Really interesting thread with some good honest contributions.

Have been following with interest as my next bike will either be a short travel 29in-only XC/trail bike or something that can take 29 or plus wheels.

How many of you plussers would just not bother if you had the chance to go back and do it again?

PS. If the WTB Tough carcass is the same as on the 29er Trail Boss then it could indeed be the answer to your prayers. Fantastically tough tyre!

Really interesting thread with some good honest contributions.

+1

@chapaking – I don’t think I’d use B+ wheels as my only wheelset but having the option to swap out my regular 29er wheels is nice to have. For steady away bikepacking rides they are ideal, especially on a rigid bike, they take just enough sting out of mildly technical ground. I can’t see the point in B+ on a FS bike or if you only/mainly rode trail centres.

@badlywireddog – I was told (quite forcibly) before getting B+ wheels to avoid Trailblazers on the front. Even on 45mm rims they are a weird profile being significantly wider halfway down the sidewall than at the tread.

Love my B+ norco torrent, it took a week or so setting it up properly and getting the tyre pressures right but its a fantastic bike, its used for trail riding, bikepacking, beach riding and some moderate DH but i just need to suss out how to stop over jumping everything on it now 😆
no tyre or puncture issues as yet and its been rode a fair bit, it sounds like no one ever gets puncture issues on anything except B+ 🙄 😆

Yep. But I’ve seen one blow on the front too. At speed. On the Hagg Farm descent. I think there’s some going back to first principles stuff here.

1. B+ ime is very pressure sensitive. There’s a window of around 2psi between too soft and too hard and it varies a little with tyre, terrain and riding style. Too hard and they just ping off stuff, too soft and they feel drunk.

2. B+ tyres blow through their ‘travel’ really fast when run at Goldilocks, ‘just right’ pressures, presumably because they’re like a high volume shock at low pressure – whoomph… Rims hit rock, tyre pinches. The answer to this is probably tougher sidewalls – WTB Tough seem to be working for people who’ve used them – and/or maybe something like Pro Core… both are heavier than the current crop of lightweight, skinny-walled tyres but at least you won’t spend hours levering pinch-flatted rubber off your expensive dinged rims.

3. B+ tyres vary like any other tyre. Trailblazers, for example, are pretty dire. Nobby Nics still have nasty rubber compounds. Fast tyres are still fast, grippy tyres still drag a little at the back. Grippy front, fast rear still works.

4. Everyone’s different. A lightweight whippet on the South Downs could have a completely different experience of the same tyre/wheel format as a 20-stone thug, but the binary, black and white screen settings of STW don’t make much allowance for this.

5. Don’t even think about putting a WTB Trailblazer on the front of anything [in this case point 4 above does not apply]

This. I am looking at replacing Trailblazers as I write. I’ve also bought a new pressure gauge as that window really is tiny.

@ Chapaking, I dunno if I would do it again to be honest. They’re really good in the right conditions, slightly better than the 29er wheels in pretty much most conditions other than proper slop.

However, the 650B Capra with a MM up front and trail boss at the back is the boy for me, and If I only had one FSer, it would be he, not the 29er or B+.

I’m gonna give the 29er wheels a go again, as it’s coming into the grimey season, and I have a shorty on there.

As my thread of the same day suggests – I am plus curious, and want a future bike to have middling width rims, with ability to go full plus or run widish normal tyres – depending on me getting on with various tyres, seasons etc.
Finding a HT bike around £1k that is that is proving tough – its either full plus/boost, or more normal HT and squeeze in bigger tyres – and none come with jack-of-all-master-of-none 30/35mm rims.
I would like 2x, slackish and lowish geometry, comfort and lightish weight.
Sonder Transmitter, Marin Pine Mountain or Nail Trail, Pinnacle Iroko, Giant Fathom, possible Orange Clockwork 120 are on ‘the list’…

Nothing from Genesis Matt?

