To go tubeless or stay tubed.

[Feanor]

One day I am going to harvest the valve cores from the mound of inner tubes that I never summoned up the enthusiasm to patch. One day.

I've done that for a while now.

Mostly because someone at this address is rather clumsy when removing the pump head from the valve after giving it a top-up.
Rather than carefully and briskly pulling the pump head off the valve in a straight line in the axis of the valve, they seem to just randomly yank at it in any which direction till it comes off.
This results in the little internal threaded bit becoming bent and snapping off in short order.
Again.

So I have a bag o' spare valve cores for this case.

[Hot Flatus]

I did harvest the valves.

Now I have a mound of patched, de-cored tubes that just stare at me reminding me what an environmental horror show I am.

One day I'll remember building sites. Any building site. And just fuck them all into the bin without a single thought.

[sojournermike]

Think HF summed most of it up. I’ve got a pair of Pacenti SL25 rims on my Audax bike. I think they’re 20mm internal (between the hooks) so tape between 23 and 25mm will be fine. I’m using this - https://www.vikingtapes.co.uk/collections/3m-polyester-tapes-flash-tapes/products/3m-8992-polyester-tape-50mm-x-66m?variant=32868785520703 in 24mm wide at the moment. You need to select the right width to avoid the eye watering price! I prefer it to the Tesa, but both work fine. The Tesa does have better initial stick, which probably makes it easier. In both cases keep the tape tight when wrapping your wheel and probably do two layers.

Tyres - Hutchinson Fusion 5 11Storm All Season sound like your sort of thing and should go up with a track pump on SL25s. There are also lighter Performance and very light Galaktic versions. If you want a bit wider then WTB Exposure come up between 30 and 32mm wide on SL25s and ride nicely, but they are a bit harder to set up than the Hutchinson and mine went flat overnight a few times before settling down. Continue GP5000 are also good, but they are usually still expensive.

Buy a few spare presta valve cores and you’ll likely get given a couple of keys.

Orange Seal Endurance is probably still too dog. I’m currently using Oko High Fibre, but haven’t anything to say about it yet. Buy a litre so you can top up. Some sort of injector so you can fill/top up through the valve stem - I’ve got a Stans version, plus a couple of big syringes from other uses.

Don’t let the sealant dry out - it’s easy enough to check by taking out the valve core and poking a small Allen key down into the pool like a dipstick. If you do let it dry out and then go for a ride that includes a descent of Greenhow Hill it can be a tad unnerving.

If you’re near Harrogate I’ll happily tape your rims for you and help you get set up, or ask here of course.

Mike

[bobb]

Cheers! Some top info there ^

[Hot Flatus]

d very light Galaktic versions.

They have an incredible feel but mine punctured beyond sealing on the second outing and I took them off. They do not have any sort of puncture protection in them at all.

[sojournermike]

d very light Galaktic versions.

They have an incredible feel but mine punctured beyond sealing on the second outing and I took them off. They do not have any sort of puncture protection in them at all.

I’ve got a pair of Corsa Speed tale if you’d like to try them;)

[zigzag]

some (mostly) good advice here, i've been using tubeless since 2016, no puncture so far that wouldn't seal. tape needs to ride up the walls a bit and be very tight with no wrinkles and air bubbles ideally - it's probably the hardest part of set up process. sealant should not be in touch with a rim. tyres all went on with a track pump, usually some energetic pumping required for the first twenty strokes. valve hole ideally cut with a craft knife, tiny bit smaller than a valve stem (to prevent splits and air loss). have enough sealant in the tyres, i use 60ml in each 25mm tyre. i don't carry spare inner tubes with me (only did on pbp, just in case, as it was an "important" ride), just a 30ml of extra sealant and tyre plugs/tool. probably around 40,000km without sudden deflations, what's not to like*

* well, there is some additional faff with them, but benefits outweigh drawbacks

[chrisbainbridge]

I would only add to warm up the tyre before using. Unfold it and sit it in the airing cupboard or over a radiators for a couple of hours. Makes mounting a lot easier.

[sojournermike]

An alternative to cutting the valve hole with a craft knife is to poke a small hole with a needle or even the tip of the valve and then to push the valve through. Don’t use a knife to cut a slot or a cross as that is more likely to lead to splits and leaks.

[Hot Flatus]

An alternative to cutting the valve hole with a craft knife is to poke a small hole with a needle or even the tip of the valve and then to push the valve through. Don’t use a knife to cut a slot or a cross as that is more likely to lead to splits and leaks.

+1 to this

I use a brawdle, then just push the valve through carefully.  You really dont want to be making any sort of lateral cut as you then have the possibility of enlarging it if the valve wiggles a bit when pumping.

Also, despite what somebody says upthread you DO NOT want your tape running up the inside of the rim wall. You want it edge-to-edge, so measure the width of your rims and add 1-2mm to account for the well in the rim bed.*

* see tubeless manufacturers instructions, such as Stans  https://www.notubes.com/support-center/faq

[Lightning Phil]

I’ll add that when initially seating don’t bother with the sealant. Add that after an initial seating. Either by popping a suitable amount of bead or through the valve for the sealant.

[Davef]

I would only add to warm up the tyre before using. Unfold it and sit it in the airing cupboard or over a radiators for a couple of hours. Makes mounting a lot easier.

