Zwift Chat

[CXRAndy]

Yep - 6 screws on the bottom. Picture below attached of the innards for your curiosity @CXRAndy - just a tiny pcb and a angle sensor basically.

Also yep - the bumps are just soft end stops at the extremities of the arc.
View attachment 541391

Thanks Pete.

I wonder if it is just a variable potentimeter. It could be optical or hall effect.

Did you see if a lever connected directly to the pcb or lever but doesn't actually touch the pcb?

Looking at the size of the pcb, it could be transplanted into a little box and a lever cobbled for the hand to adjust. I bet the pcb could be nibbled down to make it even smaller.

@bridgy It does seem alot of cash for what's inside. That's the way, demand will drive the price

 

[Randyberlin]

Thanks Pete.

I wonder if it is just a variable potentimeter. It could be optical or hall effect.

Did you see if a lever connected directly to the pcb or lever but doesn't actually touch the pcb?

Looking at the size of the pcb, it could be transplanted into a little box and a lever cobbled for the hand to adjust. I bet the pcb could be nibbled down to make it even smaller.

@bridgy It does seem alot of cash for what's inside. That's the way, demand will drive the price

Years ago I used a game joy stick Potentiometer and a piece of wood with a bearing bolted to the riser.

 

[Whorty]

If anyone is interested, here is a little recording of a mere mortal pootling around Paris with his new steering gizmo

I tested 'sticky draft' - it seems to me that you can steer around someone and avoid the sticky where previously I would have been caught
Cornering - definitely like that I can cut corners
Drafting - if not careful it's easy to accidentally steer out of the draft and get dropped, so it's not all positive
I think it will take some practice to get it honed for racing but definitely adds an extra dimension to Zwift.

 

[Randyberlin]

Hey, who is this that passed me on BKOOL this morning?

Can’t make out the name. I’ll have to re ride it and look. @bridgy was there someone up along the Scottish border who got a jersey?

 

[<Tommy>]

Can’t make out the name. I’ll have to re ride it and look. @bridgy was there someone up along the Scottish border who got a jersey?

That can’t be a Cyclechat jersey Randy. Even at that resolution we’d be able to see the itchy rash.

 

[mjd1988]

Took a chance and "jumped on" a random race on zwift. Turned out to be a 71 minute slot around the 6 train in new York with 10 riders.

Dropped 3 at the start then one each lap for the next three laps until 4 of us stuck together a couple of laps then 2 of us were gapped. He very kindly let me draft him home for aaaages. Nasty course, rollers and one horrible steep bank where the attacks came like clockwork. Ended up being an interval workout. Did make for an exciting race to be fair

 

[Brendan Parker]

@Whorty @peterob

Steering race 👍🏼



https://zwift.com/events/view/10109...liate_ericschlange_apr19&utm_medium=affiliate

 

[mjd1988]

@Whorty @peterob

Steering race 👍🏼



https://zwift.com/events/view/10109...liate_ericschlange_apr19&utm_medium=affiliate

Crit city! Exciting.

Another place that will be fun for steering; down the alpe

 

[Whorty]

@Whorty @peterob

Steering race 👍🏼



https://zwift.com/events/view/10109...liate_ericschlange_apr19&utm_medium=affiliate

Tempting .... I'll have to see how things go here but it's the kind of time I look to ride so fingers crossed

Won a race today, probably the easiest race I've come first in. Lots of riders not registered on ZP - 18 I think in the start pen and yet only 5 finished in ZP. I had a quick look at ZP about 15-20 mins in and I saw I was in the lead and the guy in second was 3 minutes behind so all I had to do to win was stay in the little group I was in. Had to work fairly hard I guess to stay there but not so much that I ever felt like I was going to get dropped. Another virtual gold for the virtual trophy Hadn't got the steerer by time I raced so didn't get a chance to test it out in anger.

 

[Del C]

If anyone is interested, here is a little recording of a mere mortal pootling around Paris with his new steering gizmo

I tested 'sticky draft' - it seems to me that you can steer around someone and avoid the sticky where previously I would have been caught
Cornering - definitely like that I can cut corners
Drafting - if not careful it's easy to accidentally steer out of the draft and get dropped, so it's not all positive
I think it will take some practice to get it honed for racing but definitely adds an extra dimension to Zwift.

Stupid question time.

If you’ve got the steerer activated, do you actually have to steer around every bend?

What happens if you choose not to steer? Do you go straight on and off the road, or do you track with the other riders as you do in pre-steering days?

I suppose I’m saying if you activate it, is it always on and do you have to steer every bit of road or is it just for manoeuvres like overtaking and avoiding a sticky draft?

 

[theboxers]

Stupid question time.

If you’ve got the steerer activated, do you actually have to steer around every bend?

What happens if you choose not to steer? Do you go straight on and off the road, or do you track with the other riders as you do in pre-steering days?

I suppose I’m saying if you activate it, is it always on and do you have to steer every bit of road or is it just for manoeuvres like overtaking and avoiding a sticky draft?

From Gplama's review it is like sticky steering. Turn and holding left or right takes you to the extremes of the available road, not full road width.

Flick turns puts you into sticky lanes. You hold the radius of the lane that you are in going round the corner.

You are able to get out of the sticky draft by the simple act of moving to one side or the other.

See Gplama's youtube channel for more info. He's had 2 or.3 videos go up in the last week demonstrating all of this

 

[CXRAndy]

@Del C Think of several parallel (invisible) rails you can move to. Once in that rail, you will track its radius around a corner without steering. If you want to take a tighter radius turn again. The edges of the circuits now have (invisible) barriers so you can leave the track. If you steer into another rider you bounce off ( not literally),

The instant obvious benefits are cutting corners to get ahead- GP.Lama demonstrates it well in his video. Pulling out of group sticky draft when passing, nipping into gap to gain draft benefit.

Downside another input you have to keep an eye on- especially racing

 

[CXRAndy]

View: https://youtu.be/ngsAD-gcOKA



Considering making my shopper/tourer into a E-tourer

 

[steverob]

Saw my first "steerer" last night on Watopia. Was interesting to watch, as while I'd seen GPLama's videos of what it looked like if you were the person with the steering, I did wonder if non-steerers would see the same thing - after all, we've been told historically that what you see with regards to road position can vary massively from what is on someone else's screen.

Was going up the twisty 1% slope from the underwater tunnel to the Italian Village and someone was catching me but doing about the same watts, so as I was taking it easy I thought I'd accelerate a little and grab his back wheel, then sit in. Unfortunately I couldn't as he was on the very left hand side of the lane while I was stuck in the middle of the road. As we approached the next bend, his avatar then flung itself over to the opposite side of the road to take the inside line and I realised what I was up against!

What will be interesting is watching when multiple steerers meet each other (like in the FutureWorks event mentioned above). All the videos I've seen so far have just been one person steering and dodging around normal avatars - what happens when 2, 3 or 50 steerers all meet each other? Will they constantly be bouncing off each other? What happens if you're in a pack and have two steerers to your left and right and want to get out/make an attack - do you have to drop back, then steer left/right to get round them before going forward?

 

[bridgy]

With the steering feature it strikes me that it could also be really useful for teammates giving each other lead-outs for a sprint - something that can be pretty tricky to get right on Zwift without steering