Originally Posted by
mihlbach
One doesn't normally "slap on a pair of hubs". I don't know if you literally meant that, but changing hubs, usually involves many other factors such as a different wheelset, possibly different tires, different gearing, or in some cases, a different bike altogether, or even riding in a completely different area.
Unless your hubs were severely maladjusted, I doubt they were slowing you down to a degree that you could really feel and attribute to the hubs themselves.
Consider this:
My track bike has a formula rear hub with the original bearings. If I grab the axle with my fingers, it certainly feels slightly more draggy that my high end white industries road hub (which is insanely smooth-smoother than any looseball hub I've ever owned). The tires rims and spokes of these two wheels are the same, so that eliminates several other variables. If I remove the chain (so that the drivetrain of the track bike is disengaged) and spin the wheels with my hand the formula hub wheel stops just barely before the white industries hub wheel.
In the above experiment, only the the rotating momentum of the <1kg wheel was counteracting the drag of the bearings. Now consider that when you are actually on the bike, you have your own bodily mass, in addition to the mass of the bike, and the rotating momentum of the wheel itself counteracting the tiny differences in drag between the two hubs. The real world effect of slight variations in drag would be exceedingly miniscule if even measurable. Other factors, particularly aerodynamics, are much more significant.
Da*n dude. Do you work for Mythbusters or something? I really like you, Mihlbach. Your name sounds Germanic and you don't accept what you think is sh*t litely.
When I "slap on hubs" I slap them on w/ wheels attached too.
.
The Surly wheelset I ran w/ the same gearing: 46:17. A good gear for me to practice high cadence acceleration. But the Surly wheelset was clincher, and I ran a clincher tire on it. The Suntour set has tubulars. The rims on the Suntour set are Araya Aero2. The rims on the Surly were just what comes wiht the complete bike. Everything else was the same. Perhaps the rims made a huge difference. I wouldn't doubt it.
You say that your white industries hub is smoother than any loose-ball. That is one thing, and it may be true. But, as I think that your test demonstrates, smoothness -- a quality of the feel of the wheel as it spins -- is not strictly proportional to efficiency. The issue that I claim is better with the high quality loose balls is that it has better efficiency.
So, have you run this same test against a high-quality loose-ball hub? It would be interesting to see how Formula and White Industry cartridge bearing hubs measure up to, say, Dura Ace or Campy, etc.