do they go up on flow rims easily enough? or a real faff? i know they are tubeless ready so should be ok but never used them before

will i die more importantly?

You won’t die. Sidewalls may be a bit leaky to begin with but should seal and hold full pressure after a few rides without too much drama.

29″ version went up no fuss but they were still leaking through the sidewalls after 5 days of riding…

hmmmm why on earth dont they seal then once the sealant is sloshed about?? i assume they just go gradually flat like left overnight? is it just a case then of pumping back up to desired psi and riding? or does the bead etc come off too as well?

i hope it works ok, ive only ever used UST and contis’ have always gone up straight away using sealant and a bit of neat washing up liquid around the tyre edge

Wipe the inside with meths before putting together to remove whatever it is from the mold which stops the sealant from working. I’ve also heard you can give the inside a rub with sandpaper to help the sealant work although the meth has always worked for me.

the meth has always worked for me.

So are you responsible for These reviews? 🙂

cheers messiah – by meths do you mean rubbing alcohol? or IPA what ever its called?

hoping i can get them sealed up pretty quick as it will be pre-ride job, recipe for disaster i know but ive always managed it with UST tyres

Yep – meths, rubbing alcohol, IPA etc. You want to remove the residue from the “releasing agent” that was used to help free the tyre from the mold when it was made.

Quick wipe with meths and I’ve found any holes seal up really quickly with stans sealant. Before I heard about the meths trick it took days to get them to seal.

I’d rather drink beer, wine or whisky thanks 8)

cheers messiah – ive got a x-king 2.2 protection black chili on the way, so im hoping to bang it on before riding, just hoping i can get it up with a track pump ok like all my UST tyres, is that actually possible with the tubeless ready protection ones?

nice one for the tip on the meths etc, shall defo give it a good clean before even attempting it!

amazing weight saving though if this pulls off, my current 2.4 ust X king weighs about 850 grams, and this x king protection 2.2 BC weighs 570! just hope the sidewalls can deal with the peak district 🙁

I can’t help with the sidewalls 😆

To help get the tyre up with a trackpump set it up the day before with a tube in it to form the tyre to the shape of a rim/wheel. I use an old slightly damaged rim for this so I can leave it for a few days if I’d rather be out riding than faffing in the shed. Usually goes up quickly after that… if that fails one of those fizzy-bottle things are supposed to work well. I have a compressor now which is ace 😛

why cant you help with the sidewalls? southerner with no rocks? 😆

cheers though messiah i can get access to a proper industrial type compressor so its not the end of the world, just always without fail been able to do ust ones with a track pump

good tip on that rubbing alcohol though just doen a google search on the tyre and somebody else has said the same, so thanks for that!

why cant you help with the sidewalls? southerner with no rocks?

No…

oh FFS 🙁

noooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!

😆

hmmm may well just sell this tyre as soon as i get it then 🙁

That was a tired 2.4″ Rubber Queen that I sliced on a particularly nasty rock doing something rather silly 😆

😆

hmmmm still worrying though as this x king will be going on the back, which takes way more abuse on rocks than my front does

ill have a feel of the sidewalls and decide when i get it what to do, not willing to risk having slashes like that mid ride, not a chance, id prefer the weight gain of trusty UST

why on earth do they not do black chili in UST form on other tyres from conti, why only UST black chilli rubber queens?

im pretty sure my current 2.4ust xking would have lasted a lot longer tread wise had it been black chili, ive been running rubbers queens front and rear all winter ~6months’ish and theres no sign of wear what so ever to the tread

i was considering a mountain king 2 ust for the rear, but the guys at continental told me they are almost as draggy as rubber queens 🙁

Rather than meths I used fairy liquid on the inside and worked quite well. IN fact one tyre is still up 12 months after and hasn’t been used for 8 months (FSus)

I don’t think RQ’s are that draggy, not compared to Maxxis or other big 2.3/2.5 tyres anyway. I’m happy with some drag if I get some grip… Maxxis Aspens I had were great for drag but not great for grip when it was wet!!!

I do find the Conti sidewalls go before the tread does but considering the tread hardly shows any sign of wear perhaps thats not surprising.

Newer Conti tyres seem to have a thicker sidewall than a few years ago. My just recieved 2.4″ RQ’s are 1000g vs 900g 2 years ago so there seems to be a penalty for that extra rubber. Not as thick or heavy as the UST RQ which is 1150g and noticably reinforced at the sidewall (which makes it feel like a chunkier tyre when ridden and I prefer the “feel” of the non UST).