I was still thinking about 2.8, tyre roll etc, it happens that I have a 2.8 Ron as well so I stuck that on last night and tbh, it’s what I expected- it works more like a thin tyre, so it has less “plusness” and float and less drawbacks, corners better etc.

So possibly a better compromise for everyday riding if you have to have plus, or you find the small extra float is worthwhile, but for me has less of the differentiation that drew me to it. In performance terms 2.8 is working better than 3.0 for me but only because it’s more like a normal tyre. So at some point if you’re thinking this way you have to go, why not just use a normal tyre and that’s where I am now. So, back on the 29er minions.

(I’m sure a heavy duty sidewall plus tyre with sticky rubber and big tread could be awesome, allowing low pressures and huge grip and that, but it’d probably also weigh 1200g and roll like a brick)

It’s got me thinking again about wider “normal” tyres though which seems to be a coming thing… I like the 2.5 minion and I always used to use big tyres (true 2.35s or dishonest 2.5s that measure 2.35, and a 2.7 highroller on the dh bike) so it’s kind of full circle. So it’s been a good experiment anyway and it’s given me some other ideas to try.

But Plus isn’t what I hoped it was basically. Not to say it’s bad, but it’s not doing what I wanted it to do.

So cheers for all the help (and I hand the thread over to whoever wants it 😉

Nothing from Genesis Matt?

Not at £1k – other than having cheap kit and weighs 32lbs…

@Northwind, agree on the point about bigger “Normal tyres” have got some 2.6 Nobby Nics on order and perhaps we’ll see this as perhaps a good compromise. Like you I’ve tried plus and didn’t like it, maybe a lightish 2.5/2.6 tyre will offer an improvement? Looking forward to finding out!

Excellent feedback from Cy and on the basis of that (because it’s more researched than most other views I’ve heard), I’m going to go for i35s on my new new plus specific frame rather than the 45s I’d been thinking of – I figure I can always change in the future if I really think I’ve made the wrong decision.

I don’t think I’d use B+ wheels as my only wheelset but having the option to swap out my regular 29er wheels is nice to have.

This was my view too, especially with winter approaching.

Mate has a Stache 29+ and is flying on it, but he is having lots of punctures when the speed gets up on rocky trails.

I posted these numbers a little while back, but it might be worth repeating here. These are the average speeds based on over 50 hours of riding (the same trails) on a number of bikes:

Solaris (29er hardtail) ———————- 7.1 mph
Solaris Chubby (same bike with plus tyres)—- 6.8 mph
Smuggler (full-suss 29er) ——————– 6.6 mph
Surly ICT (5″ rigid fatbike)—————— 6.5 mph
Five (26″ full-suss) ————————- 6.3 mph

So, the B+ wheels were around 5% slower on average than the same bike with 29er wheels and about 5% faster than a 5″ fatbike. Of course an average speed is going to be dominated by climbing speed, which might not matter to you. But it’s data of sorts.

Bigger tyres are great.

Niece has a Surly 1*1 with Velocity rims and 2.75 tyres.

It’s amazing.
Tubeless, so much lighter than I was expecting.

Love it.

Don’t change bikes often, but the next MTB will have the capability to run fatter tyres.

It’ll be rigid too.
Looking forward to trying ditching suspension completely.

I’ve been 29+ on my rigid Krampus for a year or so now, replaced my Fortitude. Its ace. Tyre pressure is key. I’ve got the front sorted as a soft squidge (with my calibrated thumbs) and the rear is nearly good, but presently suffering from a leaky valve so doesn’t maintain good pressure for long. Should really fix that.

I’m about to embark on a wee experiment with a Codeine29, some Pikes, a set of cheapo Alpkit wheels and initially some 2.8 TrailBlazers (purely for sizing, I’ll get something more aggressive once I establish if I can fit a 3″ tyre in there). All this to replace my 26″ Five which I built initially for steep n’ rocky stuff. Five is good but I want more. Watch this space…

Not a dedicated follower of fashion but 2.8 650 on the back and 3.5 29er on the front has turned my singlespeed P29er into a bonkers woodland BMXer. Love it!

birdage – what tyre is the 3.5 29er?

