Tubeless road tires don't work for everyone - discuss

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Lewn777
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by Lewn777

I've had problems with punctures with metal shards on tubes and tires Continental GP4000S2 and 4 Seasons, where am incredibly hard to see/find metal shards keep puncturing the tube again and again, making me go through loads of tubes and patches.

So I bought Schwalbe Pro Ones (25mm) and mounted them on my DT Swiss Tubeless Ready wheels (RR21 Dicut). Front went on easily rear needed extra tape. Inflated with Stans sealant 50ml just to be on the safe side.

Super fast lovely tires for about 300kms, then one day got a puncture on the tread, small hole. It would only seal when the pressure dropped below 30psi, inflated more spun the wheel. Eventually added more sealant. This seemed to do the trick, managed to get the tire to hold 90psi - that was until the next ride, all seemed well until the 30km mark and then the tire slowly went soft until there was almost nothing in it, wouldn't take any more air. Rode home and somewhere got a sidewall cut making the tire go totally flat. Added more sealant but tire is probably beyond saving. 300km and $45 us dollars? :(

So my thoughts are....are tubeless tires on road bikes actually long-term functional? Sure I've used Stans in my tires on my mountain bike for way over 5 years, but the industry seem to be jumping the gun. Why should a smaller much thinner casing tire running much higher pressure work as well as on a mountain bike? Surely we need better sealants, better tape, better repair technology, better valves and valve seals for road use? I'm extra worried about the winter, it can be sub-zero here but as it's dry the roads are still safe, but are my tires going to lose any ability to seal at all?

Where do I go from here? Superglue? Tubeless repair kits? Better sealant different tires or go back to the less pain of tubes? :(

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jlok
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by jlok

I think u need to patch the puncture. Sealant is good for getting you home only.

And I agree that currently road tubeless is not for everyone. I wish Continental will be forced to release GP4000 S TLR.
Rikulau V9 DB Custom < BMC TM02 < Litespeed T1sl Disc < Giant Propel Advanced SL Disc 1 < Propel Adv < TCR Adv SL Disc < KTM Revelator Sky < CAAD 12 Disc < Domane S Disc < Alize < CAAD 10

RTW
in the industry
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by RTW

I had great experience on Schwalbe Ones, for about six months. Then had a puncture which sprayed sealant everywhere. Tyre totally flat, so time for a tube in it. Then the fun begins. Getting the tyre off on the road took three of us. I normally ride alone, so this was the point that I thought "these aren't for me". Now, perhaps I should have been adding sealant every few months (I hear it can dry up) but that is adding weight, and do I want to be mucking about with that sticky sealant?

Was the ride good? Yes, but I ride a Parlee now so the ride is great anyway! I am now on Reynolds Assaults with Pirelli tyres and latex tubes. Will I puncture more often? Perhaps, but do I feel better because I know I can fix it at the side of the road? Damn right.

I will possibly try them again, but I think the advantages of feel are small for road over clinchers - rolling resistance aside, and even that can be mitigated against (latex tubes). If you want a solution that is ball ache if you get a puncture, but can be dealt with at the side of the road, ride Tubulars. For me, I couldn't really see what tubeless was doing better than tubulars, other than sealant which may, or may not work.

peted76
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by peted76

As a long term sufferer of road tubeless, I can safely assume that you've not used the right sealant or haven't shaken the sealant well enough. Otherwise your small hole should have sealed within a few seconds. MTB tubeless and Road Tubeless are very different beasts.

Tubeless isn't for everyone 'at this moment' only due to the lack of knowledge around it in my opinion.

Personally I found stans sealant useless, also I didn't get with the conti revo stuff, I use the Bontrager sealant now, it's been great but it needs one hell of a shake of the bottle before use.

Also there's no reason why a sealed hole won't permanently seal. Not sure what jlok is on about sealant isn't an emergency solution, it's a proper fix.
I have experienced two holes which are too large for sealant in those cases I've used a 'Velox Tubeless Repair Kit' to fix them properly (just a stronger than normal patch).

