These Crazy Things are finally out....

[Phelan96]

What does everyone think?

http://www.inlinewarehouse.com/descpage.html?pcode=RVHS

[Drexel63]

I'd be interested in seeing a Physics major dispute or defend the claim that,

when rolling, larger wheels just cover more ground per roll

While I'd agree for a full 100mm wheel setup, you'd cover more ground per roll than a full 80mm setup, I find it hard to believe that the front wheels being 76mm in size doesn't hinder, if not eliminate, any gain you'd get from the 100mm wheel in the back...

I think I could talk myself into buying the larger footprint claim outright, if that point about the distance per roll above were'nt such a hangup for me...

[GSJaguars11]

well im guess the idea is that the 76mm's in front give you more manueverability than the full 80s on the hum'r

[rhhof]

The average on the wheels across is 80 - if you do the math of adding the wheels together and divide it by 4 - 80 is the answer....so not sure about 4mm being the difference there

you will see difference in stops and turns - the science will tell you that having more wheel on the ground will allow better and more efficient stops (most stop on the heel, but either way) -- having a bigger wheel behind you will also allow for more speed out of turns as well, so basic forward motion is carried better and your force through is now more equal instead of slowed

will take some getting used to i would think...some might end up on there ass a few times, but worth it I'm sure

[Drexel63]

76+76+76+100=328/4=82... I thought card sharks were good at simple math.. maybe it only applies to counting to 4, 13, or 52...

Anyway, I have no doubt the bigger footprint gives better control in turns... I also have no doubt that more ground can be covered coming out of the turn, if you happened to be skating on only your back wheel at the time...

I would HYPOTHESIZE, however, with no proof from, or time to perform, the physics/math required, that if you assume the same force of push between a straight 80mm setup, and this new one, that in straightaway usage, the straight 80mm setup would optimize speed and ground covered per push. I would expect more of the force of the push to have to go to spinning the 76mm front wheels faster to keep up with the 100mm wheel's angular velocity in the back... This would make the front 76mm wheels a limiting factor in how much speed/distance the single 100mm wheel would gain you, and perhaps.

Again, this is just my gut instinct giving me an opinion... Like I said, I'd love to see the proof in numbers, or just try them out myself..

When I thought about the difference, in the Physics sense, of the hi-lo and straight 80mm chassis design, this was the exact same conclusion I came to then, except reversed...

[Drexel63]

speaking of optimizing speed and distance covered...

http://www.rollerblading.com.au/roll...lineskates.htm

which inline wheel and chassis manufacturer is going to modify these so I can dominate on sport court, and make me 8 150mm wheels...

[quick_dry]

How many skate designers also have degrees majoring in race car technology?

the discussion about wheel deformation/contact patch and grip is a huge area of discussion in race engineering circles.

A big wheel may be able to deform more in a turning/accelerating (less support from the hub, more material at the outer layers that can stretch, etc), but it'd be interesting to see how that deformation increases rolling resistance.

how is the smaller wheel giving you more manouvreability? the limiting factor in a hard turn is grip - and they've already claimed that the big wheel is for grip. Going back to cars, think of how you tune oversteer or understeer - increase grip at the rear to tune towards understeer. Whenever i've come up short on a good set of front skate wheels and my rears are much grippier, it is bloody awful - cutting is much harder.

[joisyan]

i think the underlying questions are A. where can you find 100mm wheels for when you chunk that thing about every other game. and B. who could stand to look that stupid with that thing on there.

It goes back to the old "big wheel" chassis from my old Easton F4 skates (i think F4) having a 72mm 68mm 80mm and 72mm. every skate company will come out with something different to get the good ol "i want the newest bestest thing" mentality. everyone wants to be the first to do or have something.

I'm right around 200lb and I often use the 78A to 80A wheels (almost outdoor rating) and I go through wheels fairly often on the sport court here in Winchester. I couldn't imagine how short term a 100mm wheel would be if 80mm and 76mm wheels chunk as often as they do. unless the hub was much stronger

[chapt90]

at least they aren't white and lime green

[DannyG]

I'd be interested in seeing a Physics major dispute or defend the claim...

Physics...the largest wheel on any vehicle determines the top-end speed...the rest of the wheels are just along for the ride...look at the turn-of-the-century (19th/20th century)"big wheel" bicycles...

the above applies as long as the energy transfer is going through that wheel. This is why the big wheel had the pedals on the above-mentioned bikes...

on skates, the energy tansfer is going through all the wheels, although moreso toward the heel of the skate. This is why, with skates with multiple wheel sizes, the big wheels have always been in the back, eh? The smaller wheels are indeed "just along for the ride."

[joisyan]

just how fast could one go on one of the old "big wheel bikes?" haha

[quick_dry]

DannyG: I'd be interested to see where the pedals powering our wheels are?

The penny-farthing bikes (the big wheel plus tiny wheel) were a direct drive by pedals - much like a kids tricycle.

The largest wheel determines the speed only when RPM is a limited factor e.g. on a car or a bicycle, you can only rev so hard - but if you can increase the diameter you can go further per rev. Thinking in these terms only makes sense if we had a motor attached to the skate wheel.

(the low speeds of bicycles, and the capability of a bearing to spin easily meant that the little wheel never got worked very hard - if it had've been possible to go super fast, eventually it would've been unable tp spin fast enough to keep up with the big wheel - and would've gone from rolling resistance to sliding resistance)

We are always fighting friction, the faster a wheel spins, the more the bearing must work. So theory being that a big wheel must make fewer revolutions for a given distance - so the frictional losses are lower. Accordingly, the smaller wheels are the limiting factor as their frictional losses increase, and it is the small wheel which will hit the limits of a skate bearing before the big one.

(AFAIK this is the theory behind the super-swiss bearings with bigger balls - though I also think that at the low speeds hockey skaters get up to, its all a bit academic anyway)

[Phelan96]

My RBK 7k's frame just broke this past weekend, for the second time, so I almost bought these skates. Then thought, where the hell would I get a 100mm wheel if it where to break during a game, which I would think is highly likely. I'll hold off on these til I see more 100mm wheels in pro shops.

I ended up buying the new $200 Tour Code Carbon Pro's, hopefully I'll fair better with them even though they're more on the cheaper side.

[aircondition14]

hey, since we're on the topic of skates, did anyone see that mission is re-releasing the wicked light skates from what seems like a decade ago?

(since inlinehockey central won't let me post links yet, it's at www.hockeygiant.com under senior inline skates)

has anyone ever tried these? thoughts?

chen #14, 84

[DCbullets14]

Thats awesome these were possibly the lightest skatest ever made. I had a pair a long time ago and thought they were amazing. At the time I was like 14 years old and about 105lbs. I heard that alot of bigger guys had problems with the chasis breaking but i never experienced this... I would be willing to buy another pair provided this problem was fixed.