I had a DT Swiss rim tape fail on me yesterday, just riding along and pssssssssssssss, flat. Fixed with a tube and off again.

On inspection at home the rim tape has become kinda translucent orange instead of black, concave over the rim drilling & it’s here that it failed, seems that the concave part had got brittle and gave.

Using Stans Race.

Never had this issue before, always considered rim tape a fit & forget item.

Taped as per DT Swiss guidance, one lap plus 6″.

How old is your rim tape? I would say that is how long it should last.

if water gets through the nipple holes and under the tape, it fails quite quickly in my experience..

My current set is coming up to 7 years and has never been touched bar tyre changes.

Yea, I can’t remember, a couple of years I guess, maybe two. I had some WTB stuff that lasted longer.

Luckily the DT tape comes in a 10m roll, so my leftover is enough to replace both wheels tapes.

Had this recently with my DT Swiss rear wheel

The tape had changed colour and began lifting in areas, wheels are only 12 months old

I ripped it off, cleaned up the rim and replaced the tape with a Specialized tubeless rim strip, no need to stick, fits nice and snug, been running them on another set of wheels for 3 years with zero issues

Basically forever, for the good stuff- though it’ll often pick up damage when changing a tyre or similar so it’ll usually not live out that whole life.

Just replaced some Stans tape that had lasted about 8 years.

Tyre wasn’t holding pressure for anything more than a day and when I finally got round to looking at the wheel the tape had stretched over/into the spoke holes until it had become so thin it couldnt hold pressure: by this point the tape was also gettign cut into by the edge of each spoke hole too. Basically its a rubber/synthetyic tape thats put under pressure each time you pump the tyres up or indeed ride the bike so it will wear out eventually: it definately wont last forever…

Not seen those Specialized Tubeless Rim Strips before, I might give them a try next time.

Soooooo those specialised rim strips. Nothing else needs done? Pop them In Instead of tape and they just seal as tape would. Seriously? I actually hate tape, or I’m just not good with the fiddly

My factory taped DT Swiss wheels are 3 years old and the black tape has stayed black and seems fine.

The ones I built / taped myself have lost / started to lose the black and are going orange a bit like yours. Must be to do with my taping as it looks like the exact same tape on my other wheels. It hadn’t really occurred to me it might fail as I’m riding along – I kind of assumed the point it would fail would be when changing tyres.

On my longer rides I think this has made me realise I should take an inner tube with me….got a free MBUK strap somewhere – I may stick a tube up in the front part of the triangle out the way so I don’t have to carry it on me.

ive got those specialised rim strips. has 6 now.

50% success rate. would not recommend. Youve got to stretch them on in the first instance and it then takes a few hours for them to be completely air tight. Then its not guaranteed.

I’ll be slated by many for this but I have a set of dt swiss rims (27mm internal) taped with good old black gorilla tape, coming up 5 and a half years and no issues at all, added bonus its £3 a roll. I’ve used it a few times now, as have a few lads I ride with and none has ever needed to be replaced. I’d guess if the rim was any wider internally it might not work as well

Other drawback of Spesh strip is less tight seal, means sealant gets inside rim, corrodes nipples.