Which (tubular) tyres are you running on your Bora One/Ultra?

[andlb]

Great, now I'm torn between 23mm and 25mm tyres. Evenly split (the one 22mm front tyre not withstanding).

You also seem to prefer glueing over tape (although Carogna tape seems to be up there with glue according to reviews?). Any of you using Magic Mastik, or is Mastik 1 still the go-to glue?

I use magic mastic first time this year. I even glued my self. And it still hold perfect! I made over 3000km on heat, water even mid road. Is ok! I use Bora One and vittoria corsa CX.


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[userfriendly]

Ride report please once you've given them ago. Mine won't be going on until the Conti's need changing.

I've put about 300km on the Veloflex Carbon now and am glad to say I'm very happy with them. Thanks to the lower weight compared to the Arenbergs the Bora 50 end up being just as lightweight as my shallow section Julius AC22 with Conti Force/Attack clinchers and Supersonic tubes - and, oddly enough, they seem more comfortable over rough roads despite me running them at ~25 PSI higher pressure.

Not sure if I should put the latter down to the front tyre being 23mm over the 22mm Attack (though the rear tyre is 23mm also, as opposed to the 24mm Force) or if that's because they're tubulars or because the rims are carbon. Really no idea. I wouldn't even rule out a placebo effect.

No punctures yet either, and not a single cut. And this is in Scotland, with really quite rubbish roads - that's saying something, my Conti clinchers usually have cuts after only a few short rides already, so quite happy in that department as well. I'll keep the Julius with the Conti Force/Attack clinchers as winter wheels when there's salt and more detritus out there, but that's more to do with conserving the braking surface of the wheels rather than to say anything about my confidence in the tyres.

I use magic mastic first time this year. I even glued my self. And it still hold perfect! I made over 3000km on heat, water even mid road. Is ok! I use Bora One and vittoria corsa CX.

I'm *still* a tiny bit wary about the tape, but the tyres haven't rolled off on me yet - and that's after doing some fairly high speed cornering. Was much less apprehensive about this today than I was on my first ride with them, mind. Starting to build trust, one survived ride at a time. But I think next time I put tyres on these wheels I'll glue them.

[dj97223]

They were really designed around using a 25mm tubular. I've put 23mm Veloflex Carbons, 24mm Veloflex Roubaixs, and 25mm Veloflex Arrenbergs on the new Boras. The 25's fit the best and I have not even tried bigger as I could never see myself using anything bigger than 25mm on a nice road race bike. In fact, I think 24mm is a really nice choice for both comfort and handling. Jussst right you might say.
I would feel totally fine using 24-27mm tubulars on these rims. I would be much less inclined to run 23's or smaller on them.

Cal,

Thanks. What is the width of the Arenbergs when mounted? Do you have any pics?

Thanks for your contributions to the board.

[Calnago]

Ok... I did a few measurements, took a few pics, and here ya go...
Veloflex Arrenbergs mounted on 2015 Bora Ultra (Tubular): 25.5mm
Veloflex Arrenbergs mounted on pre-2015 Bora Ultra Two (Tubular): 25.7mm
Veloflex Carbon mounted on pre-2015 Utlra Two (Tubular): 23.3mm

First pic shows 25mm Arrenbergs mounted on a 2015 Bora Ultra 35 (left) and a pre-2015 Bora Ultra Two (middle). Interesting thing to note here is the interface between tire and rim at the rim edge. The new Boras are thicker and rounder at the edge, versus the old Boras which give a much smoother transition to the tire. Now I'll say right now, that I think that little piece of info is a complete red herring in the real world, but I know the aero pundits look at that transition with great interest. So I'm showing it for you guys, and you know who you are...
However, the 25mm on the older Boras does balloon out quite a bit from the rim width, whereas the 25mm on the new Boras not so much since the rim itself is 24.2mm at the brake track, versus 20.5mm on the old Boras.


Maybe you can see that a bit better here... Bora Ultra Two (pre 2015) on the left, Bora Ultra 35 (2015) on the right...


Now for the smoothest transition from tire to rim, you'd want the 23mm Veloflex Carbon on the pre-2015 Bora. This transition is almost seamless...


The 2015 Bora clinchers actually have a fairly smooth transition there as well, but... they're clinchers.

[helldiver]

I can contribute with measured width of the Veloflex Carbon on Bora One 50 2015 rim (23,5mm@7,3Bar) and Veloflex Extreme (22,4mm@7bar). The more i ride this combo, the more i like it, amazing grip in dry/wet, very aero, no crosswind issues at all and sufficient comfort (comfort is decided by the tire casing suppleness and pressure, not tire size, size is merely "enabler" of lower pressure). I'm ~70kg and mostly riding on good roads, that's why 7/7,3bar (101/105psi) is almost always working for me. There are some routes which are mostly very bad/broken tarmac, where it would be certainly better to run much lower pressures (4-5bar), which I'm hesitant to do because i fear that i could strike a rim on the narrow 22/23mm tubulars - I admit that it would be much better to run 25/27mm tubulars in such conditions. But it's a tradeoff, and I'm not willing to compromise my aero gains/crosswind stability due to minority of my rides in such conditions. Ideally i would have two sets of Bora wheels, one would be the current setup which i use most of the time and then second one (Bore One 35) with 27mm Veloflex Vlaanderen, that would be always ridden at 4-5bars on very bad roads.

