Can I permanently run tubeless tyres with inner tubes and new tyre recommendations?

[John_S]

Hi All, my general question is can you use tyres sold as being tubeless tyres with inner tubes in them? I'm assuming that the answer is yes because in the case of a bad enough puncture that the sealant in a tubeless tyre doesn't seal you may have to fit an inner tube as a get you home measure. However is it a bad idea to start off on the basis of fitting an inner tube into a tubeless tyre with no intention of using the tyre in a tubeless including sealant state?

The reason for asking is that the original stock tyres that came with my bike are now fairly worn and so I'm looking at replacing them. I have a 2016 Kona Roadhouse ( http://2016.konaworld.com/roadhouse.cfm ) and it came with Schwalbe S-One RaceGuard 700x30c tyres on the Novatech Road 30 Disc wheels ( https://road.cc/content/review/172395-novatec-30-alu-clincher-wheelset ). Re: the original tyres I wonder if these were an OEM version as opposed to the after market version sold.

The original tyres had inner tubes in and I'm perfectly fine with that. At this point I'll probably sound like a complete luddite but in more than 30 years cycling I've always had tyres with inner tubes in and so I'm familiar with this set up and I don't yet feel the need to switch to a tubeless set up.

Now I've been perfectly happy with the original tyres and I've found them easy to get on and off the rim when I've needed to so I thought that I'd just replace like with like. However whilst I won't rule out new Schwalbe tyres they are quite expensive so I'm also considering different options.

My main riding style is on road commuting with some occasional longer weekend rides and audax. Whether it's my commute or longer rides I ride mainly on quiet rural roads that are often single lanes wide and are sometimes so quiet there is grass up the middle of the road. These roads are often poorly surfaced and are mainly a chip & seal surface often featuring lots of loose gravel or stones, especially on bends, as well as frequent potholes along with a decent helping of mud dragged onto the roads by farm machinery from the fields. I also occasionally use the odd bridal path, unpaved road etc. but it's not very often.

I don't have any desire for tyres that are any narrower than the current 30mm width tyres. I'm considering the following tyres but all are marketed as tubeless tyres and I wonder if I'm going to run into any problems if I run any of these tyres with inner tubes in?

Schwalbe G-One Speed (30-622 (28 x 1.20, 700x30C)) ( https://www.schwalbe.com/en/road-reader/schwalbe-g-one-speed.html )
RRP £64.99
I gather that these are the replacement for the previous 2016 year S-One tyres and they look like they have exactly the same tread pattern as my existing tyres.

I also quite like the look of the following two options with the tan wall sides but I appreciate that this is a purely aesthetic thing but I wouldn't mind some tyres with tan side walls.

WTB Exposure 30 (700x30c) ( https://www.wtb.com/collections/road/products/exposure )
RRP £49.99

Panaracer GravelKing ( 32-622 / 700×32C ) ( https://www.panaracer.com/lineup/gravel.html )
RRP £39.99


Thanks for any thoughts as to whether I can use the above tyres with inner tubes without encountering any problems.

Likewise if anybody has alternative suggestions for tyres that I should consider for purchase I'm open to suggestions.

Than you,

John

[Scunnered]

I have run tubeless tyres both with and without inner tubes, on tubeless compatible rims. They work just fine with tubes.
I have not run them on conventional rims, but there is no obvious reason why that should not work when tubes are used.
The tyres in question are Specialized Roubaix Pro which can be found for under £30
https://www.sigmasports.com/item/Specialized/Roubaix-Pro-2Bliss-Ready-Clincher-Tyre-Tubeless/GHMB
They measure at least 32mm wide (on 19mm internal rims), I like them for poor roads and light off-road on a gravel bike

[Brucey]

not all tubeless tyres are made the same way and don't all fit the same way either.

If you plan to run tubes all the time IMHO it is best to buy a tyre that isn't tubeless; a tubeless tyre may well have extra rubber in the sidewall and the net result is usually a slightly worse tyre overall; a bit like having two tubes in a standard tyre.

cheers

[John_S]

Hi Scunnered,

Thanks for your message and for the alternative tyre recommendation which I will look at.

