[Closed] worst tyres ??

All my opinion:

Original OEM Conti MKs 2.2. OK when bone dry, otherwise terrifying. No defined edge to feel when cornering, just sliding straight away.

Non OEM Nevs were generally OK but too flimsy (punctures) and got me in trouble in the very worst situation several times: fast, flat corners. I think the edge knobs just folded over when pushed.

HR on the rear is not great for climbs unless run in reverse. They can feel skittish unless you lower the tyre pressures. Their big benefit is that they grip on rails when cornering fast.

High rollers and nobby nics, both are utter rubbish.

High Rollers:
Grip if leant over at approx 80 degrees - fine.
Grip if totally upright - sketchy.
Grip if anywhere between upright and 80 degrees (you know, the bit you normally use) - none existant.

See the thing is, this is what makes high rollers great!

I could re-phrase that as:
Grip if leant over cornering hard, when you want grip - great, and fast the rest of the time when you don't need all that grip.

Interesting thread this though, what works for some clearly doesn't for others. But then when you watch folk ride, and see the differences in riding style, terrain etc. I guess that's no surprise?

Is there a tyre no-one can fault?

Personally loving the beaver just now...

I found highrollers great for grip

But when i as going through 2 tires in a weeke ddue to bead stretching(. On d521 at between 22 and 28 psi it became cheaper to go back to comp 24 which would run down to 15 psi no issues if i wanted them to

On d521 at between 22 and 28 psi

Do you not get pinch flats all the time?

Conti Traction Pro OEM wire bead

Very draggy

OK in really wet soggy stuff, but not mud as they don't clear well enough

huge unstable edge blocks are terrifying cornering on hard surfaces

Low traction compound

Honestly they are the worst here. The fact that you may not have heard of them supports my argumnet

The move to High Rollers, despite the vague feeling at part lean were better under all conditions and less draggy

Do you not get pinch flats all the time?

He's talking about DH high rollers, that pressure's fairly normal. Either chunkier tubes or tubeless.

Standard tubes with dh tyres ( as oddly i was using them for dh racing at the time :)) very rarely flatted

Despised jones xr but they may have been oem, put me off bonty tyres for years...

Verticals are lethal...

He's talking about DH high rollers, that pressure's fairly normal. Either chunkier tubes or tubeless.

Ah. Thanks.

OEM Continental Mountain Kings are truly, shockingly bad as you never really know whether there is grip there or not. Puncture prone too & I genuinely believe they were a major contributory factor in a crash last year that gave me a broken collar bone. A hateful tyre!!!

You're all clearly young whipper-snappers. If you want really awful tyres go back to the mid 90s and pick just about anything.

Ritchey Z-Max (or worse the Alpha and Omega bites)
Panaracer TrailDusters (slick like a road bike tyre between knobs about 1.5 inches apart) lethal on everything but dry sandy soils.
WTB Velociraptors, which at least got a mention above - although the rear was at least good for climbing on small wet roots.

More recent Continental Gravity for anything that's stickier in consistency than mildly moist dust (but I did get them cheap).

OEM Continental Mountain Kings are truly, shockingly bad as you never really know whether there is grip there or not. Puncture prone too

couldn't have put it better myself. Hateful things, were on my Orange 5 when I bought it in 2008. never had so many punctures in a short time

Vredestien something or other central-spined plastic things on the hire bike a mate had a few weeks ago - like riding on WD40...

More recent Continental Gravity

These appealed to the cheapskate in me (just me really) and they were crap. Couldn't even get them to sit on the rim without high and low spots.

Did baulk at he 50 quid each price tag though. Worth it for he puncture proofness though for mega grip at low psi when racing

I kept rolling maxxis high rollers off the rim and stretching the bead

never paid more than £20 for a comp16/24 during the many years I used them either.

I bought a set of Maxxis Wormdrives to put in some miles on local old railway tracks / bridleways. My mate got a set of Halo Twinrails for the same rides. I spent most of every ride with the bike upside down replacing tubes, then later repairing tubes when I'd run out of spares. My mate thought this was hilarious.

Disagree with the chap who hated Tioga Psychos - I had loads on various bikes and absolutely loved them!

double post...

