Interestingly...I'm pretty sure the configuration of that "rake" is going to inform them more about the drag of the rider, and not so much about the wheels and bike ;-)

edit: BTW, I'm calling "BS" on them not producing a rim brake version because they're "too wide"...the internal bead width is only 20mm.

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http://bikeblather.blogspot.com/

https://www.swissside.com/...ge-and-laura-philipp

Yes it was to help determine the rider's drag and how the pressure drops behind the rider in different wind conditions on the road. They also had a truck with wind indicators etc for Kona a year or so ago as a means of determining the wind situation on course. They love to play with these things in the " real" world.

I have heard Dan Bigham talk about the "aero sensor rake" from his F1 days. Interesting to see SwissSide adopt this technology, though it doesn't look like it would do all that much for wheel design because the wake of the wheels is probably not capture well by the location of that rake. Now maybe the point is to have more accurate outdoor testing of the rider/bike package

Ah yea, I remember Patrick Lange testing with one of these last year on Instagram. I even think they went to an F1 track to do it

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All that work only to ugly up the wheels with horrible graphics.

https://cyclingtips.com/...with-pressure-rakes/

This aero rake is old news. I think it became public knowledge about 1-1.5 years ago when they announced they were working with Ineos and a few Triathletes. This is borrowed almost directly from F1 from what I can tell, with the exception of the obvious constraints of a bike v. car. With that said, the amateur data geek in me loves where this is going and assuming it can come down to a price range that average joes like myself can afford to play with it, I fully support it.

I wonder if they have parked their aero-sensor .

I have been looking at the aero-sensors, which at the moment seems to be either an Aeropod or Notio or the windsensor and CDA app route with a few others in the pipeline. I wonder if Swisssides move to the rake means that found the sensors weren't sensitive or repeatable enough for the fine tuning they wanted.

I'm not really familiar with the Aeropod or Notio but they appear to be just a single pitot tube device designed to measure freestream airspeed. So I assume they use this information in combination with power data to infer aerodynamic performance? They don't directly measure any aspect of the airflow around the bike. Rakes, force balances and smoke are standard equipment for windtunnel testing to determine pressures, flows, drag, lift etc in a wind tunnel. A power meter only provides some insight into drag magnitude and a free stream pitot tube only tells you the speed of the airflow BEFORE the rider and bike interact with it significantly.
A rake placed in the wake provides completely different information. You are mapping the result of the interaction at selected locations within the wake. This provides the potential to get some insight into where and how the drag is being produced, not just an indirect measure of the ultimate impact. It's inappropriate to compare the two as you are, since they're not solutions to the same problem.


Edit: As Tom noted, the rake appears to be specifically looking at the wake from the rider. Not the entire rider either. I wonder are they trying to normalise testing by measuring the wake where rider drag will vary most.

I suspect they have not shelved the aero sensor, just decided it is better for internal use than to work to make it a consumer product. Photos on their site from Feb 2019 with Ineos show the pod, it is a dual pitot tube device.