With a High roller, which is a much flatter, squarer profile tyre, once you fall off the centre tread onto the notorious gap, there’s not much grip, but when you rail it over far enough the big grippy side knobs come into play. High Rollers are a bit all or nothing, but if you grab em by the scruff of the neck and really lean the bike into corners, they bite.

Which is the exact reason I hate the bloody things with a passion.
If anyone can explain the design advantages of the ‘notorious gap’ I would be delighted to hear it.

So unless you’re on a surface with enough inherent grip itself, you kind of just fall off the centre tread onto nothing as the side blocks aren’t tall enough.

Never had this problem with other rounded tyres – a matter of taste indeed 😀
I’ve found 2.35 Ignitors an excellent front tyre, very confidence inspiring in everything but deep mud – no, you don’t feel them ‘bite’ as you lean them over, but I’ve never suffered a lack of grip.

I’m no fan of the XR4’s either. For some reason I find they don’t bite very well in softer conditions either, and to be honest they’re a bit meh… Quick enough rolling, but not all that good anywhere. Too big maybe, tread pattern would probably work better if they weren’t so huge!

Weird, I’ve found almost the exact opposite:
2.35 at low 20’s is remarkably grippy in northern slop and gritty mud for such a big tyre.
Not a huge amount of ‘feel’ but they really do grip well and feel consistent in all sorts of conditions.
Shed mud ok too.
For the price they’re my new favourite tyre. 🙂

Anyway, back to the Smorgasbord – I’ll give you a tenner for it, seeing as it’s all muddy now. 😀

Anyway, back to the Smorgasbord – I’ll give you a tenner for it, seeing as it’s all muddy now.

Junky offered £20 posted! 😉

I’ve far from written it off, it’s going on the back of a bike next where I expect it will be better.

Opposite to you though I like High Rollers, and most tyres where there’s a feeling of needing to crank them over to get them to bite.

interesting stuff mb.

Ive got a pair of single compound 29er ready to go F&R on the SS (Rigid).
My front rim is 35mm wide and the rear 27mm I think so may get a flatter profile to you. But will also test on the range of rock/hardpack/gravels and loam/mud that we get at this end of the Malverns.

Rusty Spanner…i think the gap in the High Roller design (and others like it) is for mud clearance?….no idea if that was the designers intentions but it works for me.
I rode Rogate recently which is quite sandy, had a Minion on the front which has less of a gap and more tread than a High Roller….all the bloody thing did was clog with sand all morning leading to front end wash outs….went home swapped to a High Roller on the front and no more problems, the widely spaced tread seems to fling more mud/sand away in my experience.

I like the sound of the rounded profile, when we had a better summer than this last year i put some Specialized Captains on for the best few weeks and they were awesome, very fast rolling, great over harder, dry ground and very linear grip through the lean when getting the bike turned….these sound similar.

Stoner, I’ll try give it a run in the Wyre Forest this weekend too, see what the terrain down there has to offer it. I think on your 35mm front rim you’ll probably get on with the tyre better to be honest. Looking at it again, all it needs IMO is a slightly flatter carcass, and the side knobbles to be about 3-4mm taller on their outside edges. Not huge changes, but would make all the difference I reckon.

brant – Member

Chalky9 is one of the testers for Dirt magazine.