Rigida Andra 30 with "CSS" or without???

[jul]

Hello everybody,

Could you say me which difference is there between the "R.Andra 30" and with "CSS" !?
The price is the double for the "CSS" and the weight is even ...
I heard the braking feeling with "CSS" is not the even that without..?

Also, for a big trip do you think The R.Andra 30 is ok ?

Thanks.

Julio

[geocycle]

The Andras are very tough rims which if well built will be great on any trip.  I have the CSS version of the slightly lighter grizzly rims. The main reason you would want CSS is for longevity.  Mine's done 11,000 miles so far with no obvious sign of wear.  My reason for going for CSS was that I want the experts at SJS (rather than my LBS or myself) to build my rohloff wheel and so the longer between builds the better.  Personally, I find the braking fine in the wet.  True, it is a big drop on the dry performance but still very acceptable in my opinion.  I'm also still on the same swiss stop blue brake pads!

[mickeg]

My CSS Andra 30 rims have only about 1,000 km on them, so I can't speak to longevity.  But I am happy I got them.  They are very heavy however.  But if you are comparing non-CSS to CSS, I assume the weight is nearly the same.

I have not yet used them in the rain, but I am quite happy with dry performance. 

I am using the Ritchey brake pads.  If you are comparing initial costs, do not forget to factor in the additional cost of brake pads on a new installation with CSS rims.

I do not have any Aluminum Oxide that on my other bikes often coats my rims, brakes, brake pads, and if I touch my wheels - coats my hands.

On my bikes with plain rims, I often sand off the Aluminum Oxide coating off of my brake pads.  I think that has helped with rim longevity, I have never completely worn out a set of rims.  Aluminum Oxide is extremely abrasive and when you get a heavy layer of that on your brake pads, I suspect that it wears down the rims faster.

I built up my 36h CSS wheels myself, not SJS.  I specified in my purchase order one rim drilled for Rohloff, when they arrived one rim had a tag attached labeled Rohloff drilling.

The rims were labeled Ryde, not Ridgida.  Apparently there is a name change.

[Danneaux]

...The rims were labeled Ryde, not Ridgida.  Apparently there is a name change.

Yep. The complete story here: http://www.thorncycles.co.uk/forums/index.php?topic=3571.0

Best,

Dan.

[pdamm]

I now have 41,000km on my Rigida Andra CSS rims.  There is still no sign of ware on the rim save the surface is starting to be a little shiny as opposed to the rough matt surface of a new set.  I am on my second set of brake pads now on both front and back but the third set are still a long way off.  In the dry the breaking is very good.  Light and intermittent rain is still acceptable.  However in constant rain their braking performance has degraded badly.  I am very cautions on descents in rain for this reason.  Fortunately where I live I don’t get to ride in constant rain very often.  If I did I would have replaced the rims some time ago.

Peter

[il padrone]

My Rigida Andra CSS rims are up to 17,000kms. No sign of any wear on them and still running the original Swisstop Blue pads that will do for about another 5000kms at a guess. It is great not to have all that dirty brake dust all over the rims and tyres.

The pads do show lesser power braking in the wet, but as others have mentioned, it is not a problem in light rain nor on wet roads, only riding in quite heavy rain and it seems to be more noticeable in colder conditions. I have some Koolstop Greens to try out next when the Swisstops are done. I'm doing a mountain ride tomorrow into the snow with a long steep descent, but did it last year with these rims and pads with no real problems.

[StuntPilot]

Reviving an old thread ... I was searching to see what people are getting with the Andra 30 Non-CSS rim and found this thread.

There are mentions here of the CSS rim longevity but none of the non-CSS rim life. Can anyone advise how many km it would be reasonable to get from a Andra 30 non-CSS rim? How many km have you had from your Andra 30 non-CSS rim before replacing?

[mickeg]

Reviving an old thread ... I was searching to see what people are getting with the Andra 30 Non-CSS rim and found this thread.

There are mentions here of the CSS rim longevity but none of the non-CSS rim life. Can anyone advise how many km it would be reasonable to get from a Andra 30 non-CSS rim? How many km have you had from your Andra 30 non-CSS rim before replacing?

