Tyres - fold or rigid

jon_e00

I've been spending the day looking at a range of tyres as I'm after a pair.
What should I be looking for.?

What do you recommend? Ideally Yellow/Black

What is the difference between folding and rigid and why would you choose one instead of the other?

Stewie Griffin

Folding are lighter and as they fold some folk will carry a spare on rides. Cant be much fun carrying a non folding tyre around all day.

P*nct*re resistance and weight are the 2 most important things for me. Schwalbe Stelvio Plus are good tyres. Am also glad to say that they only come in black :roll:

Big Red S

Folding tyres are lighter.
Non-folding tyres are cheaper.

Folding tyres are also easier to carry as spares.

jon_e00

So if I am buying two new tyres to go straight on a bike should I be going for folding or rigid? I understand that folding is ideal for carrying a spare but am currently interested in tyres that are intended to go straight on the bike.

thanks for all the help.

STEFANOS4784

I use these due to a mistake on e-bay:
http://www.cyclesportsuk.co.uk/product_ ... ts_id=1182

Seem to get good reviews and are much quicker than my old ones and available in yellow

marcelino

Or these.

http://www.wiggle.co.uk/p/Cycle/7/Vittoria_Rubino_Pro_Tyre/5360010640/

marcelino

Or these.

http://www.wiggle.co.uk/p/Cycle/7/Vittoria_Rubino_Pro_Tyre/5360010640/

Big Red S

jon_e00 wrote:

So if I am buying two new tyres to go straight on a bike should I be going for folding or rigid? I understand that folding is ideal for carrying a spare but am currently interested in tyres that are intended to go straight on the bike.:

Ideally kevlar ones, for the weight saving. On the edge of the wheel is where weight savings have the greatest effect.

jon_e00

what about width?

Mettan

jon_e00 wrote:

what about width?

Get a pair of 700 x 23 width Folding tyres:

Some ideas:

Rubino Pro Folding's:

http://www.wiggle.co.uk/p/Cycle/7/Vitto ... 360010640/

Good quality, Mid-priced Training tyre. (Ribble might have them cheaper for a pair?). I use them - very pleased.

redddraggon

Mettan wrote:

Get a pair of 700 x 23

Why not 700x25?

jon_e00

What do different widths give you?

redddraggon

Firefox had the runs........

redddraggon

Oh dear firefox is broken.....

redddraggon

jon_e00 wrote:

What do different widths give you?

Narrower does not equal faster.

23mm is an OK width, but I'd recommend 25mm tyres as you can run them at lower pressures to give more comfort and little increase in rolling resistance.

Wider tyres at lower pressure also tend to give better wet weather grip (assuming everything else is equal) although the difference is largely negligible.

Personally I reckon 25mm is the best all round tyre - more so if you weigh more than a stereotypical roadie - plenty on here even use 25mm for racing.

I personally wouldn't recommend anything more than 25mm as a lot of bikes don't have the clearances for bigger tyres.

bice

I cant quite understand why you would need a foldable tyre with you. On 28s and 35s on hybrids commuting - laterlly with Swalbe Marathons (not pluses) - I have never had a puncture that destroyed the other tyre. presumably on road bikes, these can slash badly? Is that the case also with Armadillos? I have got a 25 on the back and the cheapie standard tyre that came with the Trek 1.7 on the front. I will use for a while and then change. But how many people have actually had a tear in a puncture resistant tyre that makes it impossible to get home?

redddraggon

bice wrote:

I cant quite understand why you would need a foldable tyre with you.

I think the dude was referring to Touring as opposed to "normal riding".

andy_wrx

If you were touring in some out-of-the-way place like Tibet or Morocco, then you'd want to take a spare tyre and obviously a folding one is easier to carry.
But just for UK 'normal' use, I agree it's overkill - the most you might need to carry would be a tyre 'boot' (a section of old tyre or other stiff material you put inside a badly-slashed tyre to stop the tube poking-out)

The real difference in practice is weight, quality and price.
Folding tyres are lighter. They may also be higher quality. They'll be more expensive.
The most expensive, highest quality, lightest tyres will be folders.

A folding tyre has a kevlar bead rather than a wire one, so it saves about 100g or so on the tyre (i.e Rubino Pro is ca 220g for 700x23 rather than 320g for non-folding 'plain' Rubino)

If you're going to save 200g on your bike, then perhaps the best place to save it is as rotating weight at the wheelrim.
But it is only 200g and whether that makes a difference to you and is worth paying the extra will depend...

On your super-lightweight racebike, definitely
On your commuter/winter bike fitted with rack, guards, heavyweight everything else, where puncture protection and cheapness are more important, then probably not.


They probably cost much more to buy than the difference in manufacturing costs - how much more expensive is kevlar cord than steel wire ? How much more expensive is the manufacturing ?

Probably it's what the market will pay, same as e.g. we'll pay more for a car with a 2.0 engine than a 1.6 even though both probably cost the same for to make.

Actually, you could argue that folding tyres should be cheaper than non-folding : because they're lighter and smaller, they'll will cost less to ship mail order or on a lorry, will use less space in storage in a warehouse !