Just wondering if anyone here is running a tubeless system on a C& V bike? If so, how do you like it?

Kind of hard to seal all those spoke heads, let alone pinned and unwelded rims.

For me, tubeless on a road bike is questionable, if I were to get a high speed casing failure I really want to be on a tubular, not a section of rim.
I have friends who like them for off road use, but they all have endured "messes" from time to time. No goo for me.

Hey - When it happens it happens...

Anything to gets your bike on the road vintage or not is good...

Waiting for the pic...

I'm interested as well.

Here's a Weigle with shaved, tubeless Hetres on Pacenti rims.



Another 650b machine with tubeless Hetres.

The closest I've come to riding tubeless on a Classic and Vintage bike is with my '97 lugged steel Pinarello. In my mind, it's not old enough to be vintage, but I think it's a classic.

I've run Stan's Notubes in mountain bike tires for over ten years, nearly as long as Stan has been in the tubeless business. When I got a new carbon fiber road bike last Fall, I thought I would go ahead and try road tubeless. I built some very nice, light wheels, using Stan's Notubes Alpha 340 rims, American Classic hubs, and DT Aerolite spokes. The Alpha 340 rims are shaped in such a way that makes them ideal for road tubeless. The tubeless tire, when mounted, has a slightly rounder, higher volume shape when it's on these rims. The rims do have conventional spoke holes, so it's important to use a couple of layers of Stan's Notubes rim tape. The tape is a very thin plastic, and it's very sticky on one side. With two layers of it in the road rim, it will withstand the high pressures of a road tire and will seal off the spoke holes.

I didn't know this when I first started working with road tubeless, but pretty much any double walled clincher road rim can be set up tubeless. You set them up just like I described above, by using Stan's yellow rim tape in the appropriate width. The key is that you have to use one of the road-tubeless-specific tires on the market (which is also true when using "tubeless ready" road rims). The downside is that, and it will depend on the specific rim how much this will matter, a tubeless road tire mounted on a standard (non-tubeless) road rim will typically not give you the nice round, higher volume shape that it will have when mounted on a tubeless-ready road rim.

So here's my ride report. With the Alpha 340's on the carbon bike, I've put in quite a lot of miles, and have absolutely loved the road tubeless setup. I've used the Hutchinson Atom tubeless tires on this bike, and have worn one pair of these tires out and have installed a second pair. I have about 4000 miles on the bike with this setup. The ride quality is excellent, as one would hope. I run less pressure with road tubeless than I do with tubes; I'm running about 105 psi on the rear tire and about 100 psi in the front, where with tubes I would run about 115psi rear and 110 psi front. The mounted tires, on the Alpha 340 rims, measure exactly 23mm with a nice round shape. Keep in mind, I have always run Stan's Notubes sealant in my tubeless tires. Tubeless without sealant makes very little sense to me, as that would take away one of the big advantages of tubeless. The sealant works. In the 4000 + miles I've ridden on road tubeless, I've not had a flat yet. I feel like I'd have to really tear a good sized gash in the tire to get a flat. I do carry a tube and material for a tire boot, just in case.

On the Pinarello, I sometimes ride with a Mavic Ksyrium Elite wheelset installed. These, of course, are very modern wheels, and they do not have spoke holes; the unconventional spoke nipples are threaded into one rim wall, and so no spoke holes are needed. As I became more familiar with road tubeless, I realized that this wheelset might be an ideal candidate to set up tubeless. So I got some road tubeless tires, and without any rim tape (again, no spoke holes on these rims), installed them with the normal dose of Stan's sealant. Everything worked great, and I rode with them at a slightly lower pressure than normal, resulting in good ride quality when combined with the very high quality tires. However, the mounted tires only measure about 20- 21mm, as I used the same Hutchinson Atom tubeless tires as I used on the other bike. These particular tires are the lightest of all the road tubeless tires available, so they probably are a little narrower than the other tubeless tires on the market. I never had a flat with this setup, as expected. But I don't know, I wasn't crazy about the narrowness of the tires, and there are other tires I like better on this bike. So after a few hundred miles, I went back to tubes on this bike (actually, it was when I wore out the first pair of Atoms on the carbon bike and needed new tires that I moved these tires over to that bike). I simply wasn't as impressed with this setup as I am with the tubeless-ready rims.

