Tyres for Gisburn trail?

stehall
stehall Posts: 3
edited November 2009 in MTB beginners
Hi all, I'm new to this so please excuse my ignorance!
I recenlty bought a Scott Sportster p55, it's a 'hybrid, but leans towards the mtb side rather than a road bike i.e front suspension, disc brakes, sturdy frame etc
Although I bought it mainly to use to get to work along canal towpaths and the occasional farm track, I'd like to give Gisburn forest trail a go. The guy at the shop said the bike can handle it, but I'll need new tyres. The ones I have are 'semi slicks', and are a bit scary in the mud. My question is what tyres do I need, obviously I need 'knobbly' types, but what size is best? My current tyres/wheels read 622 x 19 DIN, alloy 700C. I haven't a clue what it means, and when I checked a site reccommended (chainreactioncycles.com) I was overawed! if anyone can suggest some tyres or sizes I'd be really grateful, as I'm well and truly lost. I'm willing to spend up to say £40 for the pair, and would like some up to say 1.8 inch wide max. Thanks for taking the time to read this.

Comments

  • Father Faff
    Father Faff Posts: 1,176
    What shop on Earth was that? Couldn't they tell you what tyres you needed? And sell them to you?

    Gisburn Forest has many routes - the easy routes you could probably ride with the tyres you have as it is just forestry track though more knobbly tyres would obviously give you less chance of sliding off on loose or slippy stuff. However there is also a new red route, black bits and even a downhilly bit all of which probably would be safer with a mountain bike and proper wide mountainbike tyres......though of course it would be interesting to try on a hybrid.
    Commencal Meta 5.5.1
    Scott CR1
  • Father Faff
    Father Faff Posts: 1,176
    With a bit of googling something like this might fit the bill:

    http://www.petracycles.co.uk/speed-king ... 7kiffb3rs0

    Continental make good tyres and the Speed King is a top-end tyre on mountain bike sized wheels so I would imagine it has a good performance on your wheel size of 700C (commonly used on cyclocross bikes). There are plenty of cheaper 700C tyres with nobblies on if you don't want to splash out this much.

    I'd still be nervous about doing the red route on them but if you don't try you'll never know!
    Commencal Meta 5.5.1
    Scott CR1
  • stubs
    stubs Posts: 5,001
    You need to look for 29 inch tyres which are 700c for mountain bikes. Or cyclocross tyres which are 700x 35. To be honest I have never seen a 29er tyre less than 2 inch wide you might run into frame clearance issues with knobblies on a hybrid.

    Try these links for cyclocross tyres they should be okay for Guisburn

    http://www.allterraincycles.co.uk/product/108019.html

    http://www.chainreactioncycles.com/Models.aspx?PartnerID=79&ModelID=36769
    Fig rolls: proof that god loves cyclists and that she wants us to do another lap
  • Thanks a lot folks, much appreciated
  • for a little jaunt around, without going on the 'big stuff' then i've seen planty of folks at gisburn on semi-slicks - plenty of kids on normal play bikes seem to manage, if it's not terribly wet, anyway.
  • biff55
    biff55 Posts: 1,404
    ^^quote above ; " if its not terribly wet"
    which is about 2 weeks a year in the pendle valley area :D


    approaching post 100 , getting excited now :D