26 Vs 27.5 tyres practically the same size?

[albash82]

Brilliant

 

[wynne]

Who'd have thought smacking your hands on every other tree wouldn't catch on?
Time to dig out the early 90s neon motocross handguards, or this pretty neat (not) solution.

 

[xtaffa]

Yep murmurs re. narrower bars now popping up lots of places. Much of the hype/justification feeding into wider bars/arm stance is about leverage and more strength to wrestle the bike through big hits etc., but that's pretty flawed, as neatly shown by James Wilson:

https://www.bikejames.com/strength/your-handlebars-are-too-wide-a-case-study-2/
I'm sceptical about press up spacing being the best spacing, but I did use the method to go out to 680 from 600 recently, and feels good/nice.

I've personally got a view that wider bars destabilise and pull centre of gravity off line in corners - for most riders anyway, based on observation and Geoff apps/Clelend blog page on steering etc.

 

[Duxuk]

The difference between 26 and 27.5" is all about the volume of air in the tyre. You need much more pressure in the lower volume 26 so they are much less absorbing of a rough surface. This means less grip, comfort and speed from a 26. OK it may only translate to a couple of seconds on a 1 minute downhill but there's also less chance of crashing. Over a well chosen cross country ride, though, my Whyte PRST4 can be faster and easier than my 27.5. Less drag and way less weight. It's horses for courses.