I should add that I own a bike shop, we are a Stan's Notubes dealer, and we sell and set up A LOT of tubeless wheels/tires, both road and mountain. For the most part, people love it. The downside is that a lot of people never really learn how to install a tubeless tire themselves, install the sealant, etc, and so the whole thing remains a bit of a mystery to them even if we have set it up for them and they ride extensively on it. I don't think that's a good thing; I think you ought to be able to install whatever tires you're using yourself, and have complete confidence in your ability to do it and understand it.

Hope this helps-

Beautiful Pics Colonel and great report Wellbiked - THANKS

Great report and it inspires me to actually run the tubeless wheels that I own as tubeless.

Dag! Given how light Hetre's are, I'd imagine these bikes really accelerate hard compared to having the extra weight of a tube. I'm pretty conservative though, so I doubt I'll be moving in that direction anytime soon.

I'm kinda suspicious of road tubeless because of the need for the carbon fiber beads and special sharp corners to prevent blowoffs. Also, I like fat tires and there just aren't 30mm supple tubeless road tires yet.

Tubeless Hetres sounds pretty hot, though... the pressure is as almost as low as MTB tires, where tubeless is already well-proven without needing any kind of special beads to prevent blowoffs.

I tried tubeless on my Campy Eurus convertible wheels, swapping tires with a guy in a town nearby.
He tried my Tufo tubular clinchers, I tried his Hutchison tubeless w/Stan's sealant and valves.

I'm back on the tubular clinchers and he's back on his tubeless. He's happy, I'm happy.
The wheels came clean, no problem. He's a steady distance guy, I ride shorter and harder.

Pro's:
The tubeless ride better than my tubular clinchers, but about the same or a bit "heavier" than my regular tubulars.
They look nice, and have a little more cornering "tread" than the tubular clinchers, seem sturdier than my Pro Race's.
I agree with well biked, they "round out" a lot better, at lower pressure, than my tubulars, clincher or regular.
Weight-wise, about the same. Look like clinchers.

Con's:
All psychological, because I didn't have a flat. I did worry about having one.
I had less confidence about high-speed cornering, and jst didn't like the sealant idea.
I don't "pre-treat" my tubulars with sealant, and don't like it as an idea for fixing a flat.
(I once treated a car flat with Slime, and the vibrations over 35mph were crazy bad).

Some of the guys at REI and Performance like the tubeless idea, a lot.
I think I'll wait a while, and I think yes, it's the future for a large % of riders.

To me, right now, they're the same as clincher tubulars, ride a bit nicer, but are messier.
Both take longer to mount and remove. Both are light, and both cost more.
However, the clincher tubulars could care less what rim you mount them on, and are clean.

For 650B applications, I think I may like it more.
There is so much more tire, and so much less pressure, maybe I'd have less anxiety.
I'm also sure if I had to change, and got used to the installation and flat tire procedure, I'd be fine.

My supply of wheels is a hand-me down market, and until they start showing up in that market, it's not an issue for me.

Down the road, sure. Of course, it would be so much easier to have the whole fleet on one or the other.
My favorite tires that are tubed are almost all a major PITA to get on the rim, and pinching tubes happens.
I prefer tubulars, but that requires having tubular wheelsets, expensive tape, and higher-dollar tires to get good performance. I like tubular clinchers, but have not found a reasonable one for racing.

If the wheel build is nice, and I can get past the idea of sealant running around in there, I don't see why not.

Has anyone run non tubeless specific tires and if so what can you use?

I don't know how popular it is, or how reliable, but there's a DIY approach that's apparently called "ghetto tubeless" or "redneck tubeless" that uses part of an innertube to seal the whole rim. The edge of the piece of tube is locked between the bead of the tire and the hook of the rim, so imperfections in the rim are not an issue.

Those of you who know my DIY tendencies will see right away why I am tempted to try this. But I haven't. Yet.

For more information, I suggest you google "ghetto tubeless." I watched a youtube video about it, and remain intrigued.

It's funny, because when Stan's Notubes tubeless system was first introduced, it was competing directly against the relatively new UST tubeless system. UST was developed by Mavic, Hutchinson, and Michelin, sort of a French conglomerate. Big, established companies vs. this little guy in upstate NY who ran a go-cart track. It didn't take long for Stan's system to be nicknamed "ghetto tubeless" by some......word got around soon enough that pro mountain bikers running UST wheels and tires were using Stan's Notubes sealant, because it was the only way they could get their UST tires to hold air.

I had ghetto tubeless on my MTB. In my first race, my front tire pressure went low (the tubeless setup was a little old). I went through a turn really hard and the tire burped off the rim. I carried the bike the remaining 4 miles and 'finished' the race on foot (Then the race published their results with my name as a DNF. So what if I took an hour longer than everyone else!?!?).
I couldn't get the tire to reseal later, so I put a tube in. A couple months later, I was prepping to go on a ride and the rear tire had lost its seal. So I was late for the ride trying to find a tube.
I've seen tubeless specific tires and rims seat and seal without having any sealant in them. That's a bit more confidence inspiring. After my experience, I have no faith in ghetto tubeless and using standard tires in a tubeless setup.

In the mountain bike world, you can run most any tire you want as long as you use either a tubeless ready rim or one of Stan's rim conversion kits (primarily a special rubber rim strip that has a valve stem on it). The conversion kits are what most folks were using several years ago (these kits consist of the thin plastic rim tape, special rubber rim strip with valve stem attached, and sealant) but nowadays there are a lot more tubeless-ready rims on the market. What you're doing with the kit is "converting" a standard mtb rim to a tubeless rim. The tire choice is not as critical because they're run at much lower psi; on my 29er I run 30 psi rear and about 25 psi front. I always advise folks that if they plan to run their mtb tires higher than 40 psi then tubeless is not for them. The main benefit is that lower pressures give better traction and ride quality off road without worry of a pinch flat. If you plan to run anything higher than 40 psi, it negates that anyway. I will say this: there are a LOT more "tubeless ready" tires on the market nowadays than there were just two or three years ago. If you plan to run tubeless on a mountain bike, you might as well use a tubeless-ready tire. The difference is the tire's bead is probably a little stouter, and the sidewalls are probably a little stiffer.

With cyclocross tires, kind of in-between road and mountain, folks are experimenting, just kind of doing whatever works in regard to tubeless. Our shop sponsors a small team, and honestly, there's no way I could explain all the different things they do with their tires. I really don't even know. Seems like everybody has their own ideas and thoughts on the matter.

I'm strongly considering using the Stan's system with Hetres on a wheelset I built earlier this year. Apparently, incidence of puncture flats is reduced due to the sealant (which stands to reason).

Does using CO2 make a difference with tubeless?

It's not recommended. It will make the sealant turn lumpy if you use sealant. As for just inflating a tubeless tire without sealant, I'd still use air; for a lot of tubeless applications, an air compressor is required to get the tire inflated initially, then you can top off with a regular air pump.

FWIW: Someone in the shop just pointed out that Hutchinson is introducing a 700 x 28c version of their Intensive road tubeless tire. Until now, the 700 x 25c Hutchinson Intensive road tubeless tire was the widest road tubeless-specific tire on the market. A 28mm tubeless-specific tire was something we felt was missing from the market. This is good news; the ride quality should be top notch.

stumbled on this thread a bit late to the party but I think I can add a few things as I've been researching tubeless for the last few weeks and just took my first ride on a cx tire with them.

1. Can you use any tire in a road tubeless setup? NO! DONT DO IT! DONT THINK ABOUT IT! at high pressures the tire will blow off the rim. i set up my 32c cx tires today and initially inflated to 80 psi fully planning to go down from there. i was sitting on my couch chilling when BLADOW!!!!! Sealant all over the place!!!! The cx tires I was using are NOT tubeless ready but are widely known as able to work fine with tubeless setups however normally a CX rider would be running between 30-40psi. I was under the incorrect impression that I needed to initally inflate to a higher psi for a couple of hours to really make sure the bead sealed. That was erroneous info that I received from 1 source. you only need to get high pressure to get the inital bead seated and you will hear the tires POP.

2. Hutchinson intensive 25c road tubeless tires are widely known as still only being a 23 c tire much to the chagrin of everyone. The whole "hutchinson is ocming out with a 28c tubeless road tire" rumor has been going on for a couple of years. believe it when you see it. With that said, the whole thing about tubeless is that you can safely run much lower pressures without fear of pinchflatting so I'm a bit surprised that so many people say they want a 28c tire for tubeless as its like pulling teet to get any roadies to put a 25c regular tire on.

3. I'm 250lbs. I want a large sized tubeless road tire just so I can try to get somewhat close to the comfort that a 150lb rider currently has on a 23c tire. Tonight I put a 32c CX tire on the front of my surly disc trucker and inflated to 45psi. I'm so used to running high pressures that I was curious how this was going to go over (I normally run a 700x40 randoneur hyper at 80psi on this bike so to go with almost half that pressure in a 32c was a big step for me!) IT worked out great. I didn't suffer much loss of speed with a CX tire vs a slick because the lower pressure gives the tire a great contact patch with the road. When I hit manhole covers with deep grooves I cruised right over them with zero issues instead of getting my bones jarred. this is a GREAT thing as a commuter in NYC. At my size, I'm always feeling the need to swerve around potholes and other road hazards. When there is a lot of traffic, you can't always swerve around things confidently and safely. It's very nice to know that I can ride right through things with no issues.

4. Can you trust sealant to seal flats? Well i've only ridden tonight on this setup, but I've used sealant inside of tubes on my tubular road wheels and yes, sealant works pretty well to seal up holes, especially if you aren't pumping your tires up over 100 psi. there are conflicting stories about what sealants do what best but most people seem to say that stans is the best. If you ride a regular tubed wheelset and have a removeable valvecore that also has threads on the entire valve, i recommend you buy the stans sealant and syringe and inject 30ml into your regular road tubes. you will be glad you did! the stuff works!.

5. whoever said it takes longer to set up a tubeless tire is full of it. its really simple. put the bead on one side of rim. put the bead on the other side leaving all but the last 7 inches . pour 30-60ml of sealant into the tube. rotate tire a little bit and finishing putting the bead into the tire. Hit the tire with a compressed air til the bead seats and you are good. Top off with a hand pump the appropriate pressure as needed.

The thing (thing. Note the singular) that has kept me from trying to go tubeless is that apparently you need a compressor to get up inflate the tire for the first time. In all the time I've been riding bikes, a zefal hp pump was sufficient for getting up to pressure. I don't have a compressor; and I've never wanted one. I can pump air by hand, but not fast enough for a tubeless system.

Huh? You have to inflate fast? Why is that?

There are a lot of variables and quite a few different situations with tubeless, but in a nutshell: seating the tire's bead depends on air pressure being in the tire. The tubeless tire cannot become airtight until this happens. An air compressor floods a high volume of air into a tire very quickly, gets the bead seated, and the tire becomes airtight as a result, and inflates. Initial inflation with a tubeless tire, using a floor pump, is difficult in most situations, if not impossible. You can't get enough air into the tire fast enough for it to become airtight and inflate. In most cases with a floor pump, you just pump air right out beneath the tire's bead.

There are exceptions, and on more than one occasion I've been able to pump up tubeless tires from scratch with a floor pump. You can't depend on it, though, and it can be done, IME, only with tubeless-specific tires and rims.

Keep in mind, once you get tubeless tires inflated, they can be topped off with a hand pump, no problem. It's the initial inflation, getting the bead seated, that's often tricky. Soapy water on the tire's bead, etc is a good idea.

Resurrecting this old thread to report that the road tubeless tire Hutchinson Sector 28 is now on the market (has been for a few months I believe). I've been using these tires for a few weeks now, and I gotta say they're everything I hoped they would be. Mounted on Stan's Alpha road rims, they measured 28.4mm wide on my calipers, so a true 28. Hutchinson's recommended pressure 87 psi (max 101 psi), I've been running them at about 88 rear and 84 front. Awesome ride quality......Just thought I'd put this out there.

I'm ordering a pair tonight. I bought HED Ardennes + and being they're tubeless ready I figured why not give it a go? It seems that it's mostly advantageous.