The width of the tape wasn't an issue. The 3M stuff I was using is just really thin and not very malleable so it would leak sealant through the bubbles and folds.
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\nThe rims are rewrapped now and when I'm off crutches in a few days I'll patch up the Somas and remount them. These Gravelkings roll like poop comparatively and aggravate my knee.
The new tape job helped a ton with air retention. I only inflate every 4 days or so, and that might be because of temperature fluctuations here in MN. It's not as long as a good tubeless mountain tire, but I'd rather spend 45 seconds pumping up a tire than sacrifice ride quality.
I used vulcanized tire patch kits on my damaged rear tire and moved it to the front. No issues at all with it, and since I was at 700ish miles it was about time for a rotation anyway.
Join the club, I purchased a set of jon bon 35s extralight and while trying to set tubeless on my Enve CX wheels one of the tire blew off the rim 3 times my fingers were swollen and needless to say my ear rung for a while, so now i cannot use tubeless as im afraid they will blow out. they now sit in the closet unused with Zero miles on them . I went back to my 36 mm MSO's
crankycolnago wrote:Join the club, I purchased a set of jon bon 35s extralight and while trying to set tubeless on my Enve CX wheels one of the tire blew off the rim 3 times my fingers were swollen and needless to say my ear rung for a while, so now i cannot use tubeless as im afraid they will blow out. they now sit in the closet unused with Zero miles on them . I went back to my 36 mm MSO's
I installed (had installed professionally) a pair of Bon Jon 35's- extra light on HED Belgium + rims. My installer told me that he didn't have too much trouble installing them and used 2 oz. of Orange Seal endurance in both wheels. But, after receiving the wheels, the tires required several weeks of TLC, before they would hold air reliably. After about a month, or about 400 miles of regular riding, they now hold air as well as any other tubeless tires. I guess these tires are problematic for tubeless application. A lot depends on the rim, and on your patience. In all honesty, while I love the performance of these tires for the type of riding I do, I can't recommend them for everyone.
I bought a second pair of SVs for spring, this time in terracotta color and the EX/extended wear version. They're considerably thicker in the tread but the sidewalls are the same. I haven't had a chance to weigh them.
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\nMy SLs aren't worn out yet (1500ish miles). I just like to replace early while the old tires still have some resale value.
Quick update on my tubeless Bon Jons Extra-light casing. As I may have mentioned elsewhere -- it took 2 oz. of Orange Seal endurance in both wheels, and several days of TLC before the tires sealed reliably. After that, their day to day tubeless performance was on par with other tubeless tires I have been using. Recently, I hit some road debris riding on pavement. When I got back from my ride, I noticed a section of the casing had been damaged; and that some Orange seal had seeped through, effectively sealing the tire. The tire is holding air again with no apparent difficulty. None the less I've decided to replace the tire, rather than take a chance with it failing on the road. I should say, that after several thousand miles on my Bon Jon's - riding both paved and unpaved roads, this is the first time I've experienced any sidewall damage. Based on other replies here, it is possible that I've just been lucky. Here are my recommendations on Compass tires: - For unpaved roads, or dubious paved roads, definitely chose the standard casing rather than the extra light option. Especially for tubeless mounting. - If most of your riding is on roads that put tire sidewalls at risk, then Compass tires may not be your best choice. - Finally, I feel that Compass tires rating their products as "Tubeles Compatible" is bit misleading. Based on my experience, and other postings, you can expect to have much more difficulty with tubeless installation, than with a tire which is rated "Tubeless Ready". A tubeless ready tire will most likely have a airtight lining of some sort, which will allow you to mount the tires tubeless - even without sealant. For example the tubeless ready Schwalbe G-One. For myself, I've decided that the risk of sidewall failure, and difficulty with tubeless installation isn't worth the marginal improvement in performance that Compass tires offer. I've switched to 28mm Schwalbe Pro-one for rides mostly on pavement and to 38 mm G-one for mostly unpaved roads.
bobknh wrote: I installed (had installed professionally) a pair of Bon Jon 35's- extra light on HED Belgium + rims. My installer told me that he didn't have too much trouble installing them and used 2 oz. of Orange Seal endurance in both wheels. But, after receiving the wheels, the tires required several weeks of TLC, before they would hold air reliably. After about a month, or about 400 miles of regular riding, they now hold air as well as any other tubeless tires. I guess these tires are problematic for tubeless application. A lot depends on the rim, and on your patience. In all honesty, while I love the performance of these tires for the type of riding I do, I can't recommend them for everyone.
bobknh I read a couple of times people with these what you want to call supple tires that the tires had pin holes in them. That sounds crazy to me but probably why it took so long to get your tires broken in as the sealant sealed those little pin holes. Do you think it is a mfg. flaw or due to the tires being called supple that the thickness of the tire isn't there that are in heavier tires?
