Fatandre

Do any of you ride the MB on the road on road tyres?
You have any pics of your bikes?

Daspydyr 

I have a good pairr of Michelin Commuters. But I am lazy and just ride the knobbies everywhere these days. I should switch out the Raptors on the HT and just use the HT in town. Where are your pics?

Fatandre

I just ordered the tyres. Wanted to see your setup.
This is what I bought

mroll

I've got a Trek 4500 (hardtail) that sees some trails on the weekends, but by far sees more road miles. I bought a pair of super cheap 'Vee Rubber' semi trekking tires at my LBS. There's a flat-ish continuous surface with a rut in the middle of the tire, and knobby ridges further to the periphery. They actually work quite well, but I wouldn't mind trying out those Continentals next time round.

I swap on Kenda knobbys for the trails.

canyoneagle

Here's mine. First is the MTB setup, the second is in commuting mode. Note: The MTB setup is more up to date (grips, saddle). The change over takes less than an hour (closer to 30 minutes). I have two front wheels with tires mounted - the commuter uses a dynamo hub and Supernova E3 lighting. So I change the rear tire, throw on the fenders, lights and rack and I'm ready to go.
Tires are Schwalbe Marathon Supreme 50mm.

contango 

My Specialized Rockhopper has a Marathon Plus ATB tyre on the front and a Marathon Extreme on the back. Most of the riding I did on it was on the road, which is why I bought a cross bike. Now I can get around faster on the road but still cope with light offroading. I've still got the Rockhopper, and now I don't need it to be so road-friendly I'm probably going to put chunkier tyres on it to blat around in the mud.

Don't have pictures at the moment...

rnorris

I have an older Cannondale HT that I keep in knobbies, because my rides around Flagstaff often involve a mix of miles on trails and roads. It's fun to alternate between them on impulse. Have two road bikes for long distance rides on pavement.

pupuplader

I ran a pair of Continental Contact and are by far the best 26" tire for road that I have used so far.

DX-MAN

I have run all different kinds of tires on my MTB, which sees 100% of my riding -- commuting, errands, trails, MUP, etc -- and the only tires I've run that have worked better than the present Michelin Country Dry 2.15's were the Intense Micro Knobby 2.25's. Those, however, SUCKED at anything but pavement rolling, whereas the Mich's rock the dirt, as well.

I have a set of Maxxis Ridgelines (2.1) waiting for the Mich's to wear out, so the experiment continues.

Raging_Bulls

2011 Bulls Copperhead 3 on Bontrager Hank 2.2" full-slicks.

The bike has since received upgraded brakes and loads of KCNC parts, but I'm still waiting for good weather to take new pictures.

These tires are only suitable for road use. Despite the lack of profile, they handle rain and ice just fine.
On snow they tend to slide a bit more than knobby tires, but they provide enough feedback to know how much grip I have left. I did around 500 miles in the snow last winter without a single scary moment.
In all conditions I have around 50 psi at the front, 58 at the back. (translated from 3.5 bar and 4.0 bar, due to using the metric system here)

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On my previous bike, the Cannondale F6, I also used the Schwalbe Big Apple, both in 2.00 and 2.35" versions.



They wore out a lot quicker, provided less grip and had no feedback whatsoever when going near the limit. Truly horrid tires, but they looked magnificent.

corvuscorvax

I tour (on-road and off-road) on a flat-bar MTB:



Just bought a set of Schwalbe Marathon Plus 26x1.75 tires that I am most happy with. Nice, smooth rolling rubber with enough tread for trails and gravel roads.

Stealthammer

I don't use road tires on my mountain bikes at all, but I've done literally 10,000s of mile on the road on my MTBs over the past 25 years, and 10-20 years ago I would regularly (every 1-2 weeks) do 150-180+ mile on-road/off-road days. I still regularly do 40-60 mile on-road/off-road days at 55 years old on my Fisher Opie and 60-80 mile on-road rides on the Serrota T-Max. The Maxxis MaxxLites are the closest thing to a mountain bike "road" tire I've used since I had a set of Fatboys back in the '90s and at 60psi they roll plenty fast enough for me.

The Fisher Opie normally runs Michelin Country Muds 26x2.0, or WTB Weirwolf 26x2.3 Kevlar tires with between 40-60psi and gets a lot of use as an Cross Country/Freeride/Urban Assault bike, and it also doubles as my winter bike with Nokian Mount and Grounds or 294 Extremes .


The Serrota T-Max normally runs Maxxis MaxLite 26x1.95 310 at 60psi and is used almost exclusively as a commuter/Urban Trekker.

MadmanMatt

2010 DB Sorrrento Sport CST street tires.. They're soft but seem to hold up so far. going for the Kenda Kwik Tendrils next time though.

giantcfr1

I've got some slicks but it's a pain in the bum (I'm lazy) to swap them back and forth with my knobbies. Knobbies sound groovy along the road too.

Road cassette and rear deraileur...

nrowensby

I think they were 26x1.5 Kenda Kwiks...


1994 Specialized HardRock Sport - Drop-Bar Conversion by owensbyphoto, on Flickr

Fatandre

^ This one looks nice.
How fast would you think I could get average on those Contis that I plan to buy?

Zephyr11

Would be nice if you could figure out things that easily. But Andy Schleck could ride a mountain bike faster than I can ride my road bike, sooo...

corvuscorvax

As an aside, what is with the format for embedding photos? I seem to have no control over whether my attached photos appear inline (as I would prefer) or in the scripted pop-up format as above.

sknhgy 

Dick's Sporting Goods carries a tire called the Swiss Army Tire. It is smooth on the road and it works OK in the dirt. I've found it to be the best all around tire, and I've tried many. I got them because I do both kinds of riding on my Rockhopper. You might look into these.

lotekmod

I have a mountain bike I use exclusively as a commuter. I have some sort of cheap Nashbar or Performance slicks on it and I'm very happy with that setup. The slick tires have noticeably less drag than knobbies but still have enough volume to soak up the rough pavement and potholes without pinch flatting.

IthaDan 

You're braver than me- I'd be too scared to put a lock on spinergys. Have you noticed any chipping/scratching? They look cool, but they scare the crap out of me.

I don't know if they still make them but the Ritchey Tom Slick or Moab Bite were the tires to have for paved mountain biking in the day.

jmccain

SlimRider

Commuting on a HT MTB is cool...

I have an adversion to commuting with a fully suspended MTB on almost 100% paved streets.

Stealthammer

Actually I am with you regarding wrapping a lock around the Rev-X-Roks or hanging the bike from the front wheel, and I normally won't even mount them until it is at least 50-60*outside (and even then they are only used for light commuting/grocery runs). I have a 700c wheelset as well and neither shows any sign of chipping/cracking at all after nearly a decade of use, but I won't sell them to anyone else due to there age, and I will probably cut them up before I feed them to a dumpster one day.

BTW: in researching the legendary Spinergy wheel failures I found that the actual number of wheel failures is quite low, even though there were a few very serious injuries that resulted from those failures. I have also known several track riders, mountain bikers, triathletes and ultra athletes who have run them for years without a failure, and I know that they put far more stress on them than I will. They are getting old for CF products however so their days are numbered.

This bike also has a second set of Spinergy Xyclone wheels that are normally mounted and I have no concerns at all with their reliability, but I am very impressed by their light weight.

Dilberto

Weighs 18.6 pounds, with Maxxis Maxxlite 310 race tires. Roadies always do a double-take, when I drop them: