Is 2.48kg overly heavy for a front wheel and tyre?

shigllgetcha

Whipped my front wheel off and it weighed 2.48kg, is that alot for a 26" front wheel or is it about average

njee20

Depends really, is that with a 2" semi-slick on a race bike, if so very heavy. Or is it with a 2.5" dual ply DH tyre, in which case not bad.

You could go a lot lighter, but it's a pretty useless piece of information on its own.

shigllgetcha

Had a feeling it might be lol

I have a carrera vulcan and it has CST MTB TRACTION tyres.

I only really do XC (some tarmac some forestry fire roads and a little mud) and im finding the hills very hard going and it doesnt seem to be getting any easier. I was reading a discussion yesterday that alot of weight on the wheels can make it hard going on the hills

njee20

Correct, changing the rear wheel will make a bigger difference, and it's heavier to start with. Not a cheap part to replace though.

shigllgetcha

Yeh couldnt afford to change the wheel/s, could change tyres though if it would give me any kind of noticable difference

-sorry should have started the thread saying tyres were all I could change and maybe tubes if it helped at all

The Rookie

The DDM wheels on the Carrera are fairly light (about 2.1Kg wheelset), but those CST's are heavy (I have some 2.35's in the shed that weigh over 1Kg each), something like a Panaracer XC pro wired will save you 250-300g a tyre, get some lighter tubes like the Schwalbes at 125g (the CST are about 220g each) each and you'd get the front wheel to about 2Kg for a lot less money than a wheelset!

shigllgetcha

is this what you are suggesting?
http://www.chainreactioncycles.com/Mode ... lID=54053#

I just feels like its harder work than it should and what I remember from my old bike back I rode when I was younger

The tyres are cheaper than I expected, i think id give tubes a punt at that price
This is what you are talking about?
http://www.chainreactioncycles.com/Mode ... elID=26726

What size would go with 2.1 in the tyres?

njee20

Panaracer tyres are heavy, even in Kevlar bead guise, and IMO are dreadful. Check out On One for cheap Schwalbes, Rocket Ron Performance can usually be had for <£20 each and weigh c500g each.

shigllgetcha

Ill have a look at those too.

You guys think it would be worth changing the tyre then?

Some weight off the wheel and less rolling resistance should help with hills?

jairaj

Wire bead tyres weight more than folding tyres and are harder to put on. Compare the same tyre in folding and wire bead for price and weight and see what compromise you're happy with. Sometimes you get lucky and the folding bead is only a few £ more expensive.

njee20

are harder to put on

Not necessarily.

These are good, although not up to much in the mud.

shigllgetcha

Thanks guys ill look into all the suggestions

MountainMonster

You could get into some high costs when buying a new wheel especially if you only focus on getting really light ones. You could probably get that down to about 1700g for not a huge chunk of change, probably about 250 or so.

You will notice a huge difference in the way the bike rides if you switched to light toys and wheels.

Buying some new tyres would be very good value for money though, especially since you say you mostly just do XC. Probably an outlay of around 80-90 on both tyres for something decent and light will improve things.

shigllgetcha

yeh dont have the money to change wheels and dont really know if it would cost effective, as the beginner says its more the tyres that are heavy rather than the wheels so I think ill go with new tyres and see how that goes.

I dont want to end up changing everything on the bike, it was supposed to be a budget buy

VWsurfbum

cheap mud tyres for you
http://www.planet-x-bikes.co.uk/i/q/TYG ... lding_tyre

njee20

Heavy and slow though. I'd say mud tyres are overkill for:

some tarmac some forestry fire roads and a little mud

shigllgetcha

Ive ordered the ones njee suggested, seems like what I am after, ill let you know how much they save and more importantly how there work

thanks guys

Benz carrera

I also have a carrera Vulcan 2012 and I find it heavy which I new it was on the heavy side when I got it but seems ok but I suppose every thing cud do with a little weight loss lol I might look into new tyres and tubes but will wear d originals down first. Have you got the white skeletal brakes on?

shigllgetcha

yeh i have those brakes. they seem to need a good pull at the start of every ride to get them working properly. Im happy enough with them

Im just really struggling on hills, there isnt much I can get up without having to get off the bike, I knew it was abit heavy when I was buying it but didnt think it would as much of an impact (that is if its the weight thats the problem and not me)

Maybe its just me and I need to man up but ill see if the tyres help

Benz carrera

Well I took my bike back with those brakes on cus the pads kept sticking and they upgraded them to the re-designed all black ones as they said they have ad problems with the white ones and my rear cassette broke so they upgraded me to a new SRAM one quite lucky really,defo let me no of anything that helps you with yours

shigllgetcha

ill update the thread when i get a go with the tyres.

I was debating whether I should bother with the 6 week service and based on your problems I might now just incase

Benz carrera

Well I took mine back after 2 weeks lol and they changed the brakes and a week later the bottom cog snapped off my cassette so I caused havoc and they upgraded it and give me the 12 month plan lol

Benz carrera

Did you tell the difference with the new tyres and tubes? What did u get what other stuff you done?

Northwind

Worth checking the weight of the tubes too, btw... My brother's carrera came with 2 absolute beasts that weigh about as much as a tyre.

The Rookie

See my previous post, the stock CST tubes are about 220g, you can get to 120g easily.