i have trouble with ideal pressure on a 48. usually too firm for off-road or too squishy for on road. i haven’t found the mixed terrain around here yet though so i’ve mostly just been riding the 700x32 bike
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I feel that. I actually took apart my 650b wheels to use the son/DT combo for wiggle bike.
I’m going to build a set of new 650b wheels for the coffee grinder soon, but probably without a dynamo for use on spirited summer underbiking excursions.
Not an experiment I can run again since they’re no longer in my stash, but I think the Horizons rode better with tubes while I was being lazy about milking them that first time.
Still haven’t yet put enough miles on the Ramparts yet to form an opinion, but they’re on the new basketbiek now, so expectations will probably be lower than on the day ruiner.
tbh the super heavy grandonneur blue labels were kinda great. not the fastest but they worked at any pressure. supportive without being too turdly
New sticker buy?
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Good to know for future dithering options.
I’d be happy if Schwalbe offered Big Apples in a 650b x 2.0" sizeway, even if not tubeless.
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I found 48 reens to be too squirmy at my weight unless I put enough pressure in to negate any advantage over a narrower tire. A stiffer casing 48-52mm 650b tire is awesome for underbiking a drop bar bike though.
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what’s your weight? i feel like for me it’s maybe like i’m trying to make the wrong in a suspension setup. air has to be too low to handle well. i want to try stiff sidewall supple tread, no puncture protection anywhere in it
The babyshoes? Eh, they’re ok. If I could buy them at Pari-Moto prices they’d be fine as a slower paced tire (as long as I kept them inflated enough so the bicycle wouldn’t try to slither sideways as I pedal.)
never tried reens in that size but i’ve had better luck finding a sweet spot with 42s than 48s
~220lbs
They felt okay at higher pressures but not any better than a narrower tire. At lower pressures, they cornered weird and just generally felt vague and squirmy. I can’t remember exact pressures but I doubt I ever went under 30psi.
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interesting. i kinda thought that maybe if one was heavier they could find a better sweet spot. some theory about starting at a higher pressure making it “ramp up” better as loads/forces are applied. maybe i have it backwards and i maybe definitely don’t know much about how suspension actually works at a theory level
My buddy runs Runny Arse knobblies in 650b and 700 and they roll really well on the road, but are pretty shit off-road.
That recent link that I think it was Heath shared said that roll-down tests were arse anyway, I forget for what reason, I always thought that would be a good test.
In some sense, Jan is right, wider tires are faster. That is, for a given pressure, a wider tire has less rolling resistance than a narrower tire. In many other senses, they are not faster. I.e. in actual use. Folks tend to run wider tires at lower pressures because they can and they’re more comfortable that way and maybe offer a bigger contact patch and more traction.
Regardless, he’s still wrong. Otherwise, why the fuck do pros still run 30mm tires at Paris-Roubaix?
It’s because they are sponsored by “Small Tire”
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I feel like Schwalbe doesn’t get much love here since people moved on from Thunder Butts but I maintain that they know how to make Big Tires
(except for those first non-tubeless Big Ones, I got a flat on my first and only ride with those lol)
People have moved on from Thunder Butts? What’s a better knobbly tire for 650b underbiking setup?
I’m curious how much casing weight muddies the waters in a roll down test too. He’s also ignoring aerodynamics. Tire aerodynamics are certainly less important than rolling resistance when looked at in a vacuum. If we’re comparing 30mm Paris Roubaix tires to 42/48 underbiking tires there’s a penalty that’s likely not to be scoffed at.
There’s also the fact that most of these gains/losses make increasingly more difference the faster you go.
If you’re tootin along at 20kph it’s ¯_(ツ)_/¯
At 40kph it’s the difference between pulling through and getting dropped.
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I also really love the contradiction between harping on tire efficiency and aggressively ignoring any areas for aerodynamic improvements.
That being said there are some rides where I’ll take having to push harder on the pavement to hang because a 650x48 is just plain faster on the rougher gravel segments. But these are definitely specific rides and conditions and there are other mixed surface routes I would never run a tire over 36 because it’s absolutely slower over the course of the ride.
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This was always my thought with riding a 30mm tire at bwr san diego. ~100mi of road vs 40mi of off-road. Having a tire that was faster on the road was going to make the ride much faster than the few minutes I might save riding a bigger tire for the relatively tame gravel in socal.
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