How many of you plussers would just not bother if you had the chance to go back and do it again?

I really like it. The Transmitter’s a bit of a blunt instrument compared to my Ragley Ti and I’m currently slightly preoccupied with stopping the things from flatting, but some of that is because – on a hardtail at least – you end up hitting rocky stuff harder and faster than you would normally.

I tried it out of curiosity initially and because I got a good deal on various parts, but it’s my current go to bike and I’m eyeing the carbon fibre Transmitter with interest…

Thought I had Trailblazers fitted but have WTB Bridger on my 650+ was thinking of picking up some Vee Rubber Trax Fatty tyres while Charlie has them at a cheap price…

Cheers, Steve

I have 2 plus bikes, a Specialized Fuse And a Mondraker crafty RR+

Here are a few of my observations

1.I think you need to ride them for a good while to adjust to the tyres and find your ideal tyre pressures
2. They are fast rolling and it makes a fast bike
3. They work just as well on a hardtail or a FS
4. They are fun because they are fast you find you attack the trail in a different way, you cant just blast into everything that is a myth but you can roll over stuff and they are fast rolling
5. the bikes are heavy but the traction on climbs helps balance this out.
6. I’ve had my bikes over a year now and only in the past month or so has there been a good choice of tyres this will only improve as I hope they will develop + specific tyres.
7.They are more prone to punctures its not wise to run with tubes.

Overall I like them but I think the future will be a 30-35mm internal rim with a 2.6 tyre.

Simon

Overall I like them but I think the future will be a 30-35mm internal rim with a 2.6 tyre.

thats what I’m waiting for.

I’m not sold on them at all.

I had a week with a demo Slackline running WTB Scraper rims and WTB Bridger / Trailblazer tyres.

At first I quite liked the extra squish which helped with the general trail chatter. The extra grip in the loos sandy stuff was noticeable however it was once speeds picked up that I didn’t like them. They felt very vague in corners, with little bite compared to the Minion DHF/DHR II combo that I’m used to. Also when braking / riding repeated stutter bumps I really noticed the undamped bounce on a hardtail (much more than with standard tyres). they did roll better than expected.

They are heavy – they didn’t feel too heavy in isolation when being picked up…until I picked up my normal wheels (ARC 30’s on Pro 4’s). I don’t want a load of extra rolling weight, especially on a lightish hardtail.

Poor Trailblazers getting so much hate.
I really like them for what i’ve used them for so far.
Fully expecting i’m still going to like them on armour plated trail centre too.

Overall I like them but I think the future will be a 30-35mm internal rim with a 2.6 tyre.

I suspect you’re right, certainly for ‘normal’ MTBs.

birdage – what tyre is the 3.5 29er?

Doh!! – meant 2.5 (on a 45mm rim)

Personally think rim width has more benefits than out and out tyre thickness. Gives a nicer profile. Would rather there were more 29er 2.6/2.8 than 3.0 options.

Doh!! – meant 2.5 (on a 45mm rim)

Personally think rim width has more benefits than out and out tyre thickness. Gives a nicer profile. Would rather there were more 29er 2.6/2.8 than 3.0 options.

Ah ok, I had googled myself out looking for it!

I just wish there were more 29+ options all round.

How many of you plussers would just not bother if you had the chance to go back and do it again?

I can “go back” any time I want by fitting the 29er wheels I built up – and I do occasionally. Running B+ today up Glen Feshie and I wouldn’t have wanted it any other way. It probably helps that I’m also running them in rigid forks at the moment so I have a nice, light bike that doesn’t “punish” me as much as a rigid, higher-pressure, lower-volume 29er.

