sd5782 

We are lucky to have generous tire clearance on nice sporty frames from the past. Why was it the case for so long? It seemed on sporty type bikes at least in the 60s, 70s, and early 80s that tubular tires and skinny clinchers were used. Did the makers use bottom brackets and head and seat lugs across a larger product line? I don’t really recall these type of bikes with larger tires in the lesser models.
Was it a case of that being the way it had always been done? It would seem that the castings would have needed to be changed for the angles for the more sporty frames. Were these sporty bikes such a small niche that larger changes didn’t make sense? Perhaps it takes a long time to change things, but skinny tires were around for a long time before clearances tighten up drastically in the later 80s. Either way, it is something that many of us appreciate when looking at these older bikes to resurrect
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repechage

Brakes. Brake reach change was stubborn.
then it collapsed, Aero Gran Compe side pulls were cool but I could not fit them as the small eccentric pad adjustment would never provide enough reach.
the first generation Campagnolo Delta brakes were even smaller than the production units which basically allowed for a 23c tire max.

In the 70’s a few small builders used the Mafac Criterium cantilever brakes, very tight clearance could be achieved, but was too custom to catch on.

randyjawa 

Though I believe that science and math would prove me wrong, the smaller the amount of tire touching the pavement, the lower the co-efficient of friction, reducing drag all equaling faster. To that add that larger tires and inner tubes add weight and reducing weight seem to carry a lot of weight with professional riders. Again, this seems logical. Also, the additional bigger tire and inner tube weight would negatively impact the feel of the bike. Prove this to yourself, if you wish. Spin a wheel, holding the axle ends, with no tire and tube installed and, while spinning, tip the wheel from side to side. Notice the resistance you feel when doing so. Repeat the same test with a wheel fitted with inflated tire and inner tube. Notice how much more resistance you feel now, compared with the unclad wheel.

Anyway, just an opinion. Also, I do like the appearance of skinny tires, such as those on my Atala...




These NOS (emphasis on old) that I bought from a local bike shop shredded themselves in short order the first year I rode them in Jamaica...


But for comfort sake, these tires, fitted to my Jamaica Bianchi(last picture), are the destroyer of any skinny and/or tubular tire myths that once formed my opinion. I will go with more air and less glue these days...

Trakhak

Every once in a while someone comes up with a great basic question like this. The most likely explanation is that in the first half of the 20th century, most European roads (other than those in good-sized towns and cities) were unpaved dirt or gravel, so the standard (tubular) tires used with drop-bar bikes were wide. Those roads were gradually improved over the decades, but there was no compelling reason for frame builders to cut down on clearances until it became fashionable to do so.

Also, many models of European racing bikes sold in the '60s and early '70s were shipped with fenders, so the frames would have needed a good amount of clearance. (When I think of all the pairs of color-coordinated Atala, Frejus, and Legnano fenders we threw away in the bike shop I worked in during the '70s, it makes me want to cry.)

abdon 

Monkey see, monkey do. Racing bikes keep getting more and more optimized. To serve that goal clearances became a lot tighter and geometries less forgiving. Making a cheap bike that looks like one of them expensive bikes is easy. Not to mention that to modern sensibilities too much clearance looks cheap.

We are not sold what we need, we are sold what we want.

sd5782 

Interesting comments. Slow to change I guess, as it wasn’t too common to see fenders on this style bike in my youth, but perhaps that’s because it’s the Midwest where bikes were mostly recreational rather than transport.

abdon 

I loooove bicycle kick stands on my bikes. Nowadays nothing screams cheap bike like one of those. Heck I got chastised here on this very forum because I said I put them turkey wing brake levers on my touring bikes. Fenders? A friend used to make fun of my full fenders until we got caught in a rainstorm and his bike put a dirt racing stripe on his back.

Racing bikes, in particular criterium bikes, defined what a road bike was supposed to be.

rustystrings61 

I can remember bike parts catalogs from major vendors still listing Clement Campionato del Mundo tubulars - 32 mm, thank you! - as their very best tires. There were people who toured on those, even - obviously with more disposable cash than I had, then or now. Then, too, bikes sold in the U.S. that did NOT feature tubulars came stock with 27-in clinchers, which was pretty much the Anglophone world standard for high performance but not all out racing bikes. My 1976 Puch Royal X, which was built by the same people on the same assembly lines as the very deluxe Austro-Daimlers, came stock with 27-in clinchers + room for Bluemels mudguards, and I ran it that way for a while - then I got a tubular wheelset and ran those. The larger amount of air around my tire did not change anything in reality.

My opinion and nothing more - fashion, for sure, drove the tighter clearances, as did a shift in how bikes were marketed. Greater affluence was especially a consideration. Why sell a cycling enthusiast one bike that can be raced one weekend, then loaded up for a short tour the next, when you can sell them TWO separate and distinct bikes that split those functions and are ever more specialized? The rise of the mountain bike surely didn't hurt the new paradigm of different bikes for different purposes for cycling enthusiasts.

