John Jorgensen wrote:
>
> Pino did boast that his earlier wheels could be ridden down
> stairs though.
Hmm, are there wheels that can't be ridden down stairs?
I have ridden plenty of wheels down stairs - "courthouse" or campus stairs anyway. Never heard of a wheel that couldn't take it, given reasonable rim weight and spoke count for the rider's weight. For instance I rode 36 spoke Arc En Ciel rims with normal tubulars down such stairs when I weighed ~175 lb. I wouldn't have tried that with my Medaille d'Or rims, but a lighter rider could. (Some skill required)
The tire is usually what determines how steep a stair you can ride down, how fast - pinch flats will happen long before the wheel collapses, again for any reasonably built wheel.
While I too admired Pino's inventiveness, I am skeptical of using wires as compression members*, and take the marketing comments as just that.
*Aside from the compression effect you get by decreasing the tension on a pre-tensioned spoke - that is real. I mean pushing on a spoke that has no tension left, which is what those Pino spoke nuts are about. I think they are nuts!
Mark Bulgier
Seattle WA USA