Zurichman wrote:......due to the tires being called supple that the thickness of the tire isn't there that are in heavier tires?
Zman
That's exactly it. The sidewalls for the extralight version are very, very thin. The few flats I have seen on those tires (in groups) are the sidewalls every time. Over on Slowtwitch, a well known rolling resistance tester said, "... the EL version is worth only ~1-1.5W per tire between 20-30 kph." when testing the Snoqualmie Pass (44) tires.
That's probably a touch higher than average gravel rolling speed for us mortals, so I would think 1 watt per tire is more like it. That's way too much of a trade-off in durability for me.
Bob, you're rather light weight, right? If so that probably helps with durability (although I had no problems with my Barlow Passes tubed in 2k miles, so maybe there's a bit of luck involved)
I saw on the Compass website that their latest shipment of Barlow Passes were a bit burlier than expected. That sounds pretty awesome if you ask me.
Zman- you can almost read through the sidewall of the extralight compasses
Volsung wrote:Bob, you're rather light weight, right? If so that probably helps with durability (although I had no problems with my Barlow Passes tubed in 2k miles, so maybe there's a bit of luck involved)
I saw on the Compass website that their latest shipment of Barlow Passes were a bit burlier than expected. That sounds pretty awesome if you ask me.
Zman- you can almost read through the sidewall of the extralight compasses
Volsung if that is the case why would anybody even consider them for a gravel tire. At my end 5-20 mph on a bike is faster than 0 mph. So yeah maybe I might be a little bit slower on my Kenda Flintridge Pro or whatever I am riding but at least I am not stopping losing time changing trying to fix a flat.
Volsung if that is the case why would anybody even consider them for a gravel tire. At my end 5-20 mph on a bike is faster than 0 mph. So yeah maybe I might be a little bit slower on my Kenda Flintridge Pro or whatever I am riding but at least I am not stopping losing time changing trying to fix a flat.
Zman
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\nThere's different gravel everywhere. If it's hard packed and not sharp, Compasses are great. A guy in MN constantly gets top 10s in Almanzo and others on his Compasses.
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\nThey're not for me though. I bet there's parts of the flint hills that would shred them instantly.
Volsung wrote: There's different gravel everywhere. If it's hard packed and not sharp, Compasses are great. A guy in MN constantly gets top 10s in Almanzo and others on his Compasses. They're not for me though. I bet there's parts of the flint hills that would shred them instantly.
I fully understand that thinking of a racer as they wanted the fastest thing going for them and probably willing to sacrifice for the possibility of a flat. I also remember reading on one of these tire threads about a regular rider that he was willing to take a chance on a flat with the thoughts of what a faster tire would give him. I don't think that is the average rider though. When I did the Pony Express ride in Marysville Kansas all the people that I saw with flats were running the skinny tires and probably will never forget this image in my mind. One dude was carrying his bike with the front tire just hanging off his rim and said he had something like 4-5 flats already and was out of the ride. The kicker was he was 2-3 miles from the rest stop and had to hoof it out carrying his bike. Not for me for sure.
On Soma website the Supple Vitesse 48c are tubeless ready but no mention for smaller sizes... I want a light medium size (35-38c) tire for 90% road use. I'll get something beefier tread wise when I get a second wheelset. I'm down to Bon Jon 35c reg casing, Supple Vitesse (SL or EX) or GK 38c. I really want to run them tubeless... I was sold on Soma's tire but now I'm not so sure if I can't run them tubeless (38c)
drwelby wrote:I just mounted up a pair of these, in the EX version. On DT R460s with two layers of tape I could mount them without tire irons. The rear pumped up with just a floor pump, the beads snapped in place with two little pings at around 30psi and it even held air overnight with no sealant. The front wouldn't quite get there with a floor pump, but locked up pretty good with a CO2 cartridge. A few more strokes with a pump got it up to working pressure and there were a few more pings of the bead snapping into place.
Six month review: these tires were performing flawlessly. But then last week I noticed the rear tire was soft. There were two thorn holes that had weeped out sealant blisters so I figured the holes were on top while the bike was in the rack so they were slowly exuding sealant. If anything, it looked like a sign that there was still sealant in the tire.
I pumped it up and went for a ride, and after about 15 minutes my tire started getting soft. So I pumped it up again and it was flat within 5 minutes. I thought maybe I hit something big so I stopped and sprayed some water on the tread to look for a hole. Nothing showed up, so I tried on the sidewall and to my surprise there about a dozen little leaks on the sidewalls.
