Have you ever installed and used tubulars without the adhesive tape ? Only with glue then.

How did it go ?

I NEVER use tape as well as glue, been racing UCI level races inc. worlds/worldcup and National stuff for 10 years, not rolled a tub once. Use good gluing practices and the tape is unneeded.

my take on it is this:
if you are wanting to run very low pressure and really supple sidewalled tires (dugast), then take the extra step. you wont have to worry about rolling a tire, EVER. why not take the extra step and have the insurance there. it takes 5 extra minutes and is very easy.

its not necessary, but is very solid. i wouldnt go without anymore. last season i rolled my first tubular down an off camber hill that was glued professionally. now, i wont ever go without tape. its worth it.

Tape (the belgian style not tufo) works, but it complicates things if you need to replace tires during the season. It's tougher to remove and clean up so you can get another tire on. It also likes to remove your base tape when you take a tire off the rim. It is great if you want to never have a tire come off, though. If I had a limited set of tires/wheels to use during the season or a big supply of tires matched to wheels, then the tape is the way to go. If you have one or two sets of wheels but a long season with varying conditions and the economic ability to have a quiver of tires ranging from file treads to Rynos, then definitely brush upon your gluing skills and skip the tape.

Any one got a link or would like to let me no how exactly you go about the belgian technique?

I never use tape. use enough of good glue, and it works.

_________________
www.crossladen.com
www.cx-sport.de

Seems like the tape question can go either way as some swear by it while others want nothing to do with it. Although I have never tried glue/tape combo for CX, I did try it on the road one time when I discovered a race wheel tubular had a large slice in the tread the night before a race. On the road, the convience of 'taping' a tubular on a wheel in under 10-minutes was really nice but the excitement quickly wore off when it came time to change that tire and the mess left when the base tape shredded while peeling the tire from the wheel.

_________________
Michael - The Anaerobic Threshold is neither...

I have never had a taped+glued cyclocross tire roll off.. but I've also never had a glued tire roll either.
IMO it is a cheap step that adds a good bit of strength to the bond.. just try removing the tire and you'll see.

I'm going to call tape a 'margin for error enhancer.' If you use tape you still need to do a good glue job, but it doesn't have to be as good as if you don't use tape. Neither is necessarily better than the other. If you do a great glue job, then the tape isn't critical. If you do a poor job, then even tape won't save you from yourself. Beyond that, however you get the tire to stay on at low pressure is up to you...

_________________
___________________________________________________

"Organization is for the simple-minded, the Genius controls the chaos." - Jens

Well put, sir.

_________________
Team Mike's Bikes

I'm a long time roadie that uses nothing but tubulars. Dispite this I had a learning curve gluing up big cross tires. My best solution is the use of a band clamp. A flexible cloth clamp that can go around the circumference of the tire. After gluing up in the normal way I put the clamp on the tire. The tire is at about 10 psi, I then tighten the clamp slightly. I then pump up the tire to the max psi the tire is rated for and let it set for 24+ hours. The bond is much improved over anything else I've tried. No issues with edges becoming unglued even after a full muddy season

_________________
WW Velocipedist Gargantuan

I tried the glue/tape method tonight

realy impressed, once you put the glue over the tape it's so much stickier than glue, which does make it a little bit harder to centre the tub, but is this a bad thing, i'm not sure.

also another thing I noticed, the tub rim wasnt brand new, so had bits of old glue still on the rim even after I had cleaned it up best i could. What I found was the tape gives a smooth surface for the tub to sit.

so, i'll see how it looks once the glue has dried and hopefully i wont roll it!

I tried without tape on a wheel set I have for training.
Without the tape it seems good enough at higher pressure, but I wouldn't feel confident to ride on same pressure as with the tape.

With my 0 experience in gluing/using cross tubulars, I'm going to use glue and tape. I have Challenge Grifos that I'm gonna glue on Cane Creek Aros 48 and without any glue the tire comes off the rim scary easy at 30 psi. I don't trust my skills enough to not use tape or whatever may help.

What about contact cement? Would contact cement glue make a stronger bond? I've used contact cement on track tubulars before.

_________________
http://demarere.blogspot.com/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;