Do you care about unequal front vs back tire wear?
 

Considering alternatives for what to use on my indoor trainer (current wheel w/ separate skewer, different rear wheel, beater bike, etc). Got me wondering...

Is there any reason why one should care about their front and back tires wearing the same?
Do you tend to replace one tire at a time or replace them as sets?

When my rear tire wears out, I move the front to the rear and get a new front tire.

Exactly! That's the safest way.

You can move the front to the rear when it wears down or just keep replacing the rear. Moving front to rear helps to keep your tires of simmilar age otherwise the front may deteriorate before it's worn out. The only thing you don't do is rotate the rear to the front as this will give you dodgy handling.

Regards, Anthony

Unless someone comes up with a matched wear set of tires, you'll always have this "problem".

Just use an old tire for the trainer. It sucks changing tires but sure beats eating up $50 tires on the trainer. Just ride that old tire to the tube (on the trainer)

Same here.

I also have an old tire that I throw on if I'm going to use the trainer a lot (which I didn't do much last winter... riding in the cold or rain is actually kinda fun if you have the right clothing etc).

Thanks for the replies.

In my situation, living in Texas, I anticipate switching between outdoor rides and the indoor trainer often. Too often to switch the tires back and forth. So I'm really looking at the other alternatives. Given what I've heard so far, I think I'm leaning toward getting a separate rear wheel for use with the trainer. In that scenario, should I get the second wheel complete with its own cassette either because of cassette-wear or for faster swaps? This question will really show my newb ignorance... How much faster is it to swap a wheel with its own cassette, vs swapping a wheel to the existing cassette? I know it'll be more expensive, but given my useage, fast changeovers will be key to using the trainer more often.

You can't have too many wheels or too many cassettes.
I find that I prefer lower gearing (bigger cassette) on my trainer, and a bigger cassette comes in handy for bigger hill ride.


Al