I pulled off the wheel, deflated the tire, and the bead popped off really easy and the tire practically fell off the rim. Inside the tire there was still some liquid sealant but not enough to splash around and cover the sidewalls. I mounted a tube and rode home.
When I tried to set it back up tubeless the bead seemed really floppy. I went through 3 CO2 cartridges trying to get it to mount but the bead just wouldn't seal enough to seat the tire. I had to go to the shop to borrow their compressor.
I have two bikes with Compass Rat Trap Passes and I think they've been better overall. But maybe this is just manufacturing variability. I still like the SV tire for a big fat slick but it doesn't seem immune from the quirks of the Compass tires.
On the whole, I love these tires. The ride is incredible. They are as fast as road tires, but super comfy and reasonably capable off-road. I've ridden a fair bit of "light gravel" on standard-casing Barlow Pass and no flats -- probably a total of around 3000 miles on BPs and maybe 200-300 of those on gravel. (I wouldn't use them for unmaintained gravel roads where sidewall cuts would be more likely; I don't use them on gravel races, since the ones around me tend to revel in including gnarly roads) I also rode for 1500-2000 miles on Snoqualmie Pass (also tubeless), with no flats, but that was almost all pavement.
But tubeless setup has been a mixed bag.
- These are very loose fitting tires as others have noted. Why, Compass!!?? On one hand, if you have a rim that's typically impossible to mount tires on, these might work just fine. On the other hand, I have some carbon rims that are a little undersized and so are not difficult to mount most tubeless tires on (e.g. Schwalbe), but Compass fit very loose. Initially I ran the BPs on a Kinlin XR31T and that was a good match. But later I switched to testing out some hookless carbon wheels (Yishun rims), and it's been a disaster (more below). - Also/relatedly, the behavior of mounting a Compass tire with a few miles on it is very different from mounting a tire with a few thousand miles. To me this suggests that the beads stretch. Compass claims that they stretch a little and then they stop stretching. Maybe "a little" is too much. But on the carbon rims, it became impossible to reseat my SP tires after I'd swapped them out for a race. I tried all the tricks, used a compressor, tried CO2s and finally gave up. They were just way too loose on the rims. - I had issue with Stans sealant not sealing the porous sidewalls very well -- tires would keep losing half their pressure while the bike sat at work during the day. I switched to Orange Seal, which has seemed to work much better. (Actually I did about 50/50 Orange Seal and Stans -- more for economy than anything else.) - I have had a few small cuts in the tread that sealant helped seal, so in general I'm a firm believer in running these tubeless.
But ... riding to work this AM with a front Barlow Pass (standard sidewall) pumped up to 43psi, it blew right off my hookless carbon rim. I'd been riding these for probably 500 miles on those rims without issue. This was just riding on flat ground (at least not down a hill!), but that is always a terrifying experience.
I'm going to switch tires (I assume that one is not safe to reuse tubeless) and switch to using these on another wheelset with tighter rims. But be careful with assuming that the "TC" labeling actually means they'll work with your tubeless-ready rims without (1) being a huge pain in the butt to setup and (2) potentially being extremely dangerous to ride at risk of tire blowing off rim.
In the end, it's probably telling that I'm willing to switch around my wheelsets because I like these tires so much. I wish there was more competition in the 38-40mm (tubeless) sizing. (e.g. I wish the smaller Soma tires were tubeless-compatible.) For gravel races I love the G-One 38mm, but the Compass are in a completely different league.
They have about 2k miles and I've rotated once. Since rotating I've added 16 oz of Orange Seal. I'm not sure if it's the heat opening up pores in the sidewalls, but the sealant dries out fast. Without fresh sealant they don't hold air well. It's kind of annoying for commuting, but they still ride nicely and I haven't gotten any flats.
has anyone compared black wall Compasses to tan walls? Are the blacks less porous and have better air retention?
They have about 2k miles and I've rotated once. Since rotating I've added 16 oz of Orange Seal. I'm not sure if it's the heat opening up pores in the sidewalls, but the sealant dries out fast. Without fresh sealant they don't hold air well. It's kind of annoying for commuting, but they still ride nicely and I haven't gotten any flats.
has anyone compared black wall Compasses to tan walls? Are the blacks less porous and have better air retention?
When I was first looking at getting Compass tyres I read online a comment somewhere mentioning the tan walls were more porous for some reason. Whether or not that's true, I don't know but it pushed me toward the black options from day one.
I've been using 650b x 48 extralight for a year and the extralight 42mm TC since it came out. Always used OrangeSeal Endurance.
The 48 does lose a little bit of air if sitting for a couple of weeks. My 42 sealed up very quickly from the beginning; has held air very well.
