I bought a 2016 Specialized AWOL the other day and I am in bike heaven. It came with a pair of Specialized Fat Boy 700x45 tires and they're slick and they make me a little nervous for some reason. I have never run slicks. The Specialized site provides little in the way of meaningful information about these tires, can someone who has used them chime in with their thoughts? I'll be doing some credit card touring along back roads out in the country side of Texas soon and no doubt will hit some gravel, crushed pavement and other tire cutting/puncturing opportunities.

What are your thoughts?

I run 26x1.95 Fat Boys on my Cimarron and have had no trouble with them. I imagine thorns, glass or nails might cause trouble but I have not experienced that yet and do not worry about the surface I'm riding on.

Bring a couple extras .. always a good idea on a tour. at least 1 more tire..

I had a Few extra 622-40 nimbus packed away for drop shipping that never happened

They will fit in a 9x14" Tyvek envelope.







./.

They'll be fine in most conditions, even off-road unless you're riding on a slippery surface that can be dug into, like mud. On roads and gravel, road slicks are great.

Bicycles can't really hydroplane, so there's no need for tires to use water-shedding grooves. Some people think fine cross-tread on the side may help in wet weather cornering by cutting through thin muck and interleaving with road irregularities, although your options here are limited if you don't want to compromise the smooth and grippy ride of wide tires. If you're willing to get spendy and don't mind not having puncture protection features, Compass tires would fit that bill; there will theoretically soon be a 700x44mm option, and they roll insanely well.
There's nothing particularly wrong with the Fatboys, though.

Knobs are for clumpy moist surfaces and mud. If you're planning on doing a lot of that, then maybe equip your bike with knobbier tires, or carry spare knobby tires with you.

Thanks guys. I guess the lack of tread just makes me think is begging for a flat, and yet 80% of my riding is going to be on pavement, and I do not plan to ride in mud. Specialized claims these tires have "Flak Jacket" and then they fail to explain what that means. I love their bikes but their site is total amateur in that regard, in spite of how it looks, their site is super unhelpful in many ways. They also state the inner tubes are "standard" so I think I'll upgrade those to make myself feel better. I like the tires I was just worried about how durable or puncture resistant they might be.

Slick doesn't imply flimsy.

Fun fact: the only time I've ever gotten two flats on a single paved ride, it was on knobby MTB tires.

Yeah, manufacturers have their own labels for embedding puncture-resistant materials in the tire. For Trek it's "hardcase", for instance.

Chances are they put a kevlar strip under the tread.

It has a tread, it's just smooth. Get a thick smooth tread and put grooves into it and you have gaps for glass to penetrate and more wear on the reduced surface area. Puncture resistance is a function of a specific barrier between the tread and the tube not ridges and valleys in the soft rubber tread.

People have a lot of incorrect assumptions about tires. Slick tires are actually the grippiest tire for smooth, wet surfaces. The tire conforms and fills in micro-cracks and little gaps in paving, and that's what gives you grip. So, theoretically, the only time knobs are better than slick tires is when your surface can be bitten into, like dirt or gravel. On pavement, tread just means less contact area, which means less grip.

MTB tires are also often wide, which is a big reason for the association with traction. Mount up 2-inch wide slicks and your grip will be just as good as a knobby, or better, on pavement.

Slick tires in rain are perfectly fine, and slick tires aren't any more or less likely to get flats, that's about the casing. I would say these tires will be fine for almost everything you can throw at them; the only time you might want tread is if you're trying to climb off-road and can't get a grip on wet leaves, dirt, or sand.