There was a study of sealants done a while back.. http://www.slowtwitch.com/Products/Thin ... _4155.html It probably needs updating no has good info in.

gewichtweenie
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Joined: Fri Sep 25, 2015 3:12 pm

by gewichtweenie

If you've got a puncture large enough that the sealant won't deal...patch the puncture.
I do it from the inside, using glueless patch. Nothing intricate. If the patch isn't patched perfectly....well that's what the sealant is for.

Worked this way for hundreds of KMs

dvq
Posts: 181
Joined: Mon Sep 25, 2017 1:36 pm

by dvq

Lewn777 wrote:I've had problems with punctures with metal shards on tubes and tires Continental GP4000S2 and 4 Seasons, where am incredibly hard to see/find metal shards keep puncturing the tube again and again, making me go through loads of tubes and patches.

So I bought Schwalbe Pro Ones (25mm) and mounted them on my DT Swiss Tubeless Ready wheels (RR21 Dicut). Front went on easily rear needed extra tape. Inflated with Stans sealant 50ml just to be on the safe side.

Super fast lovely tires for about 300kms, then one day got a puncture on the tread, small hole. It would only seal when the pressure dropped below 30psi, inflated more spun the wheel. Eventually added more sealant. This seemed to do the trick, managed to get the tire to hold 90psi - that was until the next ride, all seemed well until the 30km mark and then the tire slowly went soft until there was almost nothing in it, wouldn't take any more air. Rode home and somewhere got a sidewall cut making the tire go totally flat. Added more sealant but tire is probably beyond saving. 300km and $45 us dollars? :(

So my thoughts are....are tubeless tires on road bikes actually long-term functional? Sure I've used Stans in my tires on my mountain bike for way over 5 years, but the industry seem to be jumping the gun. Why should a smaller much thinner casing tire running much higher pressure work as well as on a mountain bike? Surely we need better sealants, better tape, better repair technology, better valves and valve seals for road use? I'm extra worried about the winter, it can be sub-zero here but as it's dry the roads are still safe, but are my tires going to lose any ability to seal at all?

Where do I go from here? Superglue? Tubeless repair kits? Better sealant different tires or go back to the less pain of tubes? :(


It's not you, it's the tires honestly. My first tubeless wheels were pro ones and I honestly think the tire caseing is too thin to keep the casing together for sealant to work effectively. I've since then tried zipp rt25s, s-works turbo tubeless, and irc x-guard and they ALL work better at sealing holes with sealant. The x-guard are ridiculously good at sealing punctures, I managed to run over glass a couple weeks ago and got a dreaded double puncture. I felt a bit of mist, and it sealed within a couple rotations. Also, buy a Dynaplug road tubeless plug kit, it works really well for holes that are too large to seal and I've left them in for a thousand miles after plugging just fine.

Recommendations:
- Thicker tires than Pro One
- Orange Seal not Stans for road tubeless
- DynaPlug
Last edited by dvq on Wed Oct 11, 2017 4:54 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Ltyarbro42
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Joined: Wed Aug 10, 2016 6:05 pm

by Ltyarbro42

Orange seal has always performed better for me at high pressures. I think the learning curve with tubeless is not as high as people claim. Simply, do it right and don't be dumb. I don't foresee myself ever fully committing to tubed tires for performance ever again.

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Orlok
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by Orlok

Okay, you had bad luck with a to big puncture that the sealant couldn't fix. That was happening to me too several times, but in that case you had to put an inner tube and drive further. When you did drive with a normal tire and inner tire probably you had a puncture also, so . . . ! :roll:

At home you can repair the puncture with a good patch for road tires or a patch for inner tubes with a reinforcement - 8mm yellow tape oslt - cause the high pressure.!

