I’m looking at buying a cheap rear wheel for my 29er (mavic tn319 rim) and looking to run a 2.3 tyre on it. A wider rim is going to cost me more, does it make much difference? If so what?

a well know calderdale based bike designer explained the reasons to using a wider rim to me.
the bigger you are, the wider you need, and not only for the extra cushioning……. 😀

But what is big though? I’m only a kind of small, medium big! 🙂

tyres are less pinched in on wider rims, so they have a different shape… this effectively gives you a much larger volume for the same tyre width and weight.

bigger volume is more betterer.

also, the widening of the tyre can mean that the tread can sit flatter, so can mean you get more gripsyness on the floors.

Dave

So why are Mavic rims still the same width as they have always been?
Do they not believe in volume = better
or do they think we should be using narrower tyres ?

mavic 729 are not a vey narrow rim scruff.
mavic do five or six extremely wide rims.

a wider rim will stop a tyre rolling off when run at lower pressure.

there are more differences than width between mavic and rims like stans.

stans have a very low sidewall, which allows the tyre to balloon out even more (they use a ‘hook’ to hold the bead), so for a given width, the stans rim will give the tyre a better shape the the equivalent mavic.

Some say that Mavic are a bit stuck in the past with their rims. As pointed out by ton, they do do wider rims, but because of the way they make them, they suffer a weight penalty. Stans seem to have got around this, making wide rims which weigh as much as mavic’s narrow rims.

Dave

When are you chaps going to start using properly wide rims then?
http://www.unicycle.uk.com/unicycle-spares/rims/26-nimbus-dominator2-rim.html
http://www.einradladen.net/shop/show_product.php/cPath/4/products_id/795

2.3″ tyre you say? But what model/make tyre, they can differ loads

aracer, I have just bought one of those from tazzy and am looking to get something to almost match it, but don’t want to go quite so heavy, plus I’m limited by frame width.

“stans have a very low sidewall, which allows the tyre to balloon out even more (they use a ‘hook’ to hold the bead), so for a given width, the stans rim will give the tyre a better shape the the equivalent mavic.”

Surely all modern rims have hooks?

Surely all modern rims have hooks?

well yes, to some extent… there is some marketing bullshit involved, but the stans ones (having a shorter sidewall, and therefore a smaller circumference) rely on their hook to hold the bead, whereas the mavics rely on having more metal to increase the circumference which stops the tyre bead from being able to escape.

make sense? thought not 🙂

Dave

(mavic tn319 rim) and looking to run a 2.3 tyre on it

that’ll be fine.

I run 2.4 (RaRas) on tn719. i haven’t died.

EDIT: they don’t make a tn319. they make a tn 317.

aracer – Member
When are you chaps going to start using properly wide rims then?

I’m using these. Wide enough for you? 🙂

100mm wide DHL

Quite a lot IMO. I had to borrow a wheel over the weekend and it happened to have a Mavic 729 on it. My Minion 2.35 came up huge on it compared to my 317! It looked more like a 2.5 than a 2.35. Wider rims ftw!