I tried this and got very hot and claustrophobic in the airing cupboard. Ok makes more sense now without skipping the “it”

[TimC]

For those a bit worried about going tubeless, Vittorio have recently come out with a foam insert for tyres ('Airliner' - no prizes for guessing why I like it!) which allows safe run-flat riding for a limited period. Yes, this has been done before, but this doesn't fill the entire air chamber, doesn't weigh much, is compatible with sealant fluid (with a couple of minor caveats), and doesn't make the bike feel different. It's about £50 for a set. GCN ran a video about it recently.

[yoav]

I got the impression that these inserts were really meant for racing. If you got a puncture in your tubeless tyre that didn’t seal when out on a ride and you had to put a tube in then the inserts would have to come out first and you would need to somehow get them home as they’re too expensive to simply throw away.

[Hot Flatus]

Speculating here, but I would be surprised if a product intended purely for racing would be a worth it because the market is tiny. Yes, Vittoria make some tyres that are used only by racers, but they already have the tooling to make them. This is a standalone product. 

But on the other side I can't really see a purpose for this product other than pro racing as the rest of us tend to stop and deal with tubeless punctures that dont seal.

[TimC]

The point of the inserts is that you don't have to stop; you can deal with the puncture when you get home.

[Hot Flatus]

Yes I get that, but you'd still end up with a really soft tyred ride home. Most of the time I don't stop because the tyre sorts itself out quickly, but if it doesn't then I do stop preciisely because I don't want a soft tyred ride home. Anyway, we'll see what happens with take up. Just saying that I don't think I will be an early adopter of these. I'll let you buy some and report back 

[LittleWheelsandBig]

I think velomobiles and possibly tandems might use them on at least one wheel. Tadpole trikes lose directional stability with a rear wheel flat and it is not unknown for velomobiles to roll over after a high speed rear wheel flat. A sudden front flat on a descending tandem is marginal to ride to a stop without crashing (don’t fancy my chances of being able to ride an >80km/h tandem without a front tyre to a stop again). Both are tiny markets but relatively price insensitive.

[TimC]

Yes I get that, but you'd still end up with a really soft tyred ride home. Most of the time I don't stop because the tyre sorts itself out quickly, but if it doesn't then I do stop preciisely because I don't want a soft tyred ride home. Anyway, we'll see what happens with take up. Just saying that I don't think I will be an early adopter of these. I'll let you buy some and report back 

No, I won't be buying any. Touch wood, I've suffered only one puncture in the last 5 years. I own 9 bikes, and regularly use most of them (even if I don't actually go very far) so the investment would be a significant proportion of N+1!

[MartinC]

Most of the market for expensive bikes is driven by racing and getting people to buy a new bike every year.  If you get the pros to ride something then you've got a big market with those who aspire to emulate them or think that what's good for racing must be god (that was a typo but on reflection I'll leave it) for all.  I'm sure the Vittoria insert will follow the same route.  It fulfils 2 functions, it gets round the problem the manufacturers/sponsors have created in making wheel changes in races virtually impossible and also makes tubeless tyres a more attractive proposition for pro teams.  Go back to sentence 2 and start again.

There's a long discussion possible about the cultural aspects of bike technology but at the moment it brings to mind the old Burl Ives song about the woman who swallowed a fly.

Verschlimmbessern.

[Hot Flatus]

It has long been this way.  Think about how and why the quick-release and the parallegram derailleur were invented; technology which I'm sure you use. Ditto STI levers.  Tubeless tyres are an example where this isn't the case.

[Cudzoziemiec]

Disc brakes are another example where the road pros end up with something already being adopted in other areas of cycling.

[TimC]

The Airliner thing was developed originally for MTB riding, and has only just been adapted to road tyres. It'll be interesting to see if it catches on in the pro peloton, but tbh I don't think that's where it's aimed.

[MartinC]

It has long been this way.  Think about how and why the quick-release and the parallegram derailleur were invented; technology which I'm sure you use. Ditto STI levers.  Tubeless tyres are an example where this isn't the case.

I disagree.  It's become a far more marked phenomenon since the demise of utility cycling in USA/UK.  There's also a distinction between beneficial technology that trickles down from racing and that which is given to racing largely for the purpose of marketing to the general public.  Slant Parallelogram mechs became useful with indexed gearing and wide ratio cassettes - there were many drivers for this, and they've been uninvented now that it's "necessary" to shift the market to 1x transmissions.  STI's (and the necessary indexing) have created such a mish mash of conflicting transmission and braking standards that if you're not in the business of changing your bike every 2 years you need to be an expert to keep it running.

It's interesting to watch (and maybe for you to think about) the way companies like Microshift, Sunrace and Dia Compe are generating a market in more down to earth componentry as Shimano and SRAM more heavily invest themselves in the fashionable end and vacate the more prosaic market (as Campag did years ago).  Electric bikes are the biggest growing market and it cuts right across race led marketing.

[Hot Flatus]

x1 Road is dead, because pro racing (Team Aqua) so I'm not sure where that leaves either of us.

I can't remember when utility cycling was a thing, certainly not since the 70s and I suggest car ownership has largely killed it outside of a resurgence in a few cities.  Equally when you look at the market share of companies like Suntour, Microshift etc it is microscopic in relation to Shimano. So if you are thinking in terms of 40 years, then yes I agree.

In my time cycling (40 years) I'm struggling to think of a mainstream technology that didn't come via racing (clip less, pedals, STI, electronic gears) Ht2 and aheadset came from MTB.

I'm sure you are quite correct to talk about electric bikes as the future, and with environmental factors starting to bite these will only accelerate.