Originally Posted by delbiker1

Yesterday evening I did some work on my Airborne Zeppelin titanium road bike. I cleaned, lubed and polished everything. I switched out the crankset from Shimano 6400 to a Dura Ace 7700 with Vuelta 48/38 chainrings. That included switching BBs. I also changed cassettes from a Shimano Tiagra 12-25 to a new Miche 13-28. I had to play with the limit screws and cable adjustment to get it to operate smoothly in all gears, and it is doing just that now.

The big change was mounting Vittoria Open Pave, 27mm, tires and Vittoria latex tubes. The bike did have Rubino Pro 25mm on it with butyl tubes. I have used the Rubino Pros a lot and I really like them. This morning I did a 30 mile ride with the new set up and what a difference. The Open Paves with the latex tubes make for an incredibly smooth ride. Definitely a WOW! moment on a bike. I noticed the difference immediately. In the course of my ride, I purposely chose a couple of roads that I usually avoid due to the condition making for a very rough ride. With these tires and tubes, riding those rough stretches was quite smooth, and I didn't even try to avoid the worst of it. I was running 102 psi in the rear and 95 for the front. The tires were also easy to mount. By my measurement, with 102 psi the tire is 27.2 mm, 26.9mm with 95. Both on C17 rims. CRC has them on a clearance sale now and I am going to purchase a couple more.

I am going to be riding this bike a lot over the next couple of months. Light, fast, nimble and smooth ride, what's not to like?


Clean and shiny!