This is a bit like the whole fatbiking thing. A lot of folk (users and manufacturers) are jumping on a bandwagon without understanding where the configuration is best used. Much as I respect Cy, until he’s riding the trails and routes I ride, his opinion is only one of many. There are other I respect equally (e.g. whitestone on this thread) and I suspect some of their riding is more in line with my own.

I love it enough that I’ve sold my 29er frame and have a plus frame on the way to replace it. I still have a 29er for longer or more sensible rides but I’m pretty sure I’ll end up riding the plus bike most of the time I’m just out ‘mtbing’.

@Northwind – this may have been touched upon earlier in the thread but I don’t remember reading it.

I went from current standard high volume 29er tyres to 650B+ and just recently to a fat bike whereas you seem to have gone: standard -> fat bike -> plus sized tyres. I got the “Wow aren’t these big tyres brilliant!” feeling in going from standard to Plus whereas you got it going from standard to fat. I noticed a difference in going from Plus to fat but it was nowhere near the same step change, I suspect that you are getting similar in going the other way.

Overall I like them but I think the future will be a 30-35mm internal rim with a 2.6 tyre.
I suspect you’re right, certainly for ‘normal’ MTBs.

The boys at Stanton feel the same and reckon that this will be where many settle.

What fat bike did you get Whitestone?

(fellow Fat bike & Solaris owner here)

A Singular Puffin as a rolling chassis. Nearly finished building it up, just got tape and grips to fit. Have been for a ride using some temporary grips.

Look forward to the pics Sir 8)

Interesting reading people’s thoughts on this. I’ve been running a Cotic Solaris B+ for most of this year.

I wanted to keep it reasonably zippy and spoke to a few people. Ended up plumping for 35mm internal width rims which seem to give a good blend of tyre support and not as heavy as a Scraper.

I’m running a 2,8 Trailblazer out back and 3.0 Nic at the front. Contrary to other people’s experience…riding mixed terrain (Including south downs flint), I have not suffered a single puncture in 1000 miles of riding.

We were just coming out of winter when I started riding, so I have no real winter slop stories yet…other than you get a hell of a lot more mud thrown up from 3.0 than a standard tyre!!

Grip wise… I love the 3.0 Nic up front. It’s glued to the trail.As such, I am putting in a lot of PB times on the bike on trails I have ridden on both 29 HT and 26 FS bikes over the last few years. I was also surprised at just how well the bike climbs. The extra grip more than outweighs the weight penalty.

Through rooty singletrack, it feels like cheating. And I have done 35 mile rides on it without feeling noticeably more fatigued than on any of my other bikes.

I’ve also ridden a Spesh 6 Fatty for a day in Fort William. That was on a 30mm rim, and I lacked the confidence that the Cotic has. It felt less stable but possibly due to that fact that I just picked the bike up and rode it. The tyres were fitted with tubes so I am not sure I got the best from it. Still fun though!

I’ve a feeling that the 2.6 offerings of 2017 could be very good sellers…

the future will be a 30-35mm internal rim with a 2.6 tyre.

Safe bet for TNBT. There will be more in the 2.4-2.6 range I expect, similar to WTB Convicts.

similar to WTB Convicts.

Those look the business, hadn’t seen them yet.

As some have already said you need to look upon the tyre as something else to tune. My Hightower is running 45mm Scrapers with rekon 2.8 front and back. For faster stuff I run 16/18 F/R and slow down the rebound on the suspension to account for the undamped rebound on the tyre. Golfcourse and other steep I run 14/15 F/R for loads of grip but the tyre still has enough support to not roll too much, although you still notice it have a moment or two if you’re feeling cocky.

I’m after a hardtail for quick local muddy winter rides , I fancied something like the sonder but am I barking up the wrong tree . If the tyres are no good in mud would I be better off just getting a normal 27.5 hardtail and whacking the biggest tyre I can fit in the back then a 2.8 or so on the front ? Part of me misses having one bike and just putting fire xc pros on for everything !