Hi Brucey,

Thanks for your message and I will try to look for tyres which are made to take tubes.

However the frustrating thing with this is that when reading he manufacturers websites I find them fairly confusing and I can't easily tell whether the tyres are meant to be run with tubes or tubeless.

Take for example the Schwalbe G-One Speed and the website mentions that the tyres have "Tubeless Easy technology" but then when you expand the details of the 30-622 (28 x 1.20, 700x30C) tyre it also states "Tube: 17, 18" but this reference is not a clickable link and so I'm not sure whether this tyre is just meant to be tubeless or not.

Then when I look at the Panaracer website the GravelKing tyre in the sizes of 700x23c, 700x26c and 700x28c is clearly marked as a tubed tyre but I don't want a tyre that narrow. Then the 700x32c, 700x35c and 700x38c versions of the GravelKing are labelled as "Tubeless Compatible" so does this mean that they're designed to used in both tubed and tubeless states?

With the WTB exposure 30 reading it I think that it seems to suggest that it's tubeless only but again I'm not entirely clear on that.

I wish that the manufacturers could do something like just put a box marked "tubed" and "tubeless" on their websites with the specifications of their tyres and tick the box that applies and tick both boxes in the case that the tyres are designed for either application.

Also I could be completely wrong with this feeling because it's not based on a load of research or data gathering on all tyres but it seems like an increasing number of manufacturers tyres in sizes of 30mm + are marked as tubeless tyres.

Thanks.

John

[The utility cyclist]

I'm currently on my last of my old stock of Specialized Armadillo Pro 32mm folding tyres, they've been brilliant for all conditions and like most of us like to have tyres in hand rather than buying on the fly. So I bought some Jack Browns when they were £15 at PX, so far seem to be just fine for all sorts of road conditions, a bit slower than the 28mm Giant folders and a bit slower again than my Panaracer Evo 28s but not bad at all.
In fact the Panaracer's come up at a measured 31mm on a H+Son TB14 rim. A bit wider than I would normally want for a fast winter/audax/do it all but it is what it is and I like th tyre.

There are a few different versions of the Jack Browns but this is the 'green' version
https://www.planetx.co.uk/i/q/TYPAJBG/j ... lding-tyre

Personally I would avoid tubeless tyres completely if you are not going to run it so, you're simply adding weight and more reinforcement where it's not needed, there are loads of tyres to choose from that aren't tubeless.

[Ivor Tingting]

You can but as Brucey suggests better to get a non tubeless tyre.

I just changed from Schwalbe Marathon Plus 700 x 28C to Schwalbe Marathon Racer 700 x 35C tyres which have an almost identical tread pattern. The latter are half the weight of the former and seem to roll the same or slightly better and are a more comfortable ride as there is more volume in the tyre so less buzz in the handlebars from the road surface. Same pressures. Chain Reaction are doing them for £22 at the moment. They have very good feedback only 1 numptee who gave them 1 star because of something totally unrelated. I've ridden about 180 miles on them so far and 'am very impressed and no punctures so far. Schwalbe rate them as a 4 instead of a 5 for SMP+, but the weight saving is significant. I use Continental Touring Slim tubes 700 28-37C with Presta valves. The rims are Mavic Open Pro Disc tubeless 700C. The total weight saving using this combination over the previous SMP+ set up is about 700-750g as I weighed each wheel once I had changed the tyres and tubes and had inflated them. The weight saving is very noticeable riding my bike. It feels so much lighter.

I used to use Specialised Armadillos before SMP+. They were ok but once they became worn which was fairly quick as I was riding a lot of miles they lost their shallow tread markings and then started getting punctures. In the wet when half worn they were not good and would easily slide.

HTH.

[Brucey]

I found this chart



which explains some of the possible combinations of tubeless parts.

