Burning Rubber on the Turbo

thegodplato

My Tacx Blue Motion arrived yesterday and, of course, set it up and had a short session on it last night. Whilst on the lowest resistance setting I warmed up and then changed it to setting 3 ( I think ) and did about 25 mins keeping my cadence around 90-95 and then increased it for a couple of mins at 110. Then I thought I would increase the resistance to see how much more difficult it was. Within a minute there was a noticeable burning rubber smell which as soon as I reduced the cadence and resistance went away. I was using my Bianchi with its Schwalbe HD tyres as I didn't want to go down the route of getting a specific Turbo tyre/wheel just yet.
So, have I set it up wrongly? Can you have the roller part too tight against the tyre - or how little should it be touching?
I've looked at a spare wheel but seem limited as I have a Campag set up.
Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

Boy, don't you sweat too - and I was in my garage!

GiantMike

I set mine to 90 psi and enough pressure on the roller that it doesn't slip if I give it a bootful of power, but not so much that the tyre deforms too much.

I use a cheap Michelin Speedium 2. Lasts ages on the turbo and can be used on the road too.

Herbsman

re: the sweat- get a big massive floor fan, at least 30" diameter

ShutUpLegs

^ ideally with a remote control

Tom Dean

If you can't get one with a remote control, you will need to turn it ON before you start training.

thegodplato

Right, I think I can manage without the fan until I'm on it for a longer period. Anyway, I am concerned about the burning smell. I've tried adjusting the rollers contact with the tyre and it was, perhaps, not quite in contact sufficiently to stop wheel spin when putting the power down. How does the resistance on the roller operate? Is it the flywheel that is `braked` or is it the roller that moves tighter to the wheel?
I've also noticed a difference in the `noise` it creates. Warming up on the lowest setting and it is quite noisy - there seems to be 2 different pitched sounds. As I increase the resistance the noise goes away and is very quite. Is this normal?
I also can tell the difference between using it at setting 1 to setting 3 to setting 5 but it doesn't seem to alter much above setting 6 - is that normal. Is it normal for the reistance to take a few seconds to alter as well? I had it on 10 just to see how tough it was and then moved the leaver back to 1 and it took maybe 5 to 10 seconds for the resistance to alter ( and the double noise start! ).
As you can tell, I'm a complete newbie to Turbo's so any advice would be helpful.

I'm currently watching Metallica's videos upto 2004 DVD were I use one song to warm up, increase cadence to another song and so on. Does anyone have any training advice? Not after racing, just want to increase my fitness whilst its cold and wet before I do LeJog on 6th April.

Tom Butcher

Are you certain the tyre can't make contact with the floor ? My turbo is very old and something must have got a bit worn, loose or bent on it and I have to stick a couple of paperbacks under it or if I really sprint the tyre rubs the concrete floor of the garage and that creates a burning smell. Initially I was thinking it must be the tyre on the roller.

thegodplato

I don't think it would be the painted garage floor, I will check when I get home. It only occurs when I increase the resistance - cadence kept the same-ish.

sungod

the resistance is applied within the flywheel assembly, not by the pressure of the roller on the tyre

there are two places that will heat up...

whatever power you generate will mostly be dissipated within the flywheel assembly, i.e. it'll get hot

a normal road tyre will also warm up as it gets distorted by the relatively small roller

for frequent use ideally use a tyre designed for the turbo as otherwise the road tyre may wear quite fast

feel the tyre, if it's hot maybe that is the source of the smell

be careful touching the flywheel assembly, it may get quite hot if there's no fan and you've been training hard

thegodplato

Thanks but the smell only appeared when the resistance was high. As soon as I set it back to 1 it seemed to go away.