Why is it faulty reasoning that you can have both wider tires and still meet the 105 rule busy just making the whole thing wider? How can that even be faulty? Lol. Zipp said having the tire stretching wider is better than meeting 105, but you can have… both.
Which companies have shown that the smooth interface is faster? Never seen a single data point that attributes a wheel’s speed to that feature. Perhaps mavic with the CXR80 had something but those wheels can’t be compared with/without strips since there’s a big recess that sticks out where the strip sits. Roval and Hunt have gone the opposite way and exaggerated the step created by the hooks (one is hollow and the other is filled). They claim it’s faster because it is easier to meet the 105 rule with bigger tires. The air can flow smoothly even if the surface has small gaps, as long as the two disjoint sections line up. So are Roval/Hunt the ones making wrong claims or is it Zipp? In any case, the smooth transition won’t help you with smooth airflow if you have a 28mm tire ballooning to 30mm on a 23mm internal wheel that is 27mm on the outside.
Regarding the price. I said sub-1600g so clearly I’m talking about the 858. The Firecrests are competitive value. The 404FC was in my top 2 when I was purchasing new wheels last year and almost pulled the trigger when i saw them 20% off. Went with the i9.65 which is 7mm deeper, wider, still within 30g, and has hooks. I wonder how they managed that weight with those 150g hooks (just kidding around).
If there are contradicting “sources” and “measurably true” data for the claims you make, I’d be happy to read those if you’re wiling to share them instead of replying in 1-2 words to each paragraph. I like reading about the tech side of these things but haven’t found anything that actually shows that smooth interface is measurably more aero beyond the eye tunnel, hooks save many times more weight than the material they remove, etc. Only generic claims from the sales and marketing departments.
i’m no aero expert but it seems clear that there are some different approaches in the details, none of which are necessarily right or wrong.
we’ve seen a number of manufacturers recently go against 105 so its not just zipp which makes me think there must be some truth to it but i would like to see some proper explanation of the tradeoffs. it seems logical that smoothing the transition would help recapture the airflow as you are then more treating the tyre and rim as a single shape so maybe instead of 105% you’re looking at closer to 100% but we have here 28mm tyres (or more) on 27mm rims so how can you recapture the airflow? unless there’s some real magic you have to be counting on the tyre to play nicely with the flow which is unlikely.
i can imagine there comes a point at which the wide rims required to achieve 105 with increasingly wider tyres bring about other issues, though nobody has really explained that.
105 has enough backing that i trust it until someone can provide more than marketing spiel to indicate that their approach is at least as good