Basically any tyre which mentions 'tubeless' will fall into one of the categories in the chart above. However they vary both in fit and in how much sealant is required to seal the tyre; in some cases (Mavic, Schwalbe etc, on the right rim) the tyre is meant to seal fairly well (but not perfectly) when dry and the sealant is only there to deal with small leaks between the rim and the tyre, plus any punctures that might otherwise occur. In other case the tyre sidewall is basically porous and won't work at all without quite a lot of sealant in the tyre. In the former case the tyre is usually noticeably heavier than a standard (tubed) tyre of the same type, which is easy to spot if both are offered. In the latter case the tyres usually (but not always ) have amber sidewalls, and don't have carry a weight penalty (when used with tubes in).

Annoyingly in some sizes, some manufacturers now offer tubeless tyres only, if you want a 'fast' tyre. If you can't get tubeless rims that work on your machine, then you may have to use a different tyre manufacturer or you have to put a tube inside a tubeless cover. This issue has quietly been driving HPV enthusiasts nuts in the last few years; many happily used 20" Schwalbe One tyres but have now had to take a hit on speed by being forced to use Pro-One (tubeless) tyres; the best you can do is to fit a latex tube inside but even with that they are a bit slower rolling.

cheers

[John_S]

Thanks again for all of the extra replies and info which is much appreciated!

Hi The utility cyclist,

Thanks for your message and for your recommendations. The Jack Brown tyre is one that I hadn't heard of before and so thanks for the tip because it's one to consider and I'd just need to check if a 700x33c will fit in my frame compared to my current 700x30c. Although the review in the link below is quite old now I wonder if the Jack Brown tyre is still made by Panaracer?

https://www.bikeradar.com/reviews/components/tyres/rivendell-jack-browns-review/


Hi Ivor Tingting,

Thanks for your thoughts regarding looking for non tubeless type tyres and also for your recommendations. I've used Schwalbe Marathon Plus tyres before but not the Marathon Racer tyres and so I'll take a look at those although if they're in a 700x35c again I'd just have to check if they fit in my frame but at £22 that's not too bad.


Hi Brucey,

Thanks for the chart and that's really interesting! When they say "Standardized Tubeless Rim" and "Standardized Tubless Tire"do they mean something like the Mavic UST standard? I could be completely wrong here but I'm sure that I remember listening to a Cycling Tips podcast a few months ago and they were talking about a gathering of the bicycle industry wheel and tyre manufacturers getting together to try and agree on tubeless standards and they'd not quite got there yet but were getting closer on agreeing on standards.

Also thanks for all of the other information on tubeless tyres and I would agree with you that manufacturers websites certainly seem to show increasing numbers of tubeless only tyres especially those in wider sizes which is frustrating if you're happy to run tubes but also like wider tyres.


When I've been looking at websites again I think that even if you have a good understanding of the subject it's still difficult to compare apples with apples across different manufacturers websites because they're all giving information in different ways and describing technology features with their own terminology.

What I think I've figured out is that there is a version of the Schwalbe G-One Speed which is not tubeless and is intended to be used with tubes.
That is the G-One Speed Performance Line Race Guard tyre which the website says is made in 700x30c size. This is in line with my current Schwalbe tyres that came as stock with my bike which also state Performance Line Race Guard on the sidewall. I'd happily buy these tyres as pretty much a like for like replacement from what I have now but the problem is that based on my searching so far you can't buy this tyre from anywhere and so I'm wondering if it is an OEM supplied tyre only fitted to new bikes in the shops.

I looked back at the WTB Exposure 30 again and the WTB website doesn't seem to make any reference to inner tubes and so I'm assuming that it a tubeless only tyre so I should rule it out if I want to use it with inner tubes.

Looking back at the Panaracer website they state that their tyres are either "tubed", "tubeless compatible" or "tubeless". When they say "tubeless compatible" I guess that this would put this tyre in the top left hand corner of the chart in Brucey's email as a "tubeless ready" tyre but as far as the information that Panaracer are giving out on their website I'm going to take it that the GravelKing, which in sizes 700x32c and above is listed as "tubeless compatible", is designed by them to be used both with and without inner tubes and so this tyre could remain on my list of possible new tyres to consider.

