I tried some Dugast with Racing Ralphs on them. Very nice. Perfect for the terrain around here. You could try those, too.

That's a weight weenie no! That's a weight penalty!

Yeah, perhaps. It didn't look like the tread had an extra casing on it to me, though. It looked like the tread had been stripped-off of a clincher carcass and affixed to the Dugast casing with an adhesive. To be fair, I just rode them in circles around a parking lot and on a gravel verge, so that hardly qualifies as a 'test' (and the guy was riding them with 32 psi in them!), still, they were pretty cool.

Not to highjack this thread, but there is also a Racing Ralph tubular manufactured by Schwalbe itself. I don't know if it is commonly available and have never ridden it myself.

What was the weight of these "Racing Ralph" Dugast Tubulars?

No idea, they were not my wheels and were already glued-up when I saw them.

I found this french website with Dugast "Send-ins". It says you can send regular tires and they make you your own dugast tubular. There is also some custom stock tubular there already like Dugast Crossmark (Maxxis), Purgatorys (Specialized), and Cobras (Hutchinson)

The website is called Aerowheels. It's AerowheelsDOTfr

Tubularnator - Is your anti Tufo just an appearance thing?

They get really quite good reviews unlike the road tyres. It would be good when their 29ers are more easy to get a hold of.

It's not really an appearance thing, well sort of. I've heard good reviews of Tufo as I have heard bad ones. The thread looks really good but, I'm not into the regular black sidewall thing. I think it makes bikes look unique.

rhino xl

I'm still undecided. If I get Rhinos or Fast birds, could I use Tufo Tape or Glue only? Maybe even Stu Thorne's way?

Tape is fine, the only thing you need to worry about is that some tyre's might have weird coatings on the base tape that don't stick too well but you should generally be cleaning that up for normal gluing anyway. I don't think Dugasts ever have that problem

The Fast Bird looks to be a much better MTB tyre for my conditions so that's what I'd be picking. I'm a fan of extra width anyway but what you choose should suit you're riding conditions.

Do you think I should get a Rhino XL for the rear wheel and a Fast Bird for the front wheel?

My Fast Bird after 500Kms

Hollow to keep the weight!! I would ratter have more weight!



Really just for racing but at this pace....

Dugast Rhino is the best of them all but I would love to see them in 50mm.

Schwalbe was the worst that I´ve used due to that loose inside tube that when you have a flat theres liquid every where and the air passed from the tube to the tyre and I can tell you that the Tyre kept air all the time being impossible to remove the all air from the tyre!!

Tufo are great but petty that you cant repair them as Dugast, the answer that I got from Tufo them self is when you have a cut or a impossible to fix flat tyre with Stans or Caffelatex or even the normal Tufo Liquid is that you should use the Extrem liquid from Tufo but not all the valves are possible to let that liquid pass by so is kind of a Trash tyre and I had several so dugast have been the ones that roll better and preform but after starting to see this FastBird I think Dugast should make betetr quality tyres instead of just light tyres or Racing Only!

Why buy some tubs from a company that supplies their tubs with glue to stick them back together when the tread comes off?

I had FMB make me a pair of 29er tubs using Furious Fred treads. I don't remember the exact weight, but they were close to 600g each, in a 50mm width. I was unlucky- one punctured on my first ride. Not light, not puncture resistant, no grip, expensive, and no discernable improvement in ride quality over a tubeless set-up.

Don't get me wrong on FMB- their road and 'cross tubs are brilliant. The MTB ones just didn't work out for me. My very poor choice of tread didn't help.



I had just built a new bike and the clinchers I had on order were ages coming. Johnathon from Strada Wheels built me up a pair of tubulars at the last minute so that I could do the 24 Hours of Exposure. I received the wheels the morning of the race so had no option but to use tape. 4 hours into the race the rear tyre rolled off the rim. I managed to borrow a wheel and continued. 2 hours later the front rolled off the rim. Since there was no chance of finding a 29er Lefty wheel to borrow it was game over.

Tape doesn't work in mud.

I was using a pair of 47mm Rhinos (the widest that were available then) and before they rolled I was sliding around all over the place. I think they were just too narrow.

They were mounted on Major Tom rims, which was the widest tubular rim I could find on the market at that time. At anything less than about 40psi both the FMBs and the Rhinos squirmed horribly.

Since then I also picked up the Fast Birds. Compared to my Stans/240 clinchers the tubular wheelset is heavy though, so I've never used them. I doubt they could be any faster than the Schwalbe or Maxxis tubeless.

(OT- thanks to Adrien from Roues-RAR.fr for getting the clincher to me in time for the 24 Hours of Finale Ligure two weeks after the aborted 24H of Exposure!).