Is Road Hookless dangerous?

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FlatlandClimber
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by FlatlandClimber

I have now gone through what feels like the 1000 posts of someone reporting of having had a crash or seen someone crash "because of hookless".
"It's not save at road pressures", "manufacturers just do it to save costs", "it's an easy way of saving weight without actually doing R&D".
With all that talk of the evil cycling industry to the side, my honest question remains:
Is hookless for road dangerous?
I have ridden a lot of road hookless and never had an issue, but that doesn't mean anything. I have heard many horror stories, most of which were anecdotal at best.
The ETRTO norm gave me a lot of confidence in hookless, but after just having crashed hard (had nothing to do with tires), I want to avoid going down again, if it was as easy as just buying hooked rims.

- Do tires really blow off hookless rims when abiding by the 72psi Max pressure?
If so, why?
Does a tubeless tire insert help that at all?

Looking forward to hearing your opinion and in a best case: independent research on the topic.
Last edited by FlatlandClimber on Thu Jul 21, 2022 8:28 am, edited 1 time in total.
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spdntrxi
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by spdntrxi

its safe.. tires can come off any rim during blowouts
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FlatlandClimber
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by FlatlandClimber

People make it sound like the likelihood of the tire blowing off would be significantly higher. I just don't know if it's true...
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kode54
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by kode54

My tire pressures never get close to 72psi. I’m usually at around 38-40 psi
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rollinslow
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by rollinslow

Hookless was done solely to reduce manufacturing complexity and reduce cost. It has no benefit to the consumer. The arguement that it may improve aerodynamics is trivial. On a hooked rim, the concern of a blow-off due to pressure or cornerning is essentially non-existent. This is a differnt circumstance than a flat tire. I personally would not bother with hookless as I don't want to take any additional unnecessary risks. It also bothers me that companies charge the same or more for their new hookless version when the manufacturing cost is now significantly lower. The risk of your tire blowing off the rim is very real, and real enough that each manufacturer is careful to spell-out what is allowed on their wheel. Something to think about is whether in 5 years, they will even make your wheel and the tire approved for it.
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FlatlandClimber
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by FlatlandClimber

kode54 wrote:
Tue Jul 19, 2022 8:56 pm
My tire pressures never get close to 72psi. I’m usually at around 38-40 psi
Either your tires are really wide or you are mega light!
Cervelo P5 Disc (2021) 9.1kg
Factor Ostro Gravel (2023) 8.0kg
S-Works SL8 (2023) 6.3kg

*weights are race ready, size 58/L.
Sold: Venge, S5 Disc, Roubaix Team, Open WI.DE, Émonda, Shiv TT, Crux, Aethos, SL7

FlatlandClimber
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by FlatlandClimber

@rollingslow:
You say the risk of tires blowing off is very real - my question is: really?
I mean when adhering to pressure, System weight and compatibility, is this really a risk?
Cervelo P5 Disc (2021) 9.1kg
Factor Ostro Gravel (2023) 8.0kg
S-Works SL8 (2023) 6.3kg

*weights are race ready, size 58/L.
Sold: Venge, S5 Disc, Roubaix Team, Open WI.DE, Émonda, Shiv TT, Crux, Aethos, SL7

TLN
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by TLN

FlatlandClimber wrote:
Tue Jul 19, 2022 9:36 pm
@rollingslow:
You say the risk of tires blowing off is very real - my question is: really?
I mean when adhering to pressure, System weight and compatibility, is this really a risk?
If everything is compatible, but due to system weight/rim width/etc it tells me to run close to max possible pressure = yes, of course it adds some risk.
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TobinHatesYou
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by TobinHatesYou

Number 1 tubeless superfan and hookless is pointless to me. There are races where I want narrow tires and high psi.

spdntrxi
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by spdntrxi

for example new enve 6.7 max psi is now what...90. I'm usually at 60-65.. Miles away.
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poulhansen
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by poulhansen

rollinslow wrote:
Tue Jul 19, 2022 9:01 pm
Hookless was done solely to reduce manufacturing complexity and reduce cost. It has no benefit to the consumer. The arguement that it may improve aerodynamics is trivial. On a hooked rim, the concern of a blow-off due to pressure or cornerning is essentially non-existent. This is a differnt circumstance than a flat tire. I personally would not bother with hookless as I don't want to take any additional unnecessary risks. It also bothers me that companies charge the same or more for their new hookless version when the manufacturing cost is now significantly lower. The risk of your tire blowing off the rim is very real, and real enough that each manufacturer is careful to spell-out what is allowed on their wheel. Something to think about is whether in 5 years, they will even make your wheel and the tire approved for it.
Totally correct. The risk lies in the compatibility. You MUST use a tyre that is allowed by the rim manufacturer, so why make your tyre choice so much smaller and difficult to ascertain when you don't get any benefits from the hookless?
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robertbb
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by robertbb