Panaracer Fire XC

Tyres I spose are just like every other bike item... both the best thing since sliced bread and the biggest pile of utter sh***... both at the same time.

Except for...

Michelin Country Gravel

I bought a set of [s]Maxxis Wormdrives[/s][b] lightweight tyres with very thin sidewalls[/b] to put in some miles on local old railway tracks / bridleways. My mate got a set of [s]Halo Twinrails[/s][b]200g heavier (thicker sidewall) tyres[/b] for the same rides. I spent most of every ride with the bike upside down replacing tubes, then later repairing tubes when I'd run out of spares. My mate thought this was hilarious

I'm with your mate on this one

It pains me, but I agree with GW 😉

Are Rapid Robs that bad for their intended role as a balls-out XC race tyre?

Rapid Robs are an entry level Racing Ralph - same tread, cheap carcass, cheap compound. Not a race tyre by any stretch.

I've got some Specialized Sauserwinds that seem utterly crap, just no good at anything!

You're all clearly young whipper-snappers. If you want really awful tyres go back to the mid 90s and pick just about anything.

Ritchey Z-Max (or worse the Alpha and Omega bites)
...

I had some Z-maxes, weren't that bad for XC riding in the dry.

re: IRC Mythos XC - are they really that bad ?

I ask; because I've just swapped a pair off and moved to Racing Ralphs and (superficially) they look like a similar tread pattern. The IRC's were always a little sketchy over wet roots; but what tyre isn't ?

Am I going to be amazed by the RR's or is it likely to be a more minor improvement?

Oh; and is it worth (since I'm moving ahead in tyre technology by a number of years) going ghetto tubeless at the same time (RR's are Tubeless ready)

IRC Mythos XC

Are the only mountain bike tyre I've ever had squealing when cornering on road in the dry. In the wet, well...

This thread is filling me with confidence seeing as i bought a Conti Mountain King 29x2.4" at the weekend (guess there was a reason it was in the bargain bucket for £18!).

Was expecting it to be bigger though, it's a 2" carcass with a few side knobs protruding out. Guess i'll try it on the rear at some stage, sounds like it'll be a touch sketchy on the front....

I hated my 29er Rampages, about the only tyre i've ever used that i had zero confidence in.

I'm glad to see that I'm not the only one who doesn't quite gel with High Rollers, especially up front. I find they feel vague up front and grip is medicre, which doesn't motivate me to push them hard and lean the bike over. They're okay on the back though.

I've tried a Minion on the front, but it just seemed to flop around then the going got very slippery and just tramline straight on. I will have another bash with them when I can get back on the bike in a couple of months.

Took my Kona to Morzine with the OEM Kenda Nevegal's, bought some High Rollers but went out without changing them as I was too excited. Halfway down a scree slope the rear tread on the Nevegal just peeled off in one go leaving me with a smooth canvas carcass that immediately burst. Difficult to even describe them as tyres tbh..

Parrot Macaw, wore quickly and burst just after I'd finished a descent. But they had purple tread...

I've always found Maxxis Crossmarks a great summer [u]rear tyre. I ride in Wales and have not torn one yet. I found high rollers would slip out quite often. A friend had a conti vapour on the rear of his bike which would fishtail on the tiniest of twigs.

Continental have made some really gash tyres over the years.

You got to admire their expirementation with tread paterns and compounds but the seem to have as many misses as hits.

Vertical Pros: not bad on soft ground (not great though) just no grip on anything else and should have a health warning if you attempt to ride wet tarmac on them.

Flow: A sort of weird semi slick tyre had the side knobs from the Vapour / Gravity but a wierd centre tread that offered no grip but didn't roll well either - Rubbish

Slash: Similar to a Flow but not as good

Mountain Kings: Proper scary, literally no idea of what they were going to do next sometimes they would slide sometimes they would grip. It was like riding around on my tip toes, horrible tyres.

For the record I think the vast majority of tyres are good (or good enough!) but these ones stood out as just being shockingly indequate

Nokian Gazzaloddi 26 x 3.0

/thread.

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I've got some Specialized Sauserwinds that seem utterly crap, just no good at anything!