[dj97223]

Cal,

Interesting that you say there is a smoother transition with the older Boras, since the difference in tire width v. rim width is slightly greater with the older model.

[Calnago]

@dj97223: I should have been a bit clearer maybe. When I'm talking about the tire/rim transition in the example above, I'm only referring to the very small area where the tire actually meets the rim (ignoring the width for a moment). The older Boras have quite a thin rim edge and you can barely detect a transition there. The new Boras have a much thicker rounder edge, which kind of juts out a bit from the actual tire. Does that make more senses now? The 25mm on the older rim is a bit bigger only because it doesn't really fit into the rim bed of the older Boras as nicely, and thus gets "pushed" out a teensy bit.

Overall however, a 25mm tire on the newer rim probably has a better aero flow of air over it than a 25mm tire on the older narrower rim. That's why I showed a 23mm tire on the older rim as I think that likely has the best "airflow" of all of them.

What I like about the new rims of 24.2mm width is that the same 25mm Arrenberg or Roubaix will sit just about a millimeter lower in height than the same tire on the older Boras, and this is all the extra clearance I needed to run them easily in my C59 or EPQ. I ran 25's on the older rims but they would cause a lot of "chatter" in the front fork area due to road crud being thrown between the fork crown and the tire as the clearance was on the tight side. For that reason alone I was sold on the new Boras, but the benefits of the wider rim as it pertains to stability was nice to have as well. Silent and stable, and oh so smooth hubs... love the new Boras.

@helldiver: Would be great if you could post a detailed closeup shot of that 22mm Veloflex Extreme mounted on the new Boras, with a particular emphasis on the rim tire interface and where the tire actually leaves the rim. Also, tire size, to the extent there is more air "volume" in the thing absolutely contributes to comfort, sometimes too much since too much air volume will start to create a mushy road feel.

[kgt]

Nice example Calnago.
I would not surprised if the pre15 Bora-25mm combo turned out to be more aero (as the transition is smoother) than the new Bora-25mm combo. I am sure the pre15 Bora-23mm would be the most aero as you guess.
Anyway I would definitely prefer the first combo in terms of aesthetics.

[Calnago]

A couple of things. When I mentioned rim/tire interface, I'm only talking about that little tiny space between the tire and rim and as I mentioned I think it's a complete red herring as far as aero goes but people think it matters so for those I talked about it. In fact, if you remember Mavic a few years ago introduced a little strip of something or other to actually fill in the gap. Ha. I bet it lasted all of about 10 revolutions in real life. I don't even hear it mentioned anymore. Or ever saw one in real life for that matter.
As for the "whole tire/rim" profile then I'd say the 25's on the new Boras would be "far more" aero than 25's on the old Boras. I put "far more" in quotes because well, you know, a little bit in aero speak is "huge".
Just intuitively, I feel the most aero of the combos would be the "old" Boras with a 22mm or 23mm tire on them. The 25's on that rim start becoming very balloon like and I think would likely detract from the whole aero thing when compared to a skinnier tire on that rim. However, the skinny tire, narrow rim, and deeper profile of a wheel just leads to a whole scary experience when actually riding, particularly during any descent with any kind of wind. So what's the point.
Since 2010 I've experimented with a whole bunch of combinations. I would say for all out speed and "aeroness" in a dead straight line with no wind, then the old Boras with 22/23mm tire are tough to beat. However, if I'm being overly cautious because it feels a bit unstable then that can't be good. So on went the 25's, and it seemed to help in that regard. A little bulbous maybe and with the narrow rim I sometimes had to "squeeze" the wheel out between the brake pads when removing because the tire width was so much larger than the rim width. Then along comes the 24.2mm wide Boras and paired with a 25mm tubular, I think I've found my nirvana in terms of ride quality and handling. And truthfully I don't care about anything more aero when taking the overall ride into consideration.
Funny, because as cool as these wheels are when looking at them in the bike, none of them give me as much confidence down a fast descent, wind or no wind, as a set of 32 spoke box section Nemesis rims laced to some nice cup and cone hubs like Record or Dura Ace.

[LionelB]

We are really splitting hairs here.

[dj97223]

I just ordered from Starlike a set of One 50's and Arenbergs.

[Calnago]

We are really splitting hairs here.

If you're talking about "aero" attributes, I completely agree. I don't give a crap about it in all honesty but it's what's trending these days.
But if we're talking about overall stability and rideability of the wheels, then I'd take a 25mm tubular on a new wider Bora all day long over a 22mm tubular on the older narrow Boras. Still great wheels for sure, but especially if you're a heavier rider, then the wider rim is just more stable, both in structure and it's ability to combat winds.

[LionelB]

I believe you, I have to kill my 3 sets and it does not seem to be happening very fast!

[markyboy]

double post

[markyboy]

Bora ultra 50 with vittoria corsa g+ 23mm tubular very nice tyres,i was looking at the 25mm but not sure they will fit my c60.