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@EdwardZ
I understand.. But these bicycles have only 2-wheels and need only 2 tyres.. with a selection of excellent tyres from all the best names (Dugast, FMB, Continental, Michelin, Veloflex, Vittoria, .....) I don't think tyre choice is a relevant paramter and if its a varaiable in the function it points to 650c rather than 650b. While there are very large numbers of ETRO 584 tyres on the market they are overwhelmingly not of the highest grade. I don't know single maker of open-tubulars in that size. For MTB its a fine size--- part of the shift from 26" to 29"--- but offroad is not road.
Even for touring.. 650c comes out better.. One might want a robust tyre but not a tyre with poor cornering, high rolling resistance on dry and poor traction on wet city roads. Here those heavy threads on the MTB tyres are counter-productive-- we can debatte how and if they make sense off-road but off-road != road.
What is my idea of a good clincher touring tyre? The Continental Grand-Prix 23-571. Its inexpensive, has a good proctection layer (woven Polyester "Poly-X") and fantastic rubber ("Black Chilie").
Does she really want to have wide tyres? In designing a frame for 650b and big wide tyres with noppies one is going to get pretty darn close to designing a frame for 700c with usual tight clearances. The point, I think, of this exercise was to design a frame for a small rider. 571mm (650c) versus 584mm (650b) and average 23mm width "slicks" versus wide threads is a big difference in size! The popular 38-584 demands at least as much frame space as a narrow 700c (19-622) tyre.