I have driven now more then 40K in all weather conditions with different fabrication 23 mm road tubeless tires all with Schwalbe Doc Blue sealant and my experience are that more then 90% of the punctures are repaired by the sealant and you didn't notice until you saw the residu of the sealant on your frame. From the other 10% about 8% you will notice that you have a puncture because you see it of feel it while you ride but you can go on with low pressure. In the other 2% you need an inner tube to repair on the road.
A happy user of tubeless road tires. :D
Once comes a time that you'll have a tailwind :D
Pinarello F10 - Ultegra 8050 Di2 - Carbonspeed C38 Tubeless

TobinHatesYou
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by TobinHatesYou

jlok wrote:I think u need to patch the puncture. Sealant is good for getting you home only.

And I agree that currently road tubeless is not for everyone. I wish Continental will be forced to release GP4000 S TLR.


This is not true, so it would be appreciated if you stopped spreading FUD about road tubeless. It doesn't benefit any of us consumers to hinder its adoption.

The vast majority of punctures seal permanently. For large punctures there’s DynaPlugs. Once again, people really need to stop f-king using Stan’s and use Orange Seal instead. Don’t blame the concept because you bought the worst sealant. Also if you’re using extra tape on supposedly tubeless-ready rims like the OP, then I suspect user error, such as not seating the bead properly around the valve stem plug. I have set-up four different brands of rims tubeless on my road bike (Venn, ENVE, Alto, Velocity) and none have ever required more than the standard two layers of tape. I even use green powdercoat masking tape, which is significantly thinner than Tesa/Stan’s tape.
Last edited by TobinHatesYou on Thu Oct 12, 2017 1:31 am, edited 1 time in total.

djwalker
Posts: 165
Joined: Sat Oct 31, 2009 7:35 pm

by djwalker

I have ridden a variety of tubeless road tire and I found that Pro Ones were the absolute worst at getting to seal after a puncture. Even tiny punctures were hard to seal. On the other hand, I have had good luck with Hutchinson where almost everything smaller than a gigantic hole will seal. So, I think that casing construction makes a big difference. I also found Pro One's hard to patch on the inside because of the exposed casing threads. It was like trying to patch cloth. Most other tires have a rubber coating on the inside. I also agree that sealed holes are permanent. I have never patched any hole that would seal with sealant. I have only patched the rare gigantic hole.

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micky
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by micky

RTW wrote:I had great experience on Schwalbe Ones, for about six months. Then had a puncture which sprayed sealant everywhere. Tyre totally flat, so time for a tube in it. Then the fun begins. Getting the tyre off on the road took three of us. I normally ride alone, so this was the point that I thought "these aren't for me". Now, perhaps I should have been adding sealant every few months (I hear it can dry up) but that is adding weight, and do I want to be mucking about with that sticky sealant?

Was the ride good? Yes, but I ride a Parlee now so the ride is great anyway! I am now on Reynolds Assaults with Pirelli tyres and latex tubes. Will I puncture more often? Perhaps, but do I feel better because I know I can fix it at the side of the road? Damn right.

I will possibly try them again, but I think the advantages of feel are small for road over clinchers - rolling resistance aside, and even that can be mitigated against (latex tubes). If you want a solution that is ball ache if you get a puncture, but can be dealt with at the side of the road, ride Tubulars. For me, I couldn't really see what tubeless was doing better than tubulars, other than sealant which may, or may not work.


I was with a friend last sunday who got exactly this situation after having the tubeless on his new bike for this past season and considering to switch back to clincher just cause more easy to deal with and not big advantage.

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Lewn777
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by Lewn777

Ltyarbro42 wrote:Orange seal has always performed better for me at high pressures.

I wanted Orange seal, but it's not available in Asia.
jlok wrote:I think u need to patch the puncture. Sealant is good for getting you home only.

If this is true, what then the advantages over tubes really? Used MTB tubeless for years, sealant sealed loads of holes, never patched anything from inside or needed a tube in an emergency.
TobinHatesYou wrote:For large punctures there’s DynaPlugs. Once again, people really need to stop f-king using Stan’s and use Orange Seal instead.