I've been going through other manufacturers websites and I think that I have found another option which is the Vittoria Terreno Zero (700x32c, 32-622, Tubeless Ready (TNT), Nylon 120 TPI, Anthracite Sidewall, 380g). I looked up what TNT stood for because I didn't know and the Vittoria website says:-

"TNT, short for Tube/No-Tube, can be used with or without an inner tube."

However when I searched for somewhere to buy this tyre from so that I could check what it costs I couldn't find this tyre for sale anywhere so that doesn't look to be an option.

So in terms of tyres that you can buy that are at least 30mm wide and don't appear to be tubeless only I might be down to considering:-

* the Jack Brown tyre
* the Schwalbe Marathon Racer
* the Panaracer GravelKing


Thanks again to everyone for the help & advice!

John

[Brucey]

AFAICT the new standard is going to be based around the Mavic UST design and this is very similar to the dimensions that the likes of Shimano and Schwalbe have been working to.

So its all going to be joy and roses...? Er, no. No manufacturer has an entirely blemish-free track record when it comes to making either tyres or rims that are sized accurately.

Part of the problem (which underlies the existence of 'non-standard' tubeless parts) is that some manufacturers make tyres with stretchy beads. These work OK with tubes and crotchet rims, but can blow off (any rim that is sized to ISO) if fitted tubelessly; rim crotchets provide no additional/reliable tyre retention when tyres are fitted tubelessly. [Standardised tubeless tyres have thicker, stiffer beads, too.]

These tyres may measure correctly but can still stretch enough to blow off a rim. Worse yet 'testing' the tyre proves little; all that needs to happen is that the position of the seal varies slightly and a tyre that survived any test may still blow off the rim.

If you have tubeless rims, they are liable to be a PITA, with most tyres too tight to fit and remove easily. If tubeless tyres are a looser fit, they don't necessarily stay seated on the rim. I recently watched a mechanic try repeatedly to get a new mavic UST tyre to seat on a new mavic UST rim and there were about twenty failures in a row: The tyre wouldn't seat at all unless the valve core was removed and a boost bottle was used. However the tyre would then unseat once it was deflated, in order to fit the valve core again.

chers

[John_S]

Hi Brucey,

Thanks again for your message and insight.

The experience of the mechanic you refer to in your message is exactly one of the reasons that I'm presently in no rush to switch to using a tubeless tyre set up.

Thanks,

John

[John_S]

Hi again,

I thought I'd just look at the websites of other companies just to see if I have any other options.

Firstly I looked at the Hutchinson website and you could put in the tyre size, as well as other search criteria if you wanted but I didn't add anuything else, and then see what tyres they do. With Hutchinson it appeared that anything larger than a 700x28c was tubeless.

That led me to look elsewhere and I came across René Herse ( https://www.renehersecycles.com previously called Compass) and I quite liked the look of the range of tyres that they offer. In particular I liked the sound of the Stampede Pass 700x32c tyres ( link below ) and in the information given about the tyre it specifically states, "The Stampede Pass requires tubes", and so I'd happily use this tyre with inner tubes.

https://www.renehersecycles.com/shop/components/tires/700c/compass-700cx32-stampede-pass/

The only downside is the price because they're more than I would have wanted to spend at £50 ( https://www.svencycles.com/products/compass-700c-x-32-stampede-pass/ )

However it is my birthday soon and perhaps if I can persuade my wife that what I really need for my birthday is a new set of tyres then maybe she will get me these René Herse tyres.

But if my wife can't be persuaded to buy them for me then I'll probably have to go for the cheaper options of either the Jack Brown, the Schwalbe Marathon Racer or the Panaracer GravelKing tyres.

Thanks and hope that everyone has a good weekend.

John