Does anyone know if small wheels are more prone to puntures?

[keepontriking]

Surely there are the same number of thorns, shards of glass and flints per mile, whether you use 20" or 700cs?

But then to mess up my own argument I do get more punctures on my 16' & 20" wheels than on the larger.

But then (again) I have more machines with smaller wheels....

I'll get my coat.

[CREPELLO]

I would imagine the pressures...are the important factors.

OK, but how does pressure affect puncture susceptibility?

I seem to find that running low pressure means more punctures.

Of course the pressure of the tyre doesn't make the tyre material stronger, but a flatter tyre covers more road and you can go over a bump and get a snakebite puncture if the pressures are too low.

Yeah, that explanation makes sense. I wasn't considering snake bites although they are a real risk with to soft a tyre.

[genome]

1. Punctures normally occur in the same place, with smaller wheels the statistical chances of this are higher.
2. Small wheels are more affected by the road conditions, therefore will experience more stress from dodgy surfaces than larger wheels - one of the reasons that 28 inch wheels were initially popular, to my knowledge.

Therefore, I would think that they are, saying that any engineer / designer worth their salt would thus design accordingly, which is why I believe that smaller wheels tend to be pumped to higher pressures. I would recommend that small wheels use tyres with kevlar belts, or puncture-resistant technology.

[thirdcrank]

1. Punctures normally occur in the same place, with smaller wheels the statistical chances of this are higher.
2. Small wheels are more affected by the road conditions, therefore will experience more stress from dodgy surfaces than larger wheels - one of the reasons that 28 inch wheels were initially popular, to my knowledge.

Therefore, I would think that they are, saying that any engineer / designer worth their salt would thus design accordingly, which is why I believe that smaller wheels tend to be pumped to higher pressures. I would recommend that small wheels use tyres with kevlar belts, or puncture-resistant technology.

A tyre puncturing in the same place - at least the same place on the tyre - normally means that the cause of the original puncture has not been detected and removed.

I don't know where the idea comes from that tyres for smaller wheels are inflated to higher pressures than larger ones. AFAIK the main determinant of pressure is the cross section of the tyre, smaller cross sections normally needing to be harder. (The original tyres for my Birdy were recommended 40psi. These were just child's bike tyres. Birdy had some specially made in the same dimensions but to higher quality and they were OK for up to 80 psi. Then good old Schwalbe came along and did the Marathon in that size, also OK for 80psi.)

I think it's understood that a smaller wheel is more affected by a surface irregularity / loose object of a given size than a large wheel. OTOH Alex Moulton (is he a 'Sir' now?) is said to be no slouch in the engineering department and his preference for smaller wheels was OK on the Mini and later his range of bikes.

So far, nobody has come up with a recognised principle that answers this so the answer may be unknown.

[DaveP]

I suspect the explanation might be that in the distant past, aka my youth tyres for small wheels were not of the same quality as the finest 27" tyres, and in my limited experience of the things tyre pressures seemed to be a lot lower. Both factors which could contribute to a perception that small wheels puntured more.
Once better quality tyres such as the Schwalbe mentioned above became available things must have started to even out, especially now that we fully realise that punctures never ever happen unless she who must never be named has been crossed.

[rogerzilla]

I think it's understood that a smaller wheel is more affected by a surface irregularity / loose object of a given size than a large wheel. OTOH Alex Moulton (is he a 'Sir' now?) is said to be no slouch in the engineering department and his preference for smaller wheels was OK on the Mini and later his range of bikes.

Smaller wheels experience more up-and-down motion on a rough surface compared to a large wheel. Moulton bikes get round this by having suspension. Moulton was the suspension designer on the Mini (Alec Issigonis designed the car).

[CREPELLO]

Sorry for pursuing this, as it is not directly related to the original question In anyone's experience is a narrower tyre significantly less likely to puncture than a wide one, because the contact patch is smaller and not because it is harder?

[JC4LAB]

A found hitting a pothole at speed with small 16" brompton wheels can give you punctures whereas a larger wheel seems to manage better..Maybe thats just coincidence and not inflating them hard enough...