The other aspect of this is the rise (for a while there) of dedicated touring bikes that were truthfully more designed for expeditions than for shorter tours. They got heavier and built with more robust tubing and ever wider gear ranges and larger racks that encouraged carrying the world with one. Then cycletouring fell out of fashion and retailers were stuck selling bikes less suited for general purpose, multiple kinds of riding. The general purpose riders wound up with mountain bikes or hybrids, the speedier folks went with bikes more suitable for "competitive" riding, and the great general purpose pavement bike withered away.

smd4

Damn straight!

One of my only cycling regrets is that I never tried 700C x 19 tires; The smallest I got was 700 x 20.

abdon 

Just take the tires off the rim and ride them. It kind of feels like that

The skinniest I go on a bike is 25mm and 28mm really makes me happy. On a long top tube bike with generous fork rake is like being on a comfy couch.

Trakhak

You didn't see fenders on those racing bikes because would-be racers in the U.S. didn't know that European pros used fenders when they did their rainy-weather training rides (using their race-day bikes). All we ever saw were photos of races.

Since we didn't know about that, we didn't want fenders on our racing bikes, and so most dealers had their mechanics simply throw them away.

Not just a Midwestern thing - the shop I worked in and where I threw away the fenders was in Connecticut.

smd4

Definitely not the feeling I’m looking for in a high performance racing bike.

John E

That is yet another reason I am keeping my classics. They look right, ride right, and serve my needs admirably.

icemilkcoffee 

That's what tubular tires are for. There is a reason why clincher tires < 23mm went completely extinct- they are just too harsh with no upside.

Trakhak

Clincher tires in 23 mm aren't fashionable these days, but most bike tire manufacturers still have them available. Remember, that was the dominant clincher tire size for racers and would-be racers from the late '70s until about 10 years ago or so. The harshness of the ride didn't put too many of us riders off during those decades.

But a large proportion of those riders have put on weight and are unable or unwilling to ride at the effort levels that made narrow tires more or less a nonissue in the past.

smd4

Harsh? Please. Only for couch potatoes who probably shouldn't be riding racing bikes if they're that sensitive. Besides, this is just a fad. In 20 years, everyone will be on 23 mm or less tires again.

downtube42

I think Schwinn was trying to sell us the bikes we needed - urban transport bikes like the Collegiate, touring bikes with 1.25" (32mm) tires; fender mounts on everything. But that's not what we wanted. We wanted fast looking toys, and by the time Schwinn responded their brand image was damaged.

repechage

nah, 630 mm Tubulars!
new rims, tires and plenty of frames required.

abdon 

Nah, they became extremely out of touch with what the market wanted. They tried to operate in (create actually) a protected market, leveraged their size with anti competitive practices (got sued by the government for their efforts), and their bikes lagged in refinements and technology compared with just about everybody else.

Some may be fine pieces of steel, but most are not refined pieces of steel. They fend off the British invasion with tariffs but when the Japanese invasion of better bikes at better prices came it was just a slow inevitable decline from there.

I am keeping an eye out for an original clunker frame and love dearly my '69 Paramount.

smd4

The Schwinn rep often came into our Schwinn store seething at the sight of the Centurions and Diamond Backs we had on the floor.

rccardr 

Nah. In 20 years we’ll have one set of rims and frames that accept tires of all possible sizes for all possible needs. Those tires will be fully sealed with a substance that provides a pneumatic-like ride but will never flat, and will be held to the rim with hydrostatic glue that responds to specific-frequency debonders allowing quick changes from size to size, knobby to file tread to slick.

You heard it here first.

Andy_K 

I feel personally attacked. I think I need to comfort myself by doing a 650B conversion on an old Italian racing bike.

downtube42

If i understand correctly, 650A/B/C was originally intended to be three wheel sizes and corresponding tire widths for one frame. Didn't take; either the consumer didn't want one all purpose bike, the manufacturers didn't want it, it both.

Atlas Shrugged

Speaking with a bit of bravado, I get it, HTFU!

I gave up on racing bikes almost a decade ago and haven't looked back. The real question is, given the demographics displayed on these forums, I highly doubt many of them will be riding at all, much less on 23s.

icemilkcoffee 

That's why I wrote '<23mm'. They used to make clincher tires down to 19mm. Nowadays tire makers still make 23mm, mostly because there are still a fair number of bikes from the 80's and 90's which had trouble fitting 25mm. I'm rolling on 23 on my KHS Aero because that's all it would take (and barely at that).

It's true that people are fatter now, but the real reason why everyone, including 150lb pro cyclists, are running 25-28mm tires today, is because data has proven that ultra high pressure skinny tires are actually slower rolling than lower pressure wider tires.