Good luck with them weight-weenie specials

cheers messiah, i dont find the rubber queens draggy off road at all, if anything i find the level of grip climbing off road saves you some energy instead of spinning out, which in turn makes them pretty quick in my eyes, id go as far to say they are brilliant tyres off road F&B, if you solely ride trail centres i doubt theres much quicker/grippier combined in one tyre…

only prob for me in summer is i do a fair bit of road to get to the good stuff, and when its properly dry you can hear the rear tyre actually sticking to the road, which makes them feel so slow on road….thats why i bought a 2.4ust x king for the rear driving tyre, which was great for summer last year fast as lightning on the road, and decent levels of grip in the wetter summer months, but 5 months use max and its got no centre tread left at all, so its now useless, again i think if that was a BC version id still have it on full tread or near enough full tread, but the 2.4ust i was using literally last five months from brand new 🙁 its now got no grip at all off road now when its remotely wet, where as when it was new it wasnt the grippiest admittedly but it did at least dig in a fair bit in the wet and not spin out on a climb….and so not paying another 50quid to last 5 months for the ust one 🙁 , its a risk getting this protection one, and the 570gram weight suggests its going to go tits up for me too 😆

that said the trade off is if i slash the sidewall on these paperweight ones ill still have to fork out another 50 quid and probably if im going to slash it it wont even last 5 months 🙁

just dont get why the xking/mking2 etc dont have BC yet in UST form 🙁

Yeah the BC tyres just seem to go on and on and one. Killed two due to side wall issues but they were old tyres, 18 months+ and the tread was still in good shape.

agreed – the BC is immense, my rubber queen 2.2ust BC’s have shown absolutly no sign of wear what so ever to the tread, neither the front nor the rear one, sidewalls have lost a bit of the writing on the side, and i would imagine they will go long before the tread does

yet on my x-king 2.4 ust the sidewalls still got full writing and looks new on the sidewalls but the centre tread has all but worn in 5 months from brand new, ie no grip…its a non BC one so i can only assume its the BC that gives longevity to the tyres

It wasn’t the sidewall that went on my X-King Protection 2.4, I kept getting slashes through the carcass from flints. Had the RQ USTs on for far longer and no damage yet. The X-King tread wore quicker despite being a harder BC compound, I kept taking small chunks off when cornering. On the plus side it was a bit quicker on dirt and a lot quicker on tarmac and amusingly progressive and drifty on the back.

I think if you ride hard then tyres with smaller blocks seem to wear faster.

hmm yeah i remember you saying last year on a thread i was on, you’d swapped to x king rear a similar time to me!

not sure then as you say you were running the BC x king, perhaps its just not much cop for AM type rocky riding 🙁

out of interest chief, what tyre are you using on the rear now? im just gonna stick with a RQ up front regardless of time of year, but id still like something relatively fast for summer on the rear

conti themselves told me a mountain king 2 wouldnt be much quicker drag wise than a RQ on the rear, and now this wear issue with the x king puts me back to square one 😆

“you were made as well as we could make you. The candle that burns twice as bright, burns half as long, and you burned very, very brightly RoyX-King.”

😆

out of interest chief, what tyre are you using on the rear now?

Still the Rubber Queen! Most of my riding is currently a mix of either twisty flatter singletrack which is often muddy in places unless we get a long dry spell or is the steep DH tracks round here, which go from wet and greasy straight through to loose and dry without pausing at that nice fast hard and grippy stage. Thus it’s rather nice to have a rear tyre which is really good at braking.

cheers chief – just actually received a x king 2.2 protection BC this morning, must say i was expecting the sidewalls to feel quite like the spesh ones (quite flimsy) but i must say i dont think they feel any weaker/thinner than a proper UST sidewall?????

but they weight 570grams as opposed to 820grams for the UST equivalent? so somethigns got to be weaker somewhere right?!?!?!

do i put it on, or not and just get money back and buy a proper ust one??!?

I’ve just started running a 29 Racesport on the front and Protection rear – on Arch rims.

Protection went up no problem. Couldnt get the RS to seat (seemed a baggier fit) but one extra lap of yellow tape did the trick.

had leaking issues from both. Took 3 rides to solve. Left the wheels overnight on a bucket – thus deploying stans to the sidewalls.

A minor faff….but relatively simple to solve.

I’m running a Baron 2.3 with Apex sidewall and it went up no bother at all using Continental Revo sealant. Not sure if the type of sealant was the trick or not. Thinking of pairing it up with a MkII 2.4 on the rear shortly once the skinny mud tire comes off.

Gordymac

I recently changed my front to a X-King 2.2 racesport. I’ve been riding it quite hard and I’ve been impressed with it. Rolls fast but with good grip and even copes well on loose stuff even though it has shallow knobs.

It was a slight faff to get the bead to seat with Shimano UST rims. I had to put a tube in to get one to seat but after that they went up in seconds. The sidewalls were a bit porous. But a bit of extra sealant and pumped up the tyre pressures after the first ride and they seem fine now.

The side wall feels a lot tougher than the old Specialised Captains I was running before and are about on par with most normal tyres I’ve used in the past.

Do you ride in a area with particularly sharp rocks or do you often get side wall cuts? If not I think you’ll be fine otherwise maybe its best to go for the Protection or UST versions.

I’ve been running an X-King BC as a rear for 18 months. It stood up to a Morzine Alps trip last summer with no issues, and it’s going back on for the Alps this summer.

I run mine on a Mavic 819 UST rim, and got it up with a track pump, and it was my first tubeless tyre! It did leak through the sidewalls a little for a few days, but was still fine to ride – it just lost pressure overnight.

For a small nobbled tyre, it is a surprisingly good Allrounder, but spins out in deep winter mud. Don’t skid it on the Tarmac Though, or you will rip off BC nobbles.