Blimey glad I read this, was about to buy a couple of Sauserwind for my marathon / race bike, as I had heard they are a good tyre for mixed conditions, I dont want to be changing tyres every race/event dependent on ground type, so thought an allrounder would be good for UK. What was not to like Njee ?
maybe I'd be better sticking to my Monorail / Crossmark combo, which has worked for me inthe past but I considered a bit too dry conditions only

Worst tyres ever? +1 on Tioga Factory DH by a country mile. Had to endure many, many crashes with these p!ss poor excuses until I bought some proper tyres.

Kenda blue groove and nevegals, utter utter gash

Single ply high roller DHs.

absolute total farking crap.

heavy enough to be dreadful unless you are running them for DH.

SO weak that putting them anywhere near a DH bike pinch flats them.

useless. I've chopped up brand new ones and used them as chainstay protectors in the past.

Most OEM tyres seem to be very poor and go on the give the that product a poor reputation. I understand a bike manufacturer wanting the spec sheet to look as good as possible by using branded product at a lower cost. What I don't get is the tyre manufacturer supplying sub standard product and trashing their own brand. Kenda have to be one of the worst offenders for this. Their OEM Nevegals regularly get slated but the retail version are good tyres as long as you pick the right version. Nevegals, for example, are available with wire bead, folding, dual tread compound, Stick e, LR3, 60tpi 120tpi etc, etc. I use Stick e front and rear for trail centres and DTC front and LR3 on the rear for longer rides on the Downs.
I have just ordered a Bontrager XR4 folding which is also available in several other flavours. It was given an MBUK value award but I won't let that put me off.
It is a complete mine field and hard to compare like with like.

[i]Panaracer Fire XC[/i]

I agree. Absolute cack. They were *ace* on fire road climbs, mind.

+1 Conti Verts. Lull you into a false sense of security then break away with no warning. Horrible tyres.

^^ Yep Tioga Factory XC & DH both awful. Draggy and yet no grip

Anything I've tried by WTB, including Velociraptors and especially Moto Raptors are just ace. Anyone opinions on Nano Raptors?

Spec Eskar but only as far as the front goes. Any loose surface it did EXACTLY what it wanted at all times. If I happened to want to go where it wanted to, all good. On the rear it was fine but I swapped the front for something else and gave it to a mate to use as a rear tyre.

Probably the only tyre I've hated other than my own idiocy for riding twin-rails in wet forest once (had them for commuting, forgot to swap them for the weekend). Stupidity compounded with an inability to accept reality. I fell. A lot.

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I concur with Samuri. This tyre is a ****ing embarrassment.
If I can go more than 10 miles without puncturing, I'm surprised and start wondering when I'm going to wake up from the dream.
Seems to puncture if you ride over a sharp sided speck of dust. Just dumping the tyre and riding on an inflated inner-tube would probably be more effective.
Next on my list would be Vapours - looked like they should grip, but don't.

+1 for WTB tyres being great, got a set of Stouts/Prowlers on each bike and they are fantastic, if a little bit draggy at times.

Worst tyres? I've never really had any that were truly horrendous. Maybe Conti Mountain Kings, since everyone else hates them. 🙂

Original Nobby Nics on rocky and rooty trails (especially when wet) were the worst tires ever. I still have 2 pairs in the shed but I haven't found anyone I'd dislike enough to give them to.

Anyone opinions on Nano Raptors?

Yes, I'm a big fan. For summer riding in the Chilterns, I love them. Fast as hell on the thin centre ridge line (hence a great Trailquest tyre), they stick well to hardpack singletrack corners, and even when you're throwing the bike around corners full of leafmush and plant litter, they slide a little but predictably and fast. And I don't suffer badly from punctures either even though they're quite light.

Obviously it's a limited tyre, for certain conditions, but they're very good at that. Here's one in its natural habitat.
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I had a pair of Michellin All Mountains that were ok, pretty fast rolling and lasted well, until a dog bit the front one!.
So I replaced it with a Maxxis ADvantage, which i hated. I rode it twice on the front. both times were just canal towpath rides to and from work, the ground was damp, deff not wet, and it felt like i was gonna loose the front on every turn. Scared the life out of me.
I bought a HR put that on the front and put the ADvantage on the back and seems a great combo. HR on the front really feels planted to me.

ADvantage on the front was shocking though (for me). Oh and Tioga Factory XC's also shocking tyres.