Rim width v. tire size
 

Just out of curiosity, is there a rule of thumb for gauging what tires will fit on what rims?

The Mavic rims on my MTB have it printed on the stickers (1.0" to 2.2"), but the Sun Rhyno Lites I have on my commuter (much, much wider) have no such documentation. I have a feeling that the 1.75s I put on are going to be a devil to remove.

Any thoughts from the experts? Thanks!

I've got a similar situation. My roadie tires say 27" * 1", and the rims say 27" * 1 1/4". I was really surprised to see my rims were labelled wider than my tires.

Sheldon has a chart. look near the bottom of the page.

http://sheldonbrown.com/tire-sizing.html

Oh, that Sheldon Brown! What CAN'T he help me with? :)

Then in my case, mounting difficulty must be a function of tire type/quality and not rim width. Hmm.

Thanks, all!

Sheldon's chart says that's theoretically possible, but I can't imagine how. Do you have awesome tire levers, or what?

The chart is meant to indicate which combinations are safe, not how easy/hard they are to mount.

ive put different sizes on before with no probs

When mountain bikes first came out, we had very little choice with what setup to use. The hot setup was a cut and rejoined Mavic rim (MA40, about 21mm wide if I recall) running 2.2" to 2.5" tires at 15-30 psi (no suspension forks). I ran 2.35" tires on similar rims for the longest time with no problems.

The problem is when you put a tire narrower than the rim (or close to the same size). That's when you start having a lot of pinch flats.

I'm not sure if things are different with current mtb's but I never had any difficulty mounting or dismounting tires with the setup. I struggle more with the road tires for sure.

hope this helps,
cdr

I currently have 1.75" tires mounted on Sun Rhyno Lite rims. It's really a much better match to the rim than anything narrower. I had 1.25" tires mounted previously. I think the beads were a bit tight, and that combined with the wiiiiide rims (for those of you who've never seen them in person, Rhyno Lites are better than an inch across) made them the very devil to get on and off. My 1.75" Panaracer T-Servs, albeit with Kevlar bead, have been no problem at all. I wouldn't hesitate to mount tires up to about 2.5" on them.

I've seen some amazingly fat tires on some pretty skinny rims. One issue that no one has mentioned is clearance. You will get to some point with fatter and fatter tires where they may not clear - either height or width - the fork crown, the fork stays, or, in the rear, the seat stays. With road bikes, the clearances are just tiny at times. 2mm is not unusual.

Mounting problems seem to come with some combinations of certain tires and certain rims. It's pretty much hit or miss. Most are not a problem and you should be able to remove with just a lever and mount with your hands. For really stubborn mounts the KoolStop TireJack is an awesome tool. Plus, it costs less than $10.

I currently have 26x1.75" Performance SpeedTrac/Ks on these Rhyno Lites. I actually had a flat yesterday (in the office... darn valve just let go of the tube) and it took a lot of effort with my Park levers to get one bead off so I could remove the offending tube. I am now somewhat worried about getting them off for good when they wear the rest of the way out.

I have a set of 1.5" Panaracer Paselas in the shed, but I'm not sure I want to risk putting them on these rims and never being able to remove them. I definitely appreciate the input.