My Hed Ardennes plus are tubeless ready but I can roll a tubed tire on with my hands even when cold. I wouldn’t want a tubeless setup that I couldn’t do that with. I may buy some tubeless to try but it’s hard to pay that much for a tire - especially when I average about 1 flat a year with tubes riding on bad city streets.
Based on Hed recommended psi chart I currently run 75-80 psi with tubes and I weigh 180 lbs.
I have been using GP5000 TL all season and have absolutely loved them. Riding with lower PSI is just more comfortable. I can’t notice any changes in rolling resistance, but the internet tells me its better.
Regarding mounting tubeless, I was not able to mount them myself with my floor pump but can do it first try every time with the Airshot (https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01BJ4MXQY/ref=cm_sw_em_r_mt_dp_U_vzKIDb1TA2RKM ).
The only downside that I have seen is due to poor decisions on my part. I like to use indoor training on my rollers (ranging from 45 min to 4 hrs) through out the year for both structured workouts and weather based reasons. I found that I had a lot of premature wear on my tires (which would have happened to any tires) and all my sealant (I use the orange stuff) dried up. The mechanic at my shop thinks that the heat from the rollers essentially ‘cooked’ the sealant causing it to congeal an dry up.
So, in sum, tubeless are great - but don’t use them indoors.
I did it, the best thing I’ve done to my bike. The ride quality is amazing, mind blowing amazing. It was a pain to seat the tire, but I don’t regret it.
Enve 5.6, vittoria corsa 28mm.
Two years and 15K kms experience running road tubeless here. I would recommend it for racing only. If flatting means you lose, it could be very valuable. For all other use. 100% do not bother. Road Tubeless is absolutely not fully resolved.
The pressures are simply too high, this results in numerous fails from what seem like insignificant cuts. If you live somewhere that doesn’t rain or you don’t ride through winter, then maybe it’s an option. However, if you ride on the usual glass and grit covered roads of a modern city. It is simply not significantly reliable.
Every single one of the riders I know who have tried it have switched back to tubes. I tried multiple brands and multiple sealants. Stans Race and Orange Seal were the best sealants. Both however, failed me on multiple occasions. Trying to fit a tube into a tight tubeless tire in the dark with sealant all over the place is a literal nightmare. Repairing the tires is also a pain. I ended up just throwing them away. This gets expensive quickly.
I run tubeless on my MTB, it works incredibly well, as I’m sure it does on high volume gravel tires. 100% recommended for those applications.
Summing up, don’t believe the marketing BS. Based on my experience and others I know, road tubeless is definitely not a proper solution for flat tires. Maybe a company will develop a better sealant that actually works at high pressure. Until then, it’s back to Latex tubes for me.
I’ve put Conti 5000TL 25mm on my Hunt 50s and I love them! Best upgrade I’ve done by far. Race regularly on them, couple of small punctures sealed right up.
Couldn’t ask for much more, especially because BC are now not allowing us a ‘lap out’ to swap a wheel!
I decided to swap the wheels over on my domane for winter and put 28mm 5000TL on instead of 25. First challenge getting old tyre off. Hard job mounting new tyre. Then it would not seat with track pump. CO2 ok but wasteful. Ordered an Airshot which arrived today and seated the tyre nicely. Small leak. Put in caffelatex sealant and all good.
Now for the rear. Epic battle again. Got it on. Pumped up. Small leak again. Added sealant. But it was coming out the spike holes. Unseated tyre and found tear in the tape. No! Epic battle. Mess. Clean up. Remove old tape and clean rim with acetone. Double layer of stan’s. Even more epic battle. Used a tyre key as well as levers. Airshot. Sealant. Job done.
Try tubeless they said.
For those struggling to mount tires, have you tried heating up the tire ahead of time? When I mounted my GP5000 TL’s, I heated them up with a hair dryer and it made a huge difference. I do this when mounting my mountain bike tires as well and it really helps.
puncturing is a chance, the watts/seconds are given, and the chances of puncturing during a race are pretty low, i havent punctured in a race for years . I’d probably take that chance for the lower resistance.
Based on other people’s experiences with mounting TL tires, punctures not sealing, and then having to do PITA roadside repairs, it re-affirms my decision on continuing to run tubes.
