Viewing 12 posts - 1 through 12 (of 12 total)
  • Tyre clearance – how little is too little?
  • jamesgarbett
    Free Member

    Just put a Rock Razor on the back of my Sherpa and clearance at the seatstays is fine but at the chainstays it’s down to 2-3mm each side

    Will fit something narrower for the winter but is this likely to be a problem? Don’t really want to wear a hole in my chainstays

    dai21t
    Free Member

    It will only wear if it touches. Ride it and find out?

    jam-bo
    Full Member

    a bit of wheel/frame/tyre flex and you’ll be wearing a hole in your frame.

    I had a lot more clearance than that in my old five and still had grooves on the inside of the swingarm.

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    yorkshire89
    Free Member

    Fit some helitape to the inside of the seatstays and see how you get on.
    2-3mm isn’t alot of clearance really.

    rocketman
    Free Member

    As above 2-3 mm is nothing the tyre will flex that much

    stones & dirt in the shoulder lugs goes through metal in no time

    molgrips
    Free Member

    My very first bike, a Kona, had a few mm clearance each side. Wasn’t an issue in the mud as the tyres were so bad in mud I could hardly ride anyway. A slight buckle in the wheel was enough to rub the chainstays, however that didn’t affect anything anyway and the bike carried on for a fair few years.

    BillOddie
    Full Member

    Rule of thumb, can you get your middle finger between the tyre and CS/SS at the tightest point?

    jamesgarbett
    Free Member

    Not a chance!

    Weirdly the part of the chainstays that are “dimpled” to create clearance are in the wrong place for this particular tyre – shame that – must be too voluminous

    kcal
    Full Member

    I’ve got various grooves in the chainstays of my M2 – for a while, I hadn’t realised the QR was tight, but not that tight, and extra force on the pedals would pull the wheel out of alignment. I also tried to put large (full 2.1 Nobby Nics IIRC) in the rear and again, the extra side knobbles did for the chainstays, another groove worn..

    Haven’t broken the bike yet though 🙂

    Squirrel
    Full Member

    Wore a hole through the chainstay on my (alloy) Scandal. I’m pretty sure there was never contact between the (2.3 Smorgasbord) tyre and the frame, it was just the mud on the tyre that did it. Clearance about 2-3mm either side.

    volksman
    Free Member

    Same problem with my switchback running 2.3 DHR minions it was ok if it was dry but no good in the mud, so i ran it as a 26er and no more clearance problems, handled better as well. sold it on though and gone back to Bfe, much better bike .

    scandal42
    Free Member

    I have about 5-6mm with no problems, wouldn’t want any less though

Viewing 12 posts - 1 through 12 (of 12 total)

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