are really tempting. And then there's the Fulcrum Quattro Carbon with the going price of about $900, though I hear those aren't terribly aero, even for the 40mm depth class.
Still deciding on new bike first and ride the boat anchors that they come with for the summer or get new wheels now (that could be put on the Haanjo [now that really could look silly] and on the new bike later) and wait 'til fall for the new bike.
Bah, 54mm can be all-rounders.
If you want shallower, I'd go all the way to 40mm as the maximum - that lets you use 60mm valve stems, which are much cheaper. With 46mm rims, 60mm valve stems will be very tricky to get the pump head on.
But realize, 40mm is only a little deeper than... 30mm aluminum rims. Barely faster. Look better? Oh hell yes.