- Now much like it took over for mountain biking,
road tubeless is becoming the choice for
an increasing number of road cyclists,
logging big miles out on the road.
So the word is out, that tubeless has some major advantages
yet, so many cyclists out there have a lot
of concerns and questions about this tire choice.
Well, Zipp has actually kindly stepped in to help
on today's video to answer some of those questions,
and to debunk some of those myths.
They've also kindly given me
a nice 404 NSW front and 808 NSW rear
in tubeless setup with a Zipp Tangente tires,
and conveniently Zipp are just down the road here in Kona
So we're about to jump on the bike,
poodle down and meet up with one of their specialists.
(upbeat music)
Right, so we're now here with Ben,
the design engineer for Zipp,
so perfect man to answer some of the common questions
we get at GTN on tubeless wheels.
Now, we've actually got this bike setup here
with the Zipp 404 on the front and 808 on the rear,
which I believe is your most popular option
here for the Ironnman World Championships in Kona
- Yep, today at bike check in, we're going to see
a lot of athletes roll through with 404 and 808 combo.
- Cool, so I'm going to ask you a few questions
that we keep getting about tubeless wheels.
So, the first one is:
Can you setup any wheel as tubeless?
- Unfortunately no, there's a very specific tubeless profile
that has a pretty specific interaction with the tire
to help it seal perfectly.
So, if you take just any old clincher rim
and try to put tubeless tape on it,
with a clincher tire or a tubeless ready tire,
there's not going to be that nice geometric lock
to get a good seal.
- Yeah cause it's almost like a lip that comes out
Isn't it, so it locks exactly - Yep
Exactly.
- And I guess, similar question then
On a tubeless wheel, can you put any tire on
to make it tubeless?
- Well, you can put a tubeless ready tire,
or a clincher tire on it, so it has the same like hooks
as a normal clincher, so a tubeless ready wheel
you could throw a tube in it, throw the normal tire
on that your running on your normal clincher
and you're just fine.
- Okay, but obviously, you can't just put a clinch
tire on and try and set that up as--
- No, it's not going to be very successful.
(upbeat music)
- Right, another question we've got is:
Is there actually really any difference between
the number of flats you get on a tube tire
versus a tubeless tire.
- Definitely, tubeless really helps with two things:
Pinch flats, so there's no tube in there to actually pinch
whenever you hit a really big bump
and your tire compresses, you don't pinch your tube
and then go flat on your normal clincher.
And like small punctures, the sealant
that you put inside of your tubeless tire
will, as that small puncture, and air's rushing out,
the sealant will go there, those little particulates
in the sealant will just seal it right up.
- And then another question we get a lot is
about traveling with tubeless wheels or tires.
So, obviously there's the worry that there's fluid in there
and then you want to let the pressure out
to travel with it, so what would you suggest?
- Normally, whenever we travel with 'em ,
like we came to Hawaii here, just let a few PSI out,
kind of like you would, cause whenever they're in the
airplane or whatever container,
they're going to get really hot and they might
expand a little bit, yeah let a little bit of air out
and normally they stay locked in,
just like a clincher would and
there's really no issues with it whatsoever.
- Is there, you know, an issue if you do let
too much out, can it sort of come off the rim?
- Yeah, if you let a lot of air out,
sometimes it will fall down into the well there,
the beads of the tire, and then it might leak
a little bit of fluid, but then you can just
pump it right up and you're good to go.
- All right, and then actually coming to installing them:
Do you need a compressor, which is what I guess
we used to be told we needed
when tubeless tires first came out.
Is that necessary now?
- I would say yes and no,
it depends on your tire and rim fitment.
So earlier this week we did some demos
and we had, I dunno 10 or 12 sets of Zipp tubeless
wheels and Zipp tires.
So like, since they're both made by Zipp,
we have a pretty good interaction on the geometry.
We did them all with just a hand pump.
But some, whenever you get like a really tight fit,
you might need a compressor just to give it
that maximum airflow to get that tire to seat perfectly.
- So compressor's probably the easiest
but it's very doable with--
- Very doable, yeah.
(upbeat music)
- All right, so other than the weight,
obviously we've removed the tube from the tire
and the puncture resistance.
Is there any other difference really?
- Yeah, like tubeless tires on a tubeless
wheel set gets a lot lower rolling resistance
and basically you don't have the tube
inside on the tire rubbing against it
creating that friction, so it does lower
your rolling resistance
and we're seeing a lot of people running
just even a little bit, larger tires too
because of the lower rolling resistance.
So you get a little bit more comfort
and it will save your legs on race day
if you need to get off and run.
- And then, if you were to get a rather bad puncture,
that the sealant isn't fixing,
what do you do, are you stuffed then?
- No, not stuffed, there's a couple of different options,
people are selling some patch kits,
where actually you just shove a little piece of rubber
or whatever the material is into the puncture,
or just like on your normal clincher,
you pull the tire off, put a tube in,
put the tire back on, pump it up
and you're ready to go.
- So I guess at that point, obviously you wouldn't have lost
too much air, so you would of put that patch in,
- Yep
that's going to fill that gap and then it's a case of
pumping the...using the CO2 canister or a pump
- Yep
and the sealant is then going to do it's work
around that? - Exactly, yeah
- Yeah, so it's not a case of game over,
race over, ride, straight ride over.
- No calls home.
(upbeat music)
- Okay, so another couple of questions.
So, once the sealant's in there,
it's all setup and ready,
can you just leave it, is that it,
or do you need to check on them from time to time?
- It depends on how much you ride.
Like, if you're riding every week,
there's really not much to do
other than continue to pump up your tires.
But, if you're, if it's a winter bike
and you set it out for you know, a few months,
that sealant will dry-up
so you got to either keep spinning the tires,
or just be prepared to put some more sealant in
after it's sat for a few months.
Pop your tire off, just wipe it off
and if it's dried, it's really easy,
it just comes out and you can throw it
in the trashcan and go again.
- Brilliant, I've been riding tubeless ready wheels
for a while, and I've had them setup as clincher.
So, what is the step now I would take
to set them up as tubeless ready?
- To be riding as clincher, you probably have
a rim strip in them, so you just pull the rim strip off,
get some tubeless tape, it comes in different widths
for different wheels.
- And what's the purpose of that,
that's to cover the spoke holes?
- Yeah, covers the spoke holes and
makes basically a complete surface
where the sealant can't get underneath.
So, once you put that tire on and the
tire bead seal, you have a completely contained system.
So, yeah, you put a couple of strips of rim tape
or tubeless tape on there,
get your tire on and pump it up, you're ready to go.
- Well thanks ever so much to Ben at Zipp for that,
I am definitely going to put my hand up here
and admit that I've been too proud to
ask some of these questions on tubeless tires in the past.
So I hope it has helped yourself.
If you do still have some questions on tubeless tires,
then please do drop them in the comments section below
and we'll do our best to answer them for you.
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If you'd like to see a maintenance video
that actually explains how you can install
tubeless tires, you can see that
by clicking just down here.