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!

Wider tires with latex tubes is a great combination. You should be able to run lower tire pressure compared to before as well. The only annoying thing with latex tubes is that they lose air quickly, so you have to air them up before every ride.

Don't let the bike sit unused for months either, otherwise you'll come back to completely flat tires and potentially a pinch flat from the weight of the bike sitting on the flat latex tubes. That's happened to me before.

great job man! I wish me and you were friends and lived near each other so I could pay you to teach me how to do those things

Flip Flop Rider, I started purchasing tools and learning how to do the mechanics on my bikes in 2018. I wanted to challenge myself and, as much as I like biking, doing that with bikes just made sense. I learned a lot from the many errors I made. BikeForums members were very helpful and generous with their knowledge and suggestions. Also, youtube and Park Tools videos are very informative. With youtube, you may have to watch a couple different ones to understand what they are showing and saying. Some are better than others. RJ the bike guy shows how to make and use some homemade tools that are pretty simple and work adequately. Again, some better than others. He is very knowledgeable. With some tools, it is definitely better to purchase a quality tool that is proven and lasts, especially with tools that are used frequently.

The cost of the tools can be considerable, but, in the long run, they not only save money, but you also become less hesitant to work on something mechanical, and will probably do a better job at keeping up with maintenance. That is my experience. I now have bought, stripped to bare metal, and rebuilt a few bikes. If there is a downside, it can become quite addictive. I now have 8 bikes and certainly do not need that many.