Mavic Ceramic bearings

TheGreatGatsby

I have recently bought a set of Ksyrium ES wheels and I was thinking of upgrading the bearings to ceramic ones. Has anyone tried ceramic bearings and are the changes noticable enough to warrant the money they cost? Are they really that good? Cna any one reccomend some for Mavics?

Cheers

Gats

Eddy S

I've not taken the plunge yet but my track bike will get a ceramic bearing upgrade sometime after this racing season has finished. Everybody I've spoken to that has used them only has positive things to say about the change.

Speak to Active Life Logistics - they have a Ksyrium ugrade kit.

proto

Sorry Eddy but a long article in Bicycle Quarterly Spring 2007, Vol 5 No 3, after some testing, states that ceramic bearing make negligible difference. Like none.

I've got that issue at home somewhere, I'll dig it out and post up some extracts.

So don't waste your money. If you want to go faster, spend it on some coaching instead. Better value. Oh, you already do that.

PS Just clicked the link, Eddy. £150 f*****cking quid. You've got to be out of your mind. You could buy carbon brake levers for that

Kléber

Other tests I've seen suggest that you'll save between 1-2 watts. If you've done everything else, then why not?

But fitting ceramic bearings to Ksyriums?

Sorry, but Ksyriums are not good wheels. They have heavy rims, chunky hubs and the rims are not aerodynamic, and the spokes are worse. Even the lightest wheels weigh in above 1500g a pair for clinchers and they're not rigid either. They're fine for daily riding and can take plenty of punishment but if you want your wheels to go faster, get some faster wheels in the first place. Too many people fall for the marketing speak.

For £500, the price of a pair of ES wheels you could get a set of American Classic 420 rims built up with Sapim CX-Ray spokes (18F/24R) on some nice hubs, assuming you want clinchers. More aero, stiffer and a shade lighter too.

Gary Holmes

If you go to Itunes and download the ZIPP podcasts (they are all very short) there is one that deals with ceramic bearings. I seem to remember that they came to the conculsion that a whole bike with everything changed to ceramic bearings would save the ride about 1 watt....... ummm as they said if you are at Pro level 1 watt is a lot, if at mortal level better to buy an aero helmet! I will go through the podcasts and find which one it was, think it was June one.

Monty Dog

Kleber - clearly you've never ridden Ksyriums - I know an Elite cat sprinter who finds them about the only thing he can't flex - unless of course you're putting out more than 1200watts? As for AM Classic wheels - go and read some real world reviews - robust they ain't.

Kléber

Monty Dog wrote:

Kleber - clearly you've never ridden Ksyriums - I know an Elite cat sprinter who finds them about the only thing he can't flex - unless of course you're putting out more than 1200watts? As for AM Classic wheels - go and read some real world reviews - robust they ain't.

I'm only quoting the Tour Magazin and LeCycle deflection tests, as well as parroting the views from WeightWeenies and RouesArtisanales, instead of the view of a friend. And I've got Ksyriums for winter training and yes, they hit the brake blocks on the front and back when I flex them out of the saddle. And at 64kgs, I'm far from 1200W for anything more than a couple of seconds!

In most tests, Ksyriums do flex a lot laterally and I think you're assuming I specified an Am Classic wheel, whereas I mentioned only the rim, so with well tensioned spokes and some good hubs, you get a lighter, stronger, cheaper and more aero wheels than Kysriums. I'm not seeking a flame war, search WeightWeenies for more on this if you like.

Not that they're bad wheels, it's just that they're far from the best for the money. Even Mavic's own Open Pro rim is lighter and you can add some CX-Rays and Dura-Ace/Record and you'll have some stiffer/lighter/cheaper/more aero wheels. So adding ceramic bearings for Kysriums, well, I think there are other improvements first.

Clearly Mavic will market their full wheels first over any handbuilts, as they get bigger margins and more money for selling the whole package, but factory wheels are that, factory solutions for individual needs. If they suit you, great, but chances are a set of bespoke wheels are better value and better performance.

Monty Dog

So real world experience doesn't count? I've had Ksyriums for 5 years - but at 65kg rim flex isn't a problem for me, but the countless guys I race with don't seem to have a problem either - but of course, that's not relevent...
However, I have also built a fair number of wheels in my time, so have pretty good experience of what is stiff and what isn't - just how many wheels have you built?
Perhaps this is just another case of Forumbull - weightweenies is a well-known haunt of pre-pubescent bike freaks who don't actually ride the stuff, but seem to have garnered all their knowledge from websites, and spend all their money putting ti bolts on 105 groupsets. If you can't provide real world experience..don't bother

TheGreatGatsby

well I'm pretty far from being an elite rider but I'm not sure the money is worth the little gains for ceramic bearings. Thanks for answering though, helped the decision.

I have raced on a set of handbuilt wheels - Tune hubs, cxray spoke DT r1.1 rims built by posh bikes, and also a number of other full carbon aero wheels like Bontrager X-lite, carbones and Topolinos and I find the Ksyrium ES wheelset to be just as good if not better in some cases to those wheels. Yeah sure they're not the lightest on the market but then by comparison they're also not the most expensive. As an everyday wheelset they do the job just fine, I just wanted to see if I could get them to roll further

Gats