Tyre buying wild goose chase

I spent the summer (my first summer as a committed cyclist and one where I fell in love with gravel/general off-road drop bar chaos) tearing around on 38mm tubeless G-one Allrounds and think they are brilliant. Until it gets muddy/wet and then they scare me. I rode the Falling Leaves event in the Peak District and realised I needed some more grip to deal with more gnarly sections that the UK offers in the winter (we're not exactly over stocked with pure gravel roads so rides tend to feature very varied terrain).

My first attempt with buying a pair of 40mm WTB Ravagers and I rode them on a 50k cx sportive that was very muddy following 24 hours of rain that ended when the ride started. They were magic in terms of traction in the mud, were confident inspiring when tackling wet slippery rooty / off camber sections and felt like riding on lovely plump cushions in terms of comfort. However, when facing anything non-gnarly they were anchors. They drained my legs and will to live.

Sooooooooooo - i got a pair of 37 WTB Riddlers, which I'd read were faster and the tread patten looked like it would roll well on tarmac and hard pack. Road them yesterday and...ANCHORS.

I know I'm in moon on a stick territory but is there a tyre with a bit more wet/light mud traction then the G-one Allrounds but still decently fast? I'm now considering the 38mm G-one Bite because they are more knobbly and I trust Schwalbe because their claims of speed / rolling resistance for the Allrounds is clearly true, the mega expensive Compass Steilacooms or perhaps Specialized Trigger Pros. Gravelking SKs seem to get good reviews but not sure if they will have enough grip for wet UK winter conditions.

Any recommendations?

PS I am going to be ebaying the Ravagers (50k use) and Riddlers (15k use) unless anyone in the UK wants to buy them.

If you want traction in the wet you need loosely spaced bigger knobs. Generally speaking these kind of tyres will roll slower most of the time compared to something with tightly spaced small knobs like the G-One Allround. 

I'd try the Bite, or if you can fit them the WTB Resolutes, or maybe the GravelKing Mud but these only come in 35. The SKs will pack up with mud like your Allrounds.

Save your pennies for the Steilacoom 

Maxxis Rambler should offer more mud traction than the G-One, without much loss of speed.

I was pleasantly surprised with how well Resolutes roll, if you can fit 43s.

Right - i decided to do what I should've done on day one (had I known what I know now of course), which is to order a set of Compass Steilacooms. At £56 a pop and on top of the two pairs that I doubt I'll get much on eBay for - it's been an expensive exercise but the upgrades (hunt 4 season gravel wheelset, RS685 shifters and hydro brakes, Rose flex seat post, easton ea70 ax bars, r8000 front much and rx800 rear mech) I've made to my bike have avoided a new bike and really transformed my enjoyment of it, so if the Steilacooms mean I look forward to off roading throughout the winter rather than avoiding my bike because it has anchors on it - money well spent 😁 Plus I can save that much just by not going out for dinner at the weekend in London one night 🤣

Well, based on others' online reviews, those look like some cracking fun tires.  The tread pattern reminds me a bit of old BMX tires in the 80's.  A local shop in Ontario lists these tires (online) for $90 (CAD), which isnt a whole lot more than the WTB Nanos that I was going to suggest.  I do a lot of mixed terrain and mixed weather (from dry and hard to quite wet and muddy) and have found them to be decent in most off road conditions and also roll OK on tarmac.  I hdisliked the Gravelking SK that came on the bike, pretty much from the first day I got the bike (though many others love that tire).

runrideski wrote:Well, based on others' online reviews, those look like some cracking fun tires.  The tread pattern reminds me a bit of old BMX tires in the 80's.  A local shop in Ontario lists these tires (online) for $90 (CAD), which isnt a whole lot more than the WTB Nanos that I was going to suggest.  I do a lot of mixed terrain and mixed weather (from dry and hard to quite wet and muddy) and have found them to be decent in most off road conditions and also roll OK on tarmac.  I hdisliked the Gravelking SK that came on the bike, pretty much from the first day I got the bike (though many others love that tire).

Yeah I think the Steilacooms were just that little bit too spendy for me to swallow initially but I didn't know then that the G-one Allrounds are unusually fast and that stepping up to an all weather, mud capable tyre that's able to roll fast on tarmac was such a difficult engineering challenge that perhaps only Compass thus far have managed to cater for (according to the reviews I've read). If they are fast and confidence inspiring in all weather and all terrain then that's going to put smiles on my face and keep me on the trails throughout our winter. Hopefully the Goldilocks / moon on a stick tyre that I've been searching for :-)

Great that you're enjoying the Nanos. Maybe when you next change try the Steilacooms and then you can compare back to back and share with us. I'll do a little review of the Steilacooms when I've put some all terrain kms on them.

I think your Compass choice may be ideal for you, but calling the WTB 37c Riddlers anchors??? I have the same tires on my hybrid and used them for my first organized gravel ride earlier this year. I thought they were great on pavement, forest fireroads, and forest floor and dirt, though i never tried them on mud.