rollinslow wrote:
Tue Jul 19, 2022 9:01 pm
Hookless was done solely to reduce manufacturing complexity and reduce cost. It has no benefit to the consumer. The arguement that it may improve aerodynamics is trivial. On a hooked rim, the concern of a blow-off due to pressure or cornerning is essentially non-existent. This is a differnt circumstance than a flat tire. I personally would not bother with hookless as I don't want to take any additional unnecessary risks. It also bothers me that companies charge the same or more for their new hookless version when the manufacturing cost is now significantly lower. The risk of your tire blowing off the rim is very real, and real enough that each manufacturer is careful to spell-out what is allowed on their wheel. Something to think about is whether in 5 years, they will even make your wheel and the tire approved for it.
They also charge more for electronic groupsets, when the manufacturing cost is significantly reduced..... especially at the shifters!

There'd be blood in the streets if people knew what this electronic stuff costs them to produce, versus what they charge.

Hexsense
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by Hexsense

Then there's also risk of sharp beat hook cutting cotton tires.
Veloflex brought this problem to the light. And it also occur on other brands as well.
But
That's not a hard problem to fix. Reinforce tire near the bead hook area and round the bead hook to not be so sharp. That's all it need to fix.

I like hookless for MTB and gravel. The wide, blunt hookless edge reduce the chance of getting pinch flat on tubeless tire casing. The same benefit can also apply to road wheel. But something have to go very wrong on my tire pressure, tire choice and line choice if I pinch road tubeless tire sidewall between road and the bead hook hard enough to cut the tire. So, it's not enough of a relevant benefit to go for road hookless wheel, especially considering the limitations.

apr46
Posts: 253
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by apr46

Not a fan of road hookless. We just arent there yet and too many people will be too close to the max PSI in their use.

If the stability of the beads are ideal, the hooks plays no role in preventing a blowoff as its the bead flange that bears the load on an inflated tire on all wheels. Some brands spend a lot of time talking about this. However, the stability of the beads are far from ideal and is the reason why hookless has 70psi restrictions. Hooked rims can be used at significantly higher PSIs because the hooks increase the stability of the bead. The other hookless applications like motorcycles and automotive all run lower PSIs where this isnt an issue. Road bikes are literally one of the most aggressive use cases for hookless wheels.

Furthermore, most people rely on specially trained technicians to seat their motor vehicle tires whereas checking for bead wear and bead condition is still new for most bike shops and cyclists. I expect this to change over time and it will make using road hookless safer.

Most people are probably well within the parameters of safe use for hookless, but are loosing a significant safety margin against damaged or otherwise less than ideally stable beads. Why take that risk for small fractions of a watt?

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warthog101
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by warthog101

rollinslow wrote:Hookless was done solely to reduce manufacturing complexity and reduce cost. It has no benefit to the consumer. The arguement that it may improve aerodynamics is trivial. On a hooked rim, the concern of a blow-off due to pressure or cornerning is essentially non-existent. This is a differnt circumstance than a flat tire. I personally would not bother with hookless as I don't want to take any additional unnecessary risks. It also bothers me that companies charge the same or more for their new hookless version when the manufacturing cost is now significantly lower. The risk of your tire blowing off the rim is very real, and real enough that each manufacturer is careful to spell-out what is allowed on their wheel. Something to think about is whether in 5 years, they will even make your wheel and the tire approved for it.
There are threads on here where the hooked part of the carbon rim has torn the tyre.
It has never happened to me though.
I have hooked and hookless. There is now an ETRTO standard for rims and tyres.
Rims and tyres are manufactured to comply with it and it is pretty bloody easy to ensure the tyre is compliant with the rim if they are both engineered to comply with the standard.
It removes any concern I have about tyre availability for my wheels going forward.
I have some WR50s that are 25mm int and 32ext hookless. Pretty wide.
A 28mm on the front at 60psi and a 32mm on the back at the same pressure is verging on too hard even at my current winter weight of 80kg.

Zero concerns about pressure, tyres blowing off the rim, or future tyre availability.
They also have a stronger rims due to them not having the complexity of a hook to lay up with the carbon.

Cycling is a very conservative sport/hobby it appears.
There appears a level of concern every time something changes.
Carbon frames.
Carbon wheels.
Disc brakes. Image
Hookless rims as per nearly every other pneumatic tyre application.


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