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There’s about 6mm between the tyre and seattube on a ti gravel bike with 2.0 29er tyres on it. I was thinking to put some vinyl tape on the seat tube so I can spot if it is rubbing.

Thx
Rich

6mm sounds plenty to me, but it either rubs or it doesn’t, and you’ll find out soon enough. Our seatstays got a bit of a notch cut in them on one of our tandems when we put a 2.4 tyre where it didn’t really fit, but they were quite thick Al tubes and it didn’t seem to matter. I sanded off the corners of the knobs a bit, but mud would still do its thing.

I think there is some standard that says 6mm

But did they supply the tyres or did you? What clearance did they claim?

I presume it is a hardtail. Depends how flexi the wheels and frame are, but I’d say 6mm is enough. Just keep an eye on it

6mm sounds fine.

6mm on the seat tube sounds ok. Chainstays not so much. Wheels flex a lot.

It’s a new version Sonder Camino gravel. They say 50mm max tyres. I think 2.1s are 53 or 54. I tried a mudX 2.0 and a 1.95 renegade so far.

Any thoughts on what XC tyres are ultra low profile?

6mm on the seat tube sounds ok. Chainstays not so much. Wheels flex a lot.

Agree. Only going to be a problem if you get 6mm+ of mud on your tyre which is unlikely on a gravel bike.

Presumably this is with 700c? If it is 650b would let you go bigger

Why are you trying to fit mtb tyres on a gravel bike?

I have about that gap on my TCR and it’s fine

Gravel bike probably fine until you go anywhere with mud? That’s why gravel frames should have loads and loads of clearance

If in doubt fit neoprene chain stay protectors each side.

each side of the seat tube?

700×50 Goodyear Connectors on my Camino, on 23mm rims. Not a hint of rub.

The difference between the widest gravel tyres and the narrowest mtb tyre is usually the more rounded carcass shape and the side knobs don’t really poke out on the Goodyears.

kerley

6mm+ of mud on your tyre which is unlikely on a gravel bike.

I wish that was true

Depends a lot on the tyre tbh, 6mm on a low profile tyre is generally fine, because they tend not to pick up much mud. But jabbier tyres tend to “grow” a lot more in the wet. Obviously depends on the frame and wheel, too.

I have 6mm of clearance on my fatbike and it’s absolutely fine, I had 6mm on my Orange and it ground the tyre into the swingarm on any hard corner.

Just buy a mountain bike 😉

Possibly 2mm max on my Kinesis CX with 40mm Terreno Dry tyres.

90% of the time it’s fine, but I had to do some precision wheel dishing and tighten the spokes a bit (yes yes, has been done, *apparently* tightening spokes doesn’t reduce wheel flex, seemed to fix mine though). Muddy rides or perhaps some over-enthusiastic stomping on pedals still scored a couple of grooves in the chainstays.

Bit of helicopter tape on chainstays was enough to prevent the little grooves getting scored any deeper at least 🙄

I’ve had this problem in the past, used the ‘hook’ side of some sticky Velcro to protect the CS and it did a good job of brushing off excess mud as well 😉.

Also, a good way of measuring small inaccessible gaps is to stick a hex key in it, a 6mm hex = a 6mm gap 👍

I wish that was true

You can make it true, just fit gravel tyres to your gravel bike and ride on gravel 🙂

Saying that, a seat tube clearance of 6mm is obviously going to get more knocks and mud than a seat tube clearance of 2cm.

My road bike has very tight clearance. I rationalised that this didn’t matter as whatever clearance you have, a bigger stone will bounce off and a smaller one will go through.
Until last summer when we were riding on a warm day up a lane that had recently been surface dressed. Every 100 yards stopping to unblock the tar and gravel that had built up under the fork and was grinding me to a halt. My pal, on his Specialized Roubaix eventually just rode off to wait at the top of the road.

Many years ago some riders used to have flint catchers which wiped grit of their tyres. Cheapskates like me used to put a bit of tape across the back of the seatstays and fork to do the same.