Yeah I’d really nervous cornering with front tyre at 20-30 psi 
Yeah, my bad. Student at the school of hard knocks.
I did use a hairdryer on the rear before mounting, it didn’t seem to help. I think adding two layers of tape made it harder. Given the old tape failed at a spoke hole, I didn’t want to risk a single layer again. The tape will be forced down harder into the channel now by inflation, which may well make life easier.
I’ve used Schwalbe One Pro on the Enve 4.5 AR rims, Contis are not compatible and they’re much easier to fit and remove. However I don’t rate them as highly for puncture resistance, rolling resistance or grip. My GF told me I was doing it wrong, and said I should be able to mount without levers. She quickly had to admit defeat.
The other issue I’ve found with these wheels (DT Swiss R470) is the tight bead and a slightly deep rim channel doesn’t allow inflation with a track pump whereas on the Enve rims that generally seems to work fine.
I’m supposed to be riding a 200k tomorrow in an area notorious for flints. So far my experience with these is 100% failure to seal but I have dynaplugs and my experience with these is good. I’ve spent so long this week messing with the tyre swap that my other prep is behind, but fitting mudguards and swapping discs and cassette over should not take too long.
I’ve got those same DT Swiss 470s and they are definitely hard to inflate with a track pump. But after maybe 20+ min of pulling the tire up onto the bead shelf I was able to get it done. Real pain in the ass though. It’s probably coming to the time where I should just buy a compressor and save myself the half hour per tire.
I’ve been on road tubeless (Schwalbe Pro One) for two years. Never had a flat. Lots of my riding buddies flat with tubes. Fitting and seating was too bad on my Rolf wheels. Run 75-80 psi.
Run tubeless on my gravel bike as well. Can’t imagine going back to tubes.
Anyone used the Schwalbe Pro One ‘Evo’ tubeless tyres? Looks like Schwalbe are promoting the newer model as more durable. I’m also coming to the conclusion that Pro Ones are too fragile, for autumn/winter use anyway, a shame because fitting them to my Hunt Sprint Aero Wide rims has been really straightforward.
I have one of the new pro ones (addix) and am running them tubeless. The compound does seem softer and more supple. They mounted on my hed ardennes easier than the old pro ones. Although the old pro ones weren’t that difficult. I think it’s due to the compound being more supple. And the new ones are following the new European standards for tubeless.
So far they seem to be doing just as good as the old pro ones, except sealant has been slowly seeping out of the tire in many locations. I’m not sure if this is due to the new addix compound. If so, they need to go back to drawing board. Hopefully this is an outlier. I did get the first batch that came out.
I haven’t done anything to test this, but from the feel of the new compound I can see traction and road feel being much better. Hopefully durability hasn’t taken a hit.
Ok so I decided to give Conti 4 seasons with tubes and sealant a try. Well today at 37F / 3C it was the worst of both worlds:
Got to fix a flat early on a 50 mile group ride, at a chilly 37F / 3C. Good times.
Maybe the Contis were pissed off because I brought these home yesterday:
Although talking to a former semi-pro after the ride, I’m probably going to setup with tubes.
Continuing the discussion from Road tubeless experiences:
After years or riding tubeless on MTB’s I was looking forward to road technology catching up and at least it looks like it has.
I have been riding GP5000TL’s 28mm for 11 months or so with punctures and super comfortable. I inflate them to 60-65 front and 65-70 rear and I am 77kg.
They were pretty straightforward to put on and seat on Roval CXL50s… super happy.
Ive used both Orange Seal and Stans Race Sealant. Both brands are highly recommended according to Bikeradar’s puncture test.
Personally, I’d choose the orange seal as when I was on the Stans Race Sealant, it could not seal 3 - 4 mm cuts. As opposed to orange seal which I have never had to end a ride due to puncture.
I do carry Dynaplugs however, even after 2 plugs, the Stans Race still couldnt seal. I have had 2 rides that I ended early (still rode back home) as I wasnt confident the punctures would seal.
The only issue I have is its hard to get Orange Seal where I am. Also, they really suck at replying your questions if you send them one.
Also, take note that both these sealants will clog up your injector (I use a milkit injector) if you dont inject the sealant within 1 - 2 seconds as the particles will clog up the hole.
Hope it helps.
