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I have a set of rollers and a single-speed road bike. My 80-90 rpm speed is 27-30 kph (17-19 mph). I feel like I would be more stable with higher rpm, but it's harder to sustain.

If I understand this, the source of the bike's stability is the gyroscopic effect of a spinning wheel. So there are few more variables to that, like a wheel's mass, or even distribution of the mass within a wheel body. For the reference, my wheels are 27" and 1.5 kg (3.3 lbs) each, and I'm 70 kg (154 lbs) myself.

Can you share an experience with the speed-stability relation of a road bike on a set of rollers?

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    Stability primarily comes from the geometries of the head tube, fork, stem, and handlebar.
    – MaplePanda
    Commented Aug 30, 2020 at 5:20
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    Not a duplicate but still significant overlap bicycles.stackexchange.com/questions/4656/…
    – whatsisname
    Commented Aug 30, 2020 at 5:28
  • Your wheels are probably 622mm. The "27 inch" measure needs to go away because its too confusing. ETRTO numbering is designed to be impossible to get two measurements meaning the same thing, or one measurement meaning two different things.
    – Criggie ♦
    Commented Aug 30, 2020 at 5:49
  • @Criggie Are you sure? In bike tire sizes 27" is 630mm and 28" 622 or (rarely) 635mm.
    – ojs
    Commented Aug 30, 2020 at 9:23

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the source of the bike's stability is the gyroscopic effect of a spinning wheel.

This is incorrect. Gyroscopic forces play virtually no part in bicycle stability. What keeps a bike stable is the counter steering induced by the frame geometry, particularly the sloped headtube and resulting trail in the fork.

In any case, your single speed will be fine on the rollers. It doesn't take much speed to stay stable on them, any gear ratio appropriate for a bike on the road will work on rollers.

I'm surprised you haven't just tried it to see how it would go, and not conclude your setup is fine already.

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  • I tried, and it feels much more stable at 100-110 rpm (34-37 kph), but it's hard for me. I also noticed that it's impossible to stay upright at 0-10 kph. So there should be some sweet spot. Hence the question. Thanks for linking a discussion here, I will study the articles.
    – user254820
    Commented Aug 31, 2020 at 3:55
  • @user254820: it's hard for everyone to get started. With practice, you'll be able to stay upright at the slower speeds without even paying attention.
    – whatsisname
    Commented Aug 31, 2020 at 4:28

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