Guess what?
I wanted to buy Dynaplugs, Orange seal and run Hutchinson Fusion 5 All Season, but they are not available in my country (Asia) and some of those products are only really available in North America and in Europe. Yes, I can buy online and get them shipped internationally, but the postage costs from North America are very high. Also it's just not sustainable to need parts and go to the internet and wait three weeks when you ride 2000km or more a month.

Opinion: There is something fundamentally wrong if someone using road tubeless for the first time but with over 5 years experience thousands of kms and 10s of tire installs on MTBs can't make the technology work effectively. I never once needed an emergency tube, inner patch, external plug or was berated for using the wrong sealant or had any other problems on MTBs. Tubes suck, but it seems for road tubeless suck almost equally. :( I won't give up, eventually when I can source all the exact things I need: High quality valves, orange sealant, Hutchuinson Fusion 5 All Season and Dynaplugs I'll have another shot. Just might take a while.

As it is I feel the bicycle tubeless technology for road has been cheaply ported across from MTB with a presumption that 'it will work the R&D has been done on MTBs we can save money'. The reality I think there should have been more R&D and a line drawn in the sand: This is road tubeless, this is a different application. Maybe an industry wide UST adoption was/is the answer.

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wheelbuilder
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by wheelbuilder

Meh. I was a huge proponent of road tubeless for years and our shop really pushed it on people who had wheels built. Have used pretty much all the tires....Schwalbe, IRC, Specialized, Hutchinson, etc. I have since switched back to clinchers with latex tubes. Too few "great" tubeless tires in the marketplace right now. Both the weight and the road feel arguments can be addressed with latex tubes. It was my experience that tubeless tires seemed to develop more cuts and gouges. Lifespan of tubeless was shorter for me as when the tread wore down, older, previously sealed "plugs" of sealant would re-open and leak. Also, not quite sure if sealants are ready for the high pressures yet. Yes, the puncture will probably seal, but I would lose a lot of pressure before sealing. I wanted to love tubeless for road and tried hard to do so. Much prefer latex tubes and vast array of very good, light, high performing tires. I think it is awesome that some of you guys are having good success with it.
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Lewn777
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by Lewn777

wheelbuilder wrote:Meh. I was a huge proponent of road tubeless for years and our shop really pushed it on people who had wheels built. Have used pretty much all the tires....Schwalbe, IRC, Specialized, Hutchinson, etc. I have since switched back to clinchers with latex tubes. Too few "great" tubeless tires in the marketplace right now. Both the weight and the road feel arguments can be addressed with latex tubes. It was my experience that tubeless tires seemed to develop more cuts and gouges. Lifespan of tubeless was shorter for me as when the tread wore down, older, previously sealed "plugs" of sealant would re-open and leak. Also, not quite sure if sealants are ready for the high pressures yet. Yes, the puncture will probably seal, but I would lose a lot of pressure before sealing. I wanted to love tubeless for road and tried hard to do so. Much prefer latex tubes and vast array of very good, light, high performing tires. I think it is awesome that some of you guys are having good success with it.

I think new on the market Pirelli tires sort of confirm your opinion. Could tubeless for road die a death long term?

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TobinHatesYou
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by TobinHatesYou

Road tubeless dying, rofl. Look, you guys are fine to do what you want, but please stop spreading FUD. Other people might actually believe you.

Maybe if you guys lived in places where the road surfaces are particularly rough, broken taillights/headlights litter the shoulder and construction fasteners fall off the back of trucks, then you'd understand. Like Orlok stated, 90% of would-be flats get sealed. Just about everything else gets fixed by a DynaPlug. I basically never have to use a boot and insert a tube.

Why would I give up the convenience of basically never worrying about flatting outside of the rare gigantic nail/scew or razor blade? Why would I give up being able to run 60psi on 25mm tires without ever having to worry about pinch flats? All this talk of not being able to fix an unsealable puncture out on the road is nonsense. Oh and yes Orange Seal seems to seal 5mm long punctures at 100psi just fine.

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