I've since moved on to a full-on drop-bar gravel bike with Clement XPlor MSO 40... maybe i should revisit my hybrid with the Riddlers.

eric/fresno, ca.

So instead of starting a new thread. I thought I would bundle on this one. I have been riding my Raleigh Roker Comp exclusively but can't bear to ride it here in the salt Tundra land of Pa. Anyways my Tamland 1 was setting around for awhile and the rear tire was low. I decided to ride it this winter as I had frame protector added to it on the inside this last spring. I rode it in the snow storm around a mile on Monday. All I did was pump up the rear tire, I went to check it tonight and the rear tire is dead flat. I guess I can check it in the bath tub any guesses why it went flat like that as I shouldn't have hit anything in the snow?

Thanks
Zman

 

epzamora wrote:I think your Compass choice may be ideal for you, but calling the WTB 37c Riddlers anchors??? I have the same tires on my hybrid and used them for my first organized gravel ride earlier this year. I thought they were great on pavement, forest fireroads, and forest floor and dirt, though i never tried them on mud.

I've since moved on to a full-on drop-bar gravel bike with Clement XPlor MSO 40... maybe i should revisit my hybrid with the Riddlers.

eric/fresno, ca.

I think its all relative. The G-One Allround is *fast* and only has very minor tread so anything with decent tread is probably going to feel slow by comparison. Im skinny and dont have a lot of watts yet so i really feel rolling resistance. Im putting the Compass set to the test on sunday with a 70k cx sportive, which is probably going to be wet and muddy judging by the forecast.

How are the Xplor MSOs going? What gravel bike did you go for? Enjoying it?

Zurichman wrote:So instead of starting a new thread. I thought I would bundle on this one. I have been riding my Raleigh Roker Comp exclusively but can't bear to ride it here in the salt Tundra land of Pa. Anyways my Tamland 1 was setting around for awhile and the rear tire was low. I decided to ride it this winter as I had frame protector added to it on the inside this last spring. I rode it in the snow storm around a mile on Monday. All I did was pump up the rear tire, I went to check it tonight and the rear tire is dead flat. I guess I can check it in the bath tub any guesses why it went flat like that as I shouldn't have hit anything in the snow?

Thanks
Zman

 

People might find it hard to find/reply to give you tech advice so might be worth starting a new thread.

Jimbop wrote:
How are the Xplor MSOs going? What gravel bike did you go for? Enjoying it?

I only have about 500 miles on them since the start of September, and a lot of it pavement riding (70/30?), but there are some gravel pits nearby, with wide crushed gravel roads along the river i usually ride. I don't have a photo of that area. But my 2 organized "gravel" rides of late have been dirt roads through private ranch land.


(that's a buddy of mine in the lower left corner photo riding Schwalbes)

I'm a bit of a wuss when it comes to off-pavement stuff. I raced my Bianchi back in the 80s, and took 25 years off from regular riding, just getting back into it last year with a mountain bike. Almost everything is sketch to me since i grew up on 21-23c sew-ups and clinchers. But the MSOs handled the softish sandy road stuff above surprisingly well. Even the fast downhill dirt stuff.

And they're fast enough for me on pavement. The only real thing holding me back is my own fitness. I have zero plans to ride in a fast group though.

The current MSOs are now Donnelly-branded. My Clement XPlor MSO tires came stock on my 2018 Norco Search XR 105 steel gravel bike. And the more I ride my Search XR, the more I love it. They're tubeless, at roughly 38-40psi.

  eric/fresno, ca.

Zurichman wrote:So instead of starting a new thread. I thought I would bundle on this one. I have been riding my Raleigh Roker Comp exclusively but can't bear to ride it here in the salt Tundra land of Pa. Anyways my Tamland 1 was setting around for awhile and the rear tire was low. I decided to ride it this winter as I had frame protector added to it on the inside this last spring. I rode it in the snow storm around a mile on Monday. All I did was pump up the rear tire, I went to check it tonight and the rear tire is dead flat. I guess I can check it in the bath tub any guesses why it went flat like that as I shouldn't have hit anything in the snow?

Thanks
Zman

 

Are you running tubeless? I encountered a similar thing with my Orange sealed tires. I think the sealant got a little hard and brittle in the very cold, but the tires were a little old and have a few sealed punctures in them, so that was probably a contributing factor - lots of opportunities for tiny holes to re-form.

reubenc wrote:

Are you running tubeless? I encountered a similar thing with my Orange sealed tires. I think the sealant got a little hard and brittle in the very cold, but the tires were a little old and have a few sealed punctures in them, so that was probably a contributing factor - lots of opportunities for tiny holes to re-form.

So I found out what happened to y Kenda Flintridge Pro rear tire tonight. It was on my Tamland 1 gravel bike which sat all summer. The tire never burped and when I pumped it up it held air. I guess when I was out riding it something happened to burp the tire or cause a small leak. When the tire was check tonight all the sealant had dried up in it as it had been about a year since any was put in it.

