Anti-Puncture Tyres At-a-glance

But if those bastards let me down again, I'll join the hippy-against-Conti crusade for sure.

Not all Contis are the same - yes I know you know that :-)

I used a pair of Travel Contacts for a year with no punctures at all. I ride on compacted stone fire roads which are very tough on tyres as there are sharp flints. MTB race tyres used to puncture at least 2 times a month when I road MTB several years ago.

Somewhere else on the internet, this argument is also going on, but the focus is mainly on rolling resistance.

There's no free lunch with fast-rolling tyres. I believe those Halo tyres probably are good for puncture protection, but you've got to balance up your priorities I suppose.

Agreed, most highly puncture resistant tyres are slower rolling and definitely heavier so slower all round.
The price I am prepared to pay. I would love to use CX race tyres and sure my bike would feel much better and be faster but when adding the time of dealing with punctures every other road that time advantage is gone (and so is my happy ride)

I'm slow as it is, given that I just cycle around London I definitely take puncture protection over anything else.

Halo Courier Berlin on rear, Maxxis Refuse on front.. 0 problems.

Used to ride Specialized All Condition Pros, and I do like them, except the last one the sidewall split on me. The rubber just pealed away, however I can't remember how long I've had them (long time though), and had 0 punctures as well.

I'm slow as it is, given that I just cycle around London I definitely take puncture protection over anything else.

Halo Courier Berlin on rear, Maxxis Refuse on front.. 0 problems.

Used to ride Specialized All Condition Pros, and I do like them, except the last one the sidewall split on me. The rubber just pealed away, however I can't remember how long I've had them (long time though), and had 0 punctures as well.

Good combination, I might copy that.

As for the Specialized All Condition Pros, I used them and loved them. Without doubt the fastest tyres I've ever used. Good puncture protection also, for a racing/training tyre. But I did get tired of the punctures eventually, so changed for a while to Maxxis ReFuse. .

Under what reasoning does he have that the Halo won't get punctured through the same broken glass as the contis?

The Belin courier is quite thick so it would take a bigger piece of glass to punture the tube. Similar to Schwalbe's idea of a puncture resistant tyre - add 5mm of 'gel' between the tread and the carcass.

Hippy seems to be on a hate campaign so I don't trust his views on tyres.

Where do I send it?

DFP
1 Mythical Street
Fantasy Land
Dreamville
BUL 5H1T

lol

Now that I feel I've learned a bit more about the Continental Supersport Plus I've been using for the past month, I thought I'd give some preliminary feedback.

I initially punctured within 2 weeks of use, and almost wrote off that tyre's abilities completely. However, I thought again, and realised that the tyre may have been slightly under-inflated at the time, so I persevered. And I can honestly say that I've not been disappointed.

Unusually, the margin for optimum tyre pressure is quite narrow, and meant that I checked my tyres everyday. It needs to be between 110psi and 120psi. I know Ed says that 100psi is enough for anyone, but most people disagree with Ed, so thats ok. My view is that the relatively high tyre pressure required is due to the performance qualities of the hard-rubber beneath the tread. Too low a psi and the hard-rubber insert is too flexible, and would not resist sharp objects with the same ability as when made stiffer, by a higher tyre pressure.

I found the ride to be only reasonable. It felt a bit dead, but considering that we're talking about two different densities of rubber working together in the same tyre, then that should be expected. It tramlines a bit, but not at much as the Halo Courier Berlin. It corners well though, which is something the Halo Courier Berlin does weirdly, because of its high and narrow profile. The most interesting thing that I have found, it that the tyre comes alive at 122-124psi. Its ride improves greatly, and feels smooth and slick. Its almost a different tyre completely. In the past 2 weeks I've had no punctures, and covered maybe 260 miles (a tad more than usual for me). The last week has been good. At the higher than recommended tyre pressure, I've really enjoyed riding it. Wear also is good so far. I would certainly recommend this tyre over the Specialized All Condition Armadillo, and also the Maxxis ReFuse, but the ReFuse is much lighter, so its an individual call.

I'll do a full review after more weeks of torture testing.

this ^ is a really particular review there. well done!
i never thought that it should be mentioned to not run the tyre under 120psi and as i do exactly yhat, never had the to see the bad side of the supersport plus.

in a notion of experimenting, i went and got me a maxxis refuse. let me shred this one to pieces and i shall be back to jibber jabber about it.

... or not and have beers instead.

I should mention that I have normally run the Halo Courier Berlin tyres at a minimum of 120psi to a maximum of 130psi (this was preferred for me). The over-inflation didn't harm performance of those tyres, but enhanced them. I would use 130psi on the rear only. The front I would run at anything from 100psi (dropping to 80-90psi when I forgot to check), to 120psi. I find that the halo Courier Berlin performs very well when slightly over-inflated. However, it is an individual experience, and I'd only recommend this sort of inflation levels for the heavier rider. The sidewalls on the Courier Berlin tyres are massively strong. Though I did have a sidewall blowout, I believe that it was from damage I had caused by taking a corner through glass shards. For a very light person, the Courier Berlin could be ridden when losing air, and nearly flat. The sidewalls are that strong.

I find that the halo Courier Berlin performs very well when slightly over-inflated. However, it is an individual experience, and I'd only recommend this sort of inflation levels for the heavier rider.

That's usually the case, 120psi to you will feel like 90-100psi to me.

racist

Had the bead split from the tyre whilst riding this weekend (spec. armadillo) - then about 10cm of tyre came off the rim, gave me quite a shock

Care to tell us more? New or old tyre?

Turns out trying to whip skid all the way down to Brighton beach was to be the end of this 23c hardshell.... through a few layers of wire, still going but not sure for how long. I'll say this though, took a shed load more abuse than the last rando I ran, and if it hadn't been for some traffic lights changing would still be going fine.

I was wondering if you had any tyre left!

Hah.... rotated it now so hopefully get another couple of weeks out of it, but will be carrying a spare tyre on any longer runs.

Care to tell us more? New or old tyre?

Old tyre - can't comment on the age as it came with a bike but the tread was ok, hadn't planned on replacing it so soon.

Front wheel locked up, looked down to see tube bulging out the side jamming one of the brake pads. Thought the rim had failed at first but removed the tyre to see the rubber had sort of unfolded from the bead. So had to go round the corner to buy a very expensive tractor tyre.

Any ideas on the cause? It does sound like the tyre could have been damaged by the brake rubbing on it.

Any opinions on the Vittoria Rubino Pro 3 Tech folding? They're on offer at the moment on Ribble and I'm thinking of picking up a pair for my audax bike.

Now that I feel I've learned a bit more about the Continental Supersport Plus I've been using for the past month, I thought I'd give some preliminary feedback.

Could I be a right pain, and ask how you've finding them now, if you're still riding them?

And which inner tubes you're running under them? I'm currently considering a pair, and would like to know how they're behaving...

Not a pain at all. I've switched back to the Courier Berlins for the winter. But I found the Contis to be excellent, with one caveat, and that is the narrow recommended psi needs to be watched carefully. So check tyre pressure daily. The handling and allround behaviour is excellent. As stated earlier, I used it at approximately 125 psi, and only had one puncture from external sources. Other than than, it was pinch flats. So my fault for not keeping an eye on the psi.

"Check tyre pressure daily."

Lolz

It's a fucking tyre, not a nuclear reactor...

"Check tyre pressure daily."

Lolz

Of all the years that I have cycled, it is the ONLY tyre that was required for. I used to be a fulltime cycle courier back in the early nineties, so you do the math.