I have a quick question about the whiskey QR Road plus Fork. Do you need the extended reach because the fork has more Crown clearance to accommodate the bigger tires? I've been looking at that fork because 1) I have a lot of Rim brake Wheels 2) the more I ride with discs the more annoying they are and 3) I have a Mandaric road bike that I want to extend the range of use in much the same way as you did your Stinner and I fairly recently picked up a very good Dura-Ace front brake.
What size of tire are you using? I wanted to go up to maybe at 32.

Yes. The brake mounting hole is positioned in the crown for "mid reach" (AKA the old "standard reach") brakes. The brake I'm using it with (SRAM Hydro R rim) doesn't have long enough slots in the arms to put the brake pads into the proper position...hence, the use of offset pad holders.


It's a very nice fork. I'm currently running 28C Turbo Cottons (Hell of the North editions) on Boyd Altamont rims, so the tires measure out at ~30mm wide. That said, I've "dry fit" tires in that fork measuring as large as 36mm wide, so 32mm wide tires should be no issue...you might have to deflate the tire slightly to get it past the pads though.

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Thanks. That is the first appealing straight steerer tube non disk option that I have found, and I really want to keep my Dura-Ace brake. Plus, if I don't really like it on my road bike, I can always shift it over to my piecemeal gravel bike and tri a caliper up front with a 650b wheel.

Sorry to dig up this older thread...
Anyway, could you elaborate on your last remark? Did you miss your road-bike at all?
My intented purpose would be solo training rides (both road and mixed terrain), some weekly fast-paced group-ride and the occasional use during holidays (= mountains) still have an old Soloist carbon that is still functional however getting very old...

I have owned a number of bikes and currently have a Tarmac, a Kinesis Tripster AT and commute on an old Scott CX. My recommendation is if you are going down the single bike route is to get a bike that takes both 650b and 700c wheels.

I originally thought the 650b things was all marketing hype but I have found it makes a big difference in terms of bike handling. As you increase tire size bike handling really slows down. This is taken into account in bike geometry design but it limits the range of tire sizes you actually want to run on a given 700c bike. For example if I run 25mm road tires on the CX race bike the handling twitchy and it feels like the bike wants to kill you at speed. At the other end of the spectrum you can squeeze 35mm tires on more modern 'endurance road' bikes but you end up with bike that is really too slow in terms of handling when you try and throw it around a twisty CX course. By using smaller wheels with bigger tires you can greatly reduce this issue.

A lot of the previous response on this thread have praised OPEN and I think its because they were early proponents of dual wheel sizes. Luckily for your wallet more companies have come on board so you have more lower priced options. However I think you will run into some gearing challenges in getting a chain set that works for both fast group chain gangs and solo off-road riding. Those two usages are just so different in terms of average speed they don't lend themselves well to a single drive train.

The Open up(per) (as well as 3T Exploro) would indeed be on my shortlist.
Regarding the speed difference for my intended use, that indeed is a concern; however I would plan for 2 wheelsets anyway (an aero 700c "road" wheelset+narrow cassette (pancake-flat around here) and a 650b set with a wide-range cassette).
As I don't anticipate to do any real road-racing or granfondo "racing" anymore, I think I could work-out the gear-range issue. Alternatively, I could still opt for a 2x build