Cycling UK Forum

We are soon to be cycle camping on our tandem and currently use Panracer Tour Guard tyres 26x1.5. I find the sidewalls to fragile for long tours and are considering changing to Schwalbe Marathon Plus or Plus Tour or Continental Touring Plus in 26x1.75. Does anyone have experience of these tyres and any recommendations.
Thanks
Picycle

Hello,

If you do a search on the forum you will find lots of similar threads. The issue of tyres, their pu****re resistance and longevity comes up regularly and there are some fairly strong views for and against some tyres, particularly the Marathon Plus due to to it's weight.

For what it's worth we run Marathon Supremes on our tandem (a Dawes Galaxy Twin). They are folding tyres & so have fairly this sidewalls, but this has not been a problem and the tyres have been very reliable and very grippy. I should point out that we pull a trailer (extrawheel) rather than adding weight to the bike with panniers. We also run them at 100 to 110 psi, well above the reccomended pressure. No problems so far (says he desperately grabbing some wood as we are setting off on our JoGLE on Friday!)

Lots of good words on the forum for Marathons. We have them (32mm) on the tandem and they are good: fairly hard wearing, puncture resistant, and have quite thick sidewalls so are pretty robust. Ours also have a reflective sidewall, which is a nice touch and useful for the rare occasions when we get caught out. I'd recommend them, but for every tyre recommendation there is always someone with a bad experience!

After an appalling series of puncture-disrupted trips a few years ago I now use Marathon Plus 26 x 1.75 on our tandem, and 700 x 32c on my solo . No penetration punctures at all, no sidewall problems. The downside is they're heavy, and their lack of suppleness shows in a slightly harsh ride. A good compromise could be fitting an Plus on the rear, where a puncture repair is a real pain when laden with panniers, and putting something lighter and faster on the front. Some tyre/rim combinations allow lever-free tyre removal with your bare hands, you can be up & running after a front puncture in a few minutes.

I tour on 26" M+s. A lot o people say that they aren't very fast - and I don't dissagree. However, they are perfectly fine for my touring needs - I pootle rather than race along so I'm happy with them. Some people also find them uncomfortable - this isn't a problem that I have - I find them just as good as the old Pan's and IRC's I had.
Grip wise they are good - my touring often takes in drit tracks and BWs - they are perfectly fine here. And the legendary p*nct*r* resistence - still haven't had a p*nct*r* in several years of using them.
Two down sides of them: they are a tad costly (got mine in a sale: £12), and they are a pain to get on and off my rims compared to some other tyres (luckily the p*nct*r* resistence means that this is rare, but I do change them for ice tyres in the winter).

Tyres? - Good old Thorn Brochure again, see page 6:

http://www.sjscycles.com/thornpdf/Thorn ... oLoRes.pdf

Al

Thanks for the replies - Has anyone tries the Continental Touring Plus?

picycle wrote:We are soon to be cycle camping on our tandem and currently use Panracer Tour Guard tyres 26x1.5. I find the sidewalls to fragile for long tours and are considering changing to Schwalbe Marathon Plus or Plus Tour or Continental Touring Plus in 26x1.75. Does anyone have experience of these tyres and any recommendations.
Thanks
Picycle

I'm of the same opinion of Panaracer sidewalls for any tandem use(other than their RibMo's, or with a very light team(we're 24st with rack bag for day rides)).Some will disagree but I'm sticking to it.

We've toured and day ridden on 26x1.5in Schalbe Marathons for years on our Thorn Discovery tandem,no problems at all.
We now have a Cannondale and a Santana tandem both shod with Marathon 700Cx32mm tyres,we've toured and day ridden on these for years too.
You needn't look any further IMO as they are quite simple the best touring tyre we've ridden,in 6,500miles last year we had four punctures one of which was a valve seating on a cheap inner tube that came with the Cannondale.
Marathon Plusses are overkill IMO unless you're riding bad dirt roads or a lot of glass strewn city streets.

+1 for normal marathons in 26 x 1.5 size, although SPA have folding marathon XR's in 1.6" for £20 at the moment (have not tried them yet).

tooley92 wrote:+1 for normal marathons in 26 x 1.5 size, although SPA have folding marathon XR's in 1.6" for £20 at the moment (have not tried them yet).

XR's are a tarmac dragging ball and chain unless you're touring exclusively on dirt roads.

We have toured on Marathon Racers (700 x 30c) and on Marathon Plus (26 x 1.75) on our tandem. Both have been excellent, giving good wear. We have had one puncture in approx 6000 miles - on the Marathon Plus; it was unlucky with a haw thorn through just beyond the puncture protection strip. I would say that the Marathon Plus are very heavy and take around 500 miles to feel smooth and lose their bumpy rolling resistance.

Having said that, I plan in future to use Supremes. they are very light and have excelent reports for puncture resistance. In addition they are foldable, so practical to carry a spare on tour, unlike the Marathon Plus.

Have a look at the TC discussion board for more plaudits on the Supreme (search for Matt Hodges and tyre).

Many thanks, I have decided to try Marathon Supremes - Marathon plus's apear to be too much dead weight.

Thanks again
Picycle