Just another tubeless tire learning experience.

Zman

I put my new Compass Steilacooms on yesterday. Slightly miffed that they both went flat overnight so I gave them another blast this morning using my tubeless tyre inflator and just rode 4km on tarmac to a train station in London. I've got a fairly light saddle pack, tube pack full of energy bars and two full bottles so bike is a smidge more sluggish, particularly coming from riding 28c Schwalbe Pro Ones on my commute all week. However...my first impression is that these Compass tyres feel like a very unusual beast; incredibly supple and comfortable, surprisingly quiet and they roll...really really well. Not road slick fast but they have no right to roll as fast as they do. Thus far very impressed. 70km mixed surface sportive tomorrow and if I'm in the mood I'll ride the 90km back to London to build up my endurance some more.

Jimbop wrote:I put my new Compass Steilacooms on yesterday. Slightly miffed that they both went flat overnight so I gave them another blast this morning using my tubeless tyre inflator and just rode 4km on tarmac to a train station in London. I've got a fairly light saddle pack, tube pack full of energy bars and two full bottles so bike is a smidge more sluggish, particularly coming from riding 28c Schwalbe Pro Ones on my commute all week. However...my first impression is that these Compass tyres feel like a very unusual beast; incredibly supple and comfortable, surprisingly quiet and they roll...really really well. Not road slick fast but they have no right to roll as fast as they do. Thus far very impressed. 70km mixed surface sportive tomorrow and if I'm in the mood I'll ride the 90km back to London to build up my endurance some more.

 

When I setup my Compass tyres (using Orange Seal Endurance) I did the 'shake' thing and let them sit on their side for a day. Shake again and flip, let rest for another day. 

Another adittonal setup idea I came across once they're seated was to pump them up to say 25psi or so (with the sealant in), shake,rest etc. Then increase the psi another 10. Shake again/rest. Then another 10. The idea is the sealant fills the larger pores first, then down to the smaller. 

owly wrote: 

When I setup my Compass tyres (using Orange Seal Endurance) I did the 'shake' thing and let them sit on their side for a day. Shake again and flip, let rest for another day. 

Another adittonal setup idea I came across once they're seated was to pump them up to say 25psi or so (with the sealant in), shake,rest etc. Then increase the psi another 10. Shake again/rest. Then another 10. The idea is the sealant fills the larger pores first, then down to the smaller. 

Dang owly that sure seems like a lot of work. Those tires really better be good and very fast. What happens to those pores when the sealant dries up?

Zman

So my day consisted of about 70km tarmac and 40k of everything from gravel to single track. There was mud and a whole heck of a lot of it because it rained heavily yesterday. Initially my legs were sound asleep and I thought I maybe needed to put some more air in but the tyres felt uncomfortable so I dropped down. I don't really get how they can cope so well with such a variety of terrain. I definitely lost some air throughout the day and the front is now down to the point where when I dropped off a kerb I touched the tarmac with the rim - oops. However - didn't seem to slow the damn things down on tarmac weirdly. The mud was generally very wet and there were a couple of sections where they got clogged up and some where I sketched around a bit but nothing but a proper mud tyre would've felt good in that. They clear quickly and coped pretty well I thought. I had a couple of little moments in slippy muddy deep ruts that I didn't enjoy but frankly I'm inexperienced on mud. A tad more bite on the sides would've helped though.

Overall - i'm very impressed. They fly along on tarmac, gravel and pretty much everything else. They do well but not outstandingly in mud but as I say - today was crying out for mud tyres if you wanted to feel really secure but I would've been a lot, lot, lot slower overall. 5 stars in my book.

Jimbop wrote:So my day consisted of about 70km tarmac and 40k of everything from gravel to single track. There was mud and a whole heck of a lot of it because it rained heavily yesterday. Initially my legs were sound asleep and I thought I maybe needed to put some more air in but the tyres felt uncomfortable so I dropped down. I don't really get how they can cope so well with such a variety of terrain. I definitely lost some air throughout the day and the front is now down to the point where when I dropped off a kerb I touched the tarmac with the rim - oops. However - didn't seem to slow the damn things down on tarmac weirdly. The mud was generally very wet and there were a couple of sections where they got clogged up and some where I sketched around a bit but nothing but a proper mud tyre would've felt good in that. They clear quickly and coped pretty well I thought. I had a couple of little moments in slippy muddy deep ruts that I didn't enjoy but frankly I'm inexperienced on mud. A tad more bite on the sides would've helped though.

Overall - i'm very impressed. They fly along on tarmac, gravel and pretty much everything else. They do well but not outstandingly in mud but as I say - today was crying out for mud tyres if you wanted to feel really secure but I would've been a lot, lot, lot slower overall. 5 stars in my book.

What tires and size are we talking about?


Zman