tubeless wheels.

A MTB riding buddy stopped using Cafelatex after it completely failed to seal a hole in his tubeless setup a couple of times. He has since changed to Stans and experienced no issues.
I use Continental for my tubeless setup.

2 weeks ago I was replacing the sealant in my 29er wheels, they had not been used for almost 2 years. I noticed on the bottle of Stans sealant it suggests the sealant is replaced every 3 months.

Commuto x bike was last used on Wednesday in torrential rain. Today I pumped up the tyres and left the house, by the end of the road I was hearing a tchuk tchuk noise I stopped to discover sealant spurting out of the rear tyre, the noise had been it hitting the mudguard once a revolution. Was in a hurry so walked the bike home, by which point the tyre was flat and all the sealant had leaked out. So I just refilled the tyre with sealant, span it round and pumped it up. It held and I rushed off, was now running a little late for work.

1 mile from my destination and I kept hearing a tschh tschh noise, and with each revolution of my front wheel there was a cloud of sealant spraying out. Clearly the front and rear tyres sealant had lost efficacy on the same day.

The air loss was slow enough that I could make it to where I was going and then remove the wheel. Not having more sealant I had to remove the valve and install a tyre. This was actually really easy. However I did spot about 25 bits of flint in the tyre and had to remove all of them before putting the tube in, in case any of the bits of flint was likely to puncture the inner tube. I have a feeling if I had been using inner tubes I'd have had a hell of a lot more punctures by now. 4.5 months on a bike that does on average about 120-150 miles a week with no punctures is pretty good. However I don think I ought to put a reminder in my diary once every four months to replace sealant in all my bikes that are tubeless.

The front tubeless tyre on one road bike i have has punctured. It lost sealant and dropped to 40 pis or so. I have tried pumping up but it looses air until the pressure drops only when riding though. So it is still rideable and I have ridden it a few times like this. Must patch the tyre. That the thing about tubeless I have only once properly flatted with a sidewall puncture.

I find zefal sealant works very well.

How old is the sealant? With fresh Stans mine are sealing at 90 psi.

Anyone tried running a H plus son tb14 tubeless?

I have them and some conti mountain king 32c on the cross bike and love everything about how they ride at 30-40 psi apart from the 3 pinch flats* I got on one ride.

*totally my fault for pushing it too far but it'd be nice not to have to worry so much about it next time.

I tried with no success with Archetypes. I wouldn't bother, if you're landing hard enough to double puncture you're probably going to be burping air out of a tubeless setup, or worse, damaging your rims.

I've setup some tubeless-compatible A23s tubeless with non-tubeless specific tyres and have lost air hitting off-camber corners. I'd say the only way to go, with regards to cross, is tubeless specific everything, and even then it won't be as good as tubs (not that they're any good if you puncture).

Bigger tyres would be my first move.

^ this

Seems sensible, can't really see myself pinchflatting in a race anyway. Tubeless is something I've just been keep to try for a while anyway, will be doing it on the 29er anyway.

had been away for the weekend, and when i got back i checked the commuto x bike in preparation for work today and the rear tyre was squidgy. pumped it up to discover a 5mm cut in the side wall and sealant was not able to block it. took tyre off and put on a spare tyre and inner tube for today.

will probably clean up the tubless tyre and put a patch on the inside of it and see how that goes instead.

I've gone through 2 tyres since starting to run tubeless in the back of my mtb - only running it on the rear as the Knard I have on the front didn't want to seat when it was new and I've just never gotten round to trying again.

Both tyres have suffered holes too large to seal due to pinches.

My current rear tyre needs replacing as it's getting quite worn but I've been putting it off and off as fitting a new tyre also mean getting bogging with the old sealant and buying/fitting new stuff.

Wondering if I'm really really seeing any benefit from running tubeless.

Tubless mtb was totally worth it for me.

29er used to get fairly regular punctures, when i went to stans rims and tubeless without even using tubeless specific tyres I have only had one puncture that did not seal properly, and that was due to the sealant having nearly dried up (even that was only a slow puncture and I did not need to put a tube in to get home) other huge benefit was lower pressures and more grip

road tubeless is slightly less successful but still better than puncture resistant tyres and their shit handling

Have not punctured on my mountain bike running tubeless since setting it up in the spring, even with cheap tyres converted. Managed to rip a knob off on my cross bike a month ago, then had problems removing the valve (which I had to tighten with pliers in order to get it to seal properly). Fortunately I'd punctured directly opposite a farmhouse with a well-stocked tool shed.

Some interesting words from Dan Timmerman, racing for the Stans cross team this year, here. They're not using tubeless specific tyres, so perhaps my earlier thoughts about the necessity of tubeless specific rims and tyres was not correct. I suspect it's down to finding a good combination. The Racing Ralphs I was using, and burped, are probably a bit too lightweight. I may have damaged the bead when I put too much air in them and blew them off the rim too.

You don't need tubeless specific CX rubber.

However the TS stuff - certainly from Schwalbe- is much more robust and can withstand the kind of skill deficit obstacle clattering that will kill a non TS tyre by ripping and pinching its sidewalls.

has anyone tried oko magic milk sealant?

i have been told the schwalbe sealant is just rebranded Stans

Tighter bead as well? Schwalbe's normal tyres can be fitted with very little persuasion.

Possibly - schwalbes stuff doesn't seem any tougher than the normal rubber I've used, but I've got some vittoria TS xgs that look like they will need an almighty scrap to get on an Iron cross rim.

i have been told the schwalbe sealant is just rebranded Stans

Yep - the Schwalbe site confirms it's made for them by Stan's.

@IR I raced today with a few people using Archetypes tubeless (I didn't really notice which tyres).

I think my wired Rocket Rons on Open Pro might work ghetto tubeless? Sidewalls are thin but the bead is very rigid and tight with 30psi. Anyone here converted open pros?

Converting road rims to ghetto CX tubeless is great if you have a couple of hours and maybe a race to throw away

what about their tyre mounting solution, whose washing up liquid is it?

Not sure i understand. I could spare a couple hours, not during a race though ;-)

They take some testing?

The Racing Ralphs I was using, and burped, are probably a bit too lightweight.

Were these the tubeless ready Racing Ralphs (i.e. Evolution "TL Easy")? Or were they another varient?

I ask because I have a bike with "Performance" Racing Ralphs that I wouldn't mind trying to run tubeless.

They'll be fine if they have tubeless written on them somewhere.

If they are MTB tyres they'll be fine no matter what is written on them.

Awesome, thanks. I have the Evo tyres but my girlfriend has the Performance ones. I'd like to convert both mtbs together.