My eyes can gloss over when one other bike model claims the same old “lighter, stiffer, quicker” a few new highway race bike. However Colnago didn’t simply polish an already profitable design. It began over, and the ensuing V5Rs touts figures representing important enhancements.
Colnago has been cooperating with the UAE Workforce Emirates WorldTour skilled biking staff since a company in Abu Dhabi acquired the bike model in 2020. Colnago staffers defined the a number of sequence of back-and-forth discussions and assessments that helped create the brand new V5Rs. And as you would possibly anticipate from a staff that appears to have limitless monetary sources, Colnago was in a position to drop important weight from the brand new bike.
The V5Rs comes on the heels of the Colnago Y1Rs, a placing aero highway bike with out a standard seat tube. The V5Rs is extra of an all-around or climbing highway race machine.
What’s New on the Colnago V5Rs
Lighter, of Course
Street racing manufacturers dare not supply a brand new “climbing” bike with out dropping weight. On this case, Colnago didn’t simply drop a number of share factors of mass — it went large.
After being the primary main model to make use of carbon fiber in bikes, Colnago has made its lightest highway body but. It claims that an unpainted body weighs 685g within the center 510mm measurement (Colnago sizes its frames otherwise than most). This isn’t the lightest highway bike body in the marketplace, however it’s nonetheless extremely svelte.
This represents a 12.5% (146g) distinction from the V4Rs, which is critical within the highway racing world.
Extra Structured Inner Mandrels
Loads of components contributed to the burden loss with out sacrificing lateral stiffness. One important distinction was Colnago’s use of a extra inflexible mandrel as an alternative of a “mushy” mandrel.
When making a carbon fiber body, an inner bladder is inflated to push the carbon fiber pre-preg towards the metallic mildew from the within to scale back voids. These inner mandrels have to be pulled out of the body after it “bakes,” in order that they have to be mushy sufficient to yank out of small holes within the body.
Colnago makes use of a stiffer mandrel manufactured from polypropylene. This permits extra managed mandrel shapes, particularly for extra intricate junctions and smaller radius angles, because the mandrels have extra construction than softer supplies.
The carbon fiber strikes much less throughout the curing course of, retaining extra of the precise fiber orientation and compaction mapped out by Finite Aspect Evaluation (FEM) pc modeling. The brand new mandrels additionally produce a a lot smoother end on the inner partitions of the body tubes.
Smaller Backside Bracket
Colnago went again in time a bit and used a BSA backside bracket, resisting the pattern towards the larger T47 that appears to be taking on. Colnago claims that the stiffness of the V5Rs’ backside bracket space doesn’t need assistance from outsized T47 backside brackets. Moreover, the Italian model created a lighter seat put up and specifies smaller head tube bearings within the V5Rs.
Is It Extra Aero?
The Colnago V5Rs bikes displayed at Sea Otter didn’t appear that visibly totally different from the V4Rs at first look, so it wasn’t apparent that they have been extra aero.
Colnago mixed the on-frame stress sensors it used to develop the Y1Rs with Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) to make the V5Rs quicker than the outgoing V4Rs.
Lowered Frontal Space
To slice by means of the air, skinny forward-facing features are the secret. Colnago did simply that on the V5Rs. The pinnacle tube is smaller, particularly on the high, attributable to a smaller bearing. It additionally sports activities a “nosecone” profile dealing with ahead.
The fork blades are additionally thinner, as is the brand new seat put up. The seat put up appeared drastically totally different: It’s manner skinnier than the earlier D-shaped unit.
Colnago claims these efforts save about 9 W at 0 levels of yaw with a rider aboard at 50 kph, in comparison with the V4Rs. The identical weighted distinction exists for as much as -10 levels of yaw.
However What About Stiffness?
Being lighter or extra aero doesn’t matter if the bike doesn’t maintain as much as the lateral and torsional forces knowledgeable rider can inflict on the body and fork. Sprinting, climbing, and cornering at velocity exaggerate any lack of off-plane rigidity on a highway race bike.
Forces on the Bike, for Actual
Colnago studied the off-axis forces produced by sprinting and seated climbing throughout the improvement of the V5Rs. It deduced that sprinting particularly stresses the entrance triangle of the body, whereas seated climbing stresses the rear triangle.
Sprinting entails putting excessive masses on each the handlebars and backside bracket at oscillating angles of camber relative to the body’s aircraft. Seated driving solely locations masses in the identical aircraft of the entrance triangle.
Aero vs. Lateral and Torsional Stiffness
Lowering frontal space can negatively have an effect on out-of-plane stiffness because the tubes’ lateral cross-section is normally thinner. Colnago subjected frames to emphasize assessments to research and engineer a approach to keep energy and handling-conserving stiffness.
Colnago deduced that the body joints on the seat tube required optimization to take care of the requirements of probably the most highly effective biking professionals. It massaged the carbon layup into particular shapes on the tube junctions and raised the seat stays on the seat tube to take care of lateral and torsional rigidity. Colnago additionally refined the tube shapes, on the whole, to eke out each little bit of effectivity.
Geometry
Colnago is aware of it has factor within the geometry and related dealing with of the V4Rs. It saved a lot of this intact on the V5Rs, however made refined changes based mostly on present skilled racing.
The pinnacle tube and seat tube are barely steeper. These accommodate the extra aggressive ahead place that present WorldTour riders favor whereas additionally sharpening the dealing with a contact. Colnago employs two totally different fork rakes in order that the path of the bike with bigger, fashionable tires stays extra constant throughout the seven sizes (510-570 mm) it gives.
Colours
The spectacular numbers are matched by Colnago’s well-known jaw-dropping paint schemes. In fact, the UAE Workforce Emirates colour scheme is obtainable, as is a World Champion model with the trademark rainbow colours towards a pure white background. Colnago gives a stealthy flat black for many who choose an understated look.
However what did it for me was the pearly white-and-blue of the ladies’s UAE Workforce ADQ WorldTour squad. It was clear, with a touch of flash.
Remaining Phrase on Tadej Pogačar’s New WorldTour Weapon
All of the hype and statistics in regards to the V5Rs don’t matter if three-time Tour de France winner and present World Champion Tadej Pogačar refuses to trip the bike. However Colnago staffers, each from Italy and Abu Dhabi, reassured us that the present darling of highway racing approves of the brand new V5Rs and can be racing it in late April. In fact, a motorbike of this caliber requires a thick pockets. Here’s a sampling of pricing:
- Body package: $6,250
- Shimano Dura-Ace/ENVE construct: $16,500
- Shimano Ultegra construct: $11,750
Save your cash, children!