Non-CSS Rigida (now called Ryde) rims are basically like any other Aluminum rim, although some rims may have thicker sidewalls than others.  But they all will wear down from braking wear.  How much you brake, how clean the rims are when you brake, how clean your pads are when you brake, and how much distance you ride are all factors.  I have never worn out a rim and I suspect most people have not.  That is more of an issue for high distance riders.  I have a neighbor that is a bike mechanic and he commutes to work.  He was telling me a few years ago he was riding to or from work and he noticed his brake on one wheel was behaving oddly and a short distance after that his rim blew apart.  Likely from wearing down the braking surface.

When I rub my hand on the braking surface of my CSS rims, it does not cover my hand with the dark gray Aluminum oxide dust that most other rims do.  That dust used to be the metal of the rim.

Brake pads are much cheaper than rims.  For that reason I have on occasion filed the surface of my brake pads down a bit to get the Aluminum oxide and dirt coating off of the pads, and sometimes you find bits of metal imbedded in the pads which I try to remove.  For that I usually use an emory board, if they go by a different name in your country I am talking about disposable fingernail files.  (I might have misspelled it.)

I am in the final stage of building up a new bike.  I considered buying one or two CSS rims for the bike, but in the end decided not to.  I bought a lot of parts for that new bike from SJS, so adding rims to the order would not have cost too much more for shipping to USA.  But eventually decided not to put CSS rims on the new build.  I did put CSS rims on my Nomad four years ago and I am quite happy with the CSS rim surface.

The photo shows my brake pads at the end of my Pacific Coast trip three years ago.  There were a lot of downhills.  While I can't say how much wear I put on my rims (on that trip I used Mavic A719 rims), I can say that looking at the pads and my first thought was that my rims lost some lifespan on that trip.

[Danneaux]

None of my bikes have CSS rims.

I have found using Kool-Stop salmon (all-salmon) pads on my bikes has proven "kinder" to rim and pad life than using other kinds or brands of pads.

I find original Shimano black-colored pads are the most abrasive I've used; they wear the rims down more quickly in my use and the pads wear more quickly as well -- to the point where I now replace the pads immediately with Kool-Stop salmons. The Shimanos also require more hand pressure to stop in my use and then don't stop as quickly -- especially in the wet.

Some of my bikes have rims with more than 50,000km on them and they're still in good shape, no concavities, scoring, or signs of undue wear.
Plain rims do vary in hardness as well. Most are made from 6061 aluminum alloy, but there can be considerable variation -- easily 3% -- in the proportion of alloys used and the rim will still be regarded as "6061". If the rim has less silica, it will be less hard, sometimes to the point where even soft pads will "load up" with aluminum -- not aluminum oxide, but aluminum. At that point, the pads are essentially metal-on-metal and don't stop so well. I had several pairs of Araya 16A(3) and 16A(5) rims back in the mid-80s that did this. 'Soon as they wore through the surface anodizing, they were like metal soap. Lacing on a different brand made all the difference. I borrowed a machine shop's Brinell/Vickers/Rockwell tester and found the worn Arayas really were at the soft end of the scale for 6061 alloys. At the other end of the scale, some Matrix (Trek) rims from the same era were super-hard anodized. They stayed clean of rim oxide but became so polished, they were like chrome-plated steel in the wet -- very difficult to stop. I soon grew tired of sailing through stop signs with the brakes clamped to the 'bars with white knuckles as my shoe soles dragged on the ground, all trying to arrest my flight. I ended up shattering the hard anodizing of one pair and remachined the braking surface so it was plain aluminum; they worked normally After.

Best,

Dan.

[StuntPilot]

Thanks Mickeg! I am in Scotland with its fair share of grit, mud and rain! Dan - just saw your reply. 50000km on one rim! Whats the secret?

I have a CSS rim on the front as I bought a SON dynamo and wanted a tougher rim. Happy with it.

The rear rim is the one that came with the Raven Tour when I bought it from SJS back in 2011. Since then I have done two 5000km long tours and many many shorter rides. I estimate that it has over 12000km (about 7500 miles) on it while I have had the bike. It was purchased from SJS second hand with the previous owner owning it for two years from new so not sure how many kms he/she racked up.

Placing a flat metal edge over the braking area area there is a concave dip with the middle being about 0.7mm deep.

What I am trying to establish is when the rim will become structurally dangerous and need replacing. I saw somewhere that Ryde/Rigida suggests rim replacement when the concave is 1mm deep.

For now I am happy its OK but before the next three month/5000km planned tour would it be prudent to replace the rim?

Any ideas and suggestions welcome!

[Danneaux]

50000km on one rim! Whats the secret?

1) Kool-Stop salmon pads.
2) While I ride year-'round, I do my greatest mileage in the drier months and on pavement. The relative absence of rain means there is also an absence of water-borne road grit to tear up the rims.
3) Part of it is the longer days of the drier months (i.e. late Spring through early Fall). I can start at about 5am in daylight and/or rode longer into the night in good, dry weather.
3) By time, my rides are split pretty evenly between pavement and gravel/soft stuff, but by mileage, it is again biased toward pavement simply because I can go further faster.
4) I really don't brake so much. I'm in to the "flow" of cycling and generally brake lightly and infrequently as I try to anticipate any increases in speed. This doesn't hold true on steep logging roads, but by mileage, those are not ridden so much as pavement.

I saw somewhere that Ryde/Rigida suggests rim replacement when the concave is 1mm deep.

As I recall, the Andra has a "show through" wear indicator, not the "wear out" kind. Supposedly (if one is not risk-averse) one could wait till a groove appeared and then replace the rim soonest thereafter. The Andra has pretty robust sidewalls. I'm reminded of the Clint Eastwood movie line : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Xjr2hnOHiM

All the best,

Dan.

[martinf]

I have worn out 4 small wheel rims (16") on my Bromptons and 9 large-wheel rims (the old 27" size and 650B).

This is just brake wear, not counting rims scrapped because of pothole damage, eyelets coming out, splits or other causes.

Average for the 4 small-wheel rims is just under 10,000 kms.

Average for the 9 large-wheel rims is 20,600 kms.

The longest distance I have had from a rim is 29,100 km.

Rim wear is quite variable.

As Dan states, choice of brake pad model is quite important.

Riding in wet weather tends to accelerate wear, as does urban riding with lots of stops and starts, touring in hilly areas, riding off-road in sandy areas.

Model of rim is another factor.

I followed the advice from Thorn when I bought my "touring" Raven Tour and specified CSS rims for both wheels. Thorn now recommend CSS on the rear and ordinary on the front, I think because there have been some instances of poor wet-weather braking with CSS. That hasn't yet been an issue for me, but I haven't done very much distance yet.

CSS will more or less prevent brake wear, but won't do anything for pothole damage, etc.

[Matt2matt2002]

CSS for me. Front and rear.
Usually a change of trousers required after cycling in heavy rain.
Absolute joke. I guess their durability and strength wins folks over.
Never mind the nonexistent wet weather braking.
( Blue Swiss tops in good condition )

[StuntPilot]

Some useful numbers there martinf! I have been using the Koolstop Salmon/Black dual compound brake pads and they are about ¾ worn after 10000km or so. I like the Koolstop pads and am using the black CSS specific pad on the front.

Dan - that probably explains your longer rim life. The two 3 month tours included the fjords of southern Norway, a crossing of the alps, and the very undulating Croatian coast and islands. Fully loaded over such terrain has taken its toll on the rear non-CSS rim, even though the front brake was used most of the time. There were many long descents where both brakes were applied or 'pumped' hard for many kilometres at a time.

I think one other reason could be that in the UK there are many granite or quartz rock areas and when it rains the very fine slurry of granite/quartz powder acts to quickly wear the rim. It is mainly for that reason I am considering having CSS rims on front and back.

I think the current non-CSS rim should be good though for another few thousand km. As they are Andra 30 I have full confidence in their strength due to the double construction and quality material. Will just keep a closer eye on the rim from time to time.

I have noticed some poorer braking in very wet weather with the front CSS rim but not dangerously so.

Matt - so you would not suggest CSS front and back? 

[geocycle]

As a data point I can confirm that the stopping power of CSS rims in the dry at least is amazing.  A car pulled in front of me this morning as I was overtaking a van parked in a cycle lane.  The bike went from 15mph to zero in less than 10m and avoided collision, unfortunately I did an extra 2m in the air but escaped with minor cuts and bruises.  The front brake locked the wheel propelling me over the bar.  I was actually quite impressed as the front rim is now highly polished after 22,000 miles.