Originally Posted by
BluesDawg
...While I could ride these roads on a MTB, it would be a very different experience and not what I was after. What I like about this setup is that I can ride paved or unpaved roads efficiently. There are many roads here that start out paved, but the pavement ends and the road continues for miles before the pavement starts again or the road ends at a paved road. The tires need to be rugged and wider than typical road tires, but knobbies or 2" wide tires would be overkill and would detract from the on-road part of the ride, as would flat handlebars. For my preferences, a rugged road bike is the ticket for this, not a MTB.
I had a blast this weekend doing something similar on my vintage MTB.
It has hard forks, hardtail, and "skinny" tires for road use. I guess because of the geometry, it's almost more of a road bike than MTB. The tires are Serfas inverted tread tires that work great on road, and surprisingly well on light offroad trails/dirt roads. They're 26x1.5 (the smallest that will fit on my rims) inflated to 65psi. I like the flat bars for the rough portions and only use the bar ends on road.
I hit a "rails to trails" track that was basically dirt and gravel. I didn't need anything more than what I had on it. I did find some rough side trails that "need" exploring so I might go back with wider knobbies, but for what I was doing these tires did the trick. It was a fun ride!
I agree with you about knobbies detracting from the road ride. That's originally why I got my skinnies. The hum, vibration and air resistance that knobbies give you onroad get old after a bit.