Have you ever rolled a (road) tubular?
 

This seems to be a substantial concern, leading to over-gluing and avoiding tubulars altogether.

I did once, BITD, but it was a spare that I hadn't glued, & extreme cornering.

Cyclocross is a separate category, N/A here.

I appreciate your question and was thinking of posing it, myself, because of the discussion currently taking place in the other thread on aluminum tubular rims ( I want aluminum tubulars. What's wrong with me?).

There are some who fear the possibility of blowing their clinchers, seemingly, completely disregarding what happens when you fail to glue your sew-ups on properly. I suspect that in either case these types of failure are very much overblown; but it will be interesting to read the commentary going forward.

You can control the risk of rolling a tubular; glue it right and it doesn’t happen.

You can minimize a bit the risk of a a flat clincher leaving the rim ( don’t brake). Beyond that you’re at the risk of chance.

So from a risk aversion point of view, no doubt tubulars are safer. This, and they can be ridden flat, is one major reason they continue to dominate the pro peleton.

Personally, I don’t think the difference in safety is significant, if you don’t need to ride your tires flat ( such as Abraham Olano) but I would have no concern about the safety of well glued tubulars

I have a question. With regard to the aspect of safety, do you perceive a difference between using tape and glue?

Funny you should ask.

I found this gem recently.

http://kuktl.dept.ku.edu/bicycle/Part9.pdf

Yeah--that seems to answer my question. Thanks.

Now, what about heat? I'm thinking, primarily, of doing a really long descent in 90-100-plus degree temps, for example. This is in general and not necessarily comparing glue to tape.

Not on road. I wonder for cross. I'm going to glue for cross, but am not sure.
Tandem - big guys 3,000W+ sprint, 400lbs, I found the clinchers could not take it. I went to tubulars. I believe, my kid believes they just respond, grip and corner better. You've seen the videos. They just don't slide out when others do and out accelerate any clincher - cause they are much lighter.

It is hard to get clinchers within 400g of the lightest tubular wheelsets.

I agree that the performance edge lies with tubulars. No question about that. But for normal training rides it is difficult to beat the convenience of clinchers; and I also don't think blowouts are a significant concern either.

This answers the heat question.

http://kuktl.dept.ku.edu/bicycle/Part6.pdf

Only tubulars for racing.
But training - tt depends.
Near me, there are lots of Goat Head thorns and glass. They are hard to avoid, and you can go sealant, etc, but for training I bought my kid old use (TdF leftovers with <200 miles on them I got from Tinkoff) tires.

Later I switched him due to the goat heads - to clinchers. We (me, wife kid) went with some nice Veloflex and latex tube clinchers. I dealt with the whining from the kid and said he could pay for tubies for training, that was that, and he did clinchers for a while - for training. Still he had a set of 3 season old Paris Roubaix (ridden there) un-flatted tubulars just hanging. they have never flatted and we retired them.

At college - I sent him with a set of Veloflex Vlaanderen, then another set. No Goat Heads there, and glass is rare. He road a year without spares, no flats. He started doing more city streets, so at my suggestion went back to clinchers. He did have some mounting/rim tape issues (flats) due to mis-mounting. Riding ~10,000 miles and no flats. Last flats were a couple years ago in SoCal.

So while I agree there is a bit of safety and security with a clincher, when riding in areas where flats are so rare - I'd just ride the good stuff - tubulars.

For MTB seems tubeless are pretty good. For cross, it is still tubular.

Interesting article as well.

In real life it is complex, though, because you have the intersection of variances in pressure (caused by many factors) and the buildup of heat. I'm sure most of us have ridden some really long, technical descents in different environmental conditions, using both clinchers and tubulars. I've never had issues with either, personally. I don't know; I am curious about the prevalence of these issues, for sure.

This is as old as dirt.

"If a tubular tire is used and subject to the same heating, the pressure rise would be equivalent. However, the
interface between the tire and the rim is no longer a rim hook and tire bead. The interface is an adhesive."

Yea that IF is not going to happen at the same rate. When you have air inside the alloy container (between the brake tracks), it heats faster than the air on top of the rim/brake tracks.

So while the tubular is unlikely to blowout due to the temperature rise, if the adhesive properties change with temperature, the tire may be more prone to roll-off.

The old Vittoria Red would melt with heat. Mastic One - not an issue. Nor Fast Tack (contact cement). Formulas have changed over the years too.

All 20 year old scientific articles aside - well glued tubulars are not rolling off.

Do you prefer glue to tape? If so, why?

I don't think there are issues with either.

IF a clincher blows out it is less likely to stay on the rim.
IF a tubular rolls off - it is not on the rim.

Neither are likely. Both can make people happy. But an arguments saying clinchers ride like tubulars is from someone that has not ridden tubulars of the same level, or someone that just likes to argue.

I agree with you. I don't think that anybody is arguing that clinchers and tubulars are equal in terms of performance, though. I also agree that these kinds of failures are rare.

Glue. I've glued hundreds since late 70s. Maybe I like the smell. But I know the small tricks, and am familiar with it. And glues are better than they were.

For road, it just takes a thin layer to get a great bond. It is lighter, and easier for me to take off. I also like the 5 min of semi-ply-ability I get. Tape is hard to remove with solvents.

For cross - I said I was wondering.
The theory is if you jar/hit a hard hole the bond can break. I buy that. On cross, a stiff joint would be more likely to break. Tape is more supple and would allow re-bonding.

For an on-road spare - tape would be better.

So for training, I can see tape being a better option.
For optimum performance, I prefer glue.

OK. Thank you.

Doge could host a gluing clinic in SD. :thumb:

Not only have I never rolled a tire, I have never seen anyone roll a tire. What I HAVE seen, is people who crash, their rim warps, the tire comes off... and they CLAIM they crashed because they rolled a tire.

Well, not really.

"Conclusion: .... These adhesives have all been proven to be effective under extreme racing conditions. Consequently, these results should not be construed as a recommendation against any of them."

My takeaway from the data is that heating a correctly glued tire (with mastik one) to 60C reduced bond strength to 60% of its strength relative to what it was at 20C.

The other takeaway is that other glues lost more relative bond strength at 60C.

I agree that the danger of rolling a tubular tire seems to be overstated these days. Haven't used tubulars for many years. But back in the 70s I bought a used bike with them and also got a free flat tire from my LBS that I patched to use as a spare. Used those tires for a few thousand miles until the tread wore out and got quite a bit of practice patching the tubes inside (lots of thorns on Tucson roads). But I never experienced any tendency for them to roll on high speed mountain descents (Gates Pass, Hitchcock Hwy., etc.) despite not adding any glue or tape - the air pressure in the tires held them securely to the rims.

+1

Or some YouTube tutorials. :)

Yes, I have technically rolled a tubular.

But it was because I was already mid crash, and the bike was sliding sideways. No matter how good my glue job was, there was no way the tire could stay on the rim given the forces being put on it. The rolled tubular was a result of the crash. The crash was not a result of the rolled tubular.

And yet they all perform OK in use, so kind of quantifying a non-issue.

I don't really buy the 140˚ thing- I've checked my rims after the steepest descent that I encounter,

~1000' much over 10% requiring braking most of the time, and found warm but far from something

you couldn't hold on to. I did alternate brakes, etc.