Tubes

jlloyd

Excluding latex tubes - Which are lovely, but expensive and are a pain to patch

Are inner tubes much of a muchness? - Looking at a bulk order for the coming year.

svetty

JLloyd wrote:

Excluding latex tubes - Which are lovely, but expensive and are a pain to patch

Are inner tubes much of a muchness? - Looking at a bulk order for the coming year.

I suspect you'll get varying views on this. I tend to use latex tubes on the rear tyre in summer and Conti supersonics on the fronts (and in the seat-pack as spares). I've my own - probably spurious - justification for this thinking that Latex is slightly more risky and not wanting a front blow-out at speed, and that the rear wheel is where the comfort benefits most accrue. In the winter I use bog-standard tubes - whichever are on offer at the time.

Incidentally I find latex tubes are easy to patch - I just use small pieces of old latex tube as patches

mercia_man

I just use standard Tip Top patches to repair latex tubes, exactly the same as I repair butyl tubes. Latex do puncture less frequently than butyl in my experience but of course need inflating before every ride. For cheaper everyday butyl tubes, I've always had good experiences with Michelin Airstop and Continental Race.

jstrang

Question related to this - is it worth using brand new tubes when fitting new tyres?

Matthewfalle

jstrang wrote:

Question related to this - is it worth using brand new tubes when fitting new tyres?

SO long as your old ones are fine no problem in using them

Matthewfalle

Svetty wrote:

JLloyd wrote:

Excluding latex tubes - Which are lovely, but expensive and are a pain to patch

Are inner tubes much of a muchness? - Looking at a bulk order for the coming year.

I suspect you'll get varying views on this. I tend to use latex tubes on the rear tyre in summer and Conti supersonics on the fronts (and in the seat-pack as spares). I've my own - probably spurious - justification for this thinking that Latex is slightly more risky and not wanting a front blow-out at speed, and that the rear wheel is where the comfort benefits most accrue. In the winter I use bog-standard tubes - whichever are on offer at the time.

Incidentally I find latex tubes are easy to patch - I just use small pieces of old latex tube as patches

CHainreaction Lifeline ones at £1.90 a pop or something - used loads of them, use them at work, great price, recommended.

bobones

JLloyd wrote:

Excluding latex tubes - Which are lovely, but expensive and are a pain to patch

Are inner tubes much of a muchness? - Looking at a bulk order for the coming year.

They can vary in weight quite substantially, e.g. Conti Supersonic at around 50 g as compared to "standard" ones at around 100-120 g. Also some have removable cores and/or threaded stems, which you may or may not prefer. I tend to prefer longer, smooth valve stems without removable cores as they don't chew up your pump valve or come loose when you don't intend them to. I always found these were good value even though they've gone up from 2 for £2.50 recently.

jstrang

Matthewfalle wrote:

jstrang wrote:

Question related to this - is it worth using brand new tubes when fitting new tyres?

SO long as your old ones are fine no problem in using them

Thanks - I needed 1 new tube anyway when I fitted my new tyres so went crazy and fitted new tubes on both anyway. Keeping old one as spare

MiddleRinger

I've never noticed any difference. Just been using the standard Conti Race 28 or Cannondale tubes for years, about middle of the range price wise and tend to stock up with a bunch when on special. I like removable valve cores so I can use the same tubes for my deep sections (with valve extender) as my other wheels.

I should probably get some of those Supersonics and become a proper weight weenie!

N0bodyOfTheGoat

It can make a huge difference in weight, when you move up through tubes sizes to those suitable for 4" fat tyres.

Supplied tubes on the Voodoo were ~550g each.
Schwalbe SV13J are ~390g each.
Schwalbe SV13F, which officially are 2.1-3" but work for many riders in 4" tyres, are just ~185g each.

froze

Cheap generic brand tubes will not be well made with varying thicknesses in the tube walls, and their valve stems will not last long. But if you stick with the 3 or 4 largest brands then you won't have those weird problems.

dannbodge

I like the specialized turbo tubes.
They are lighter than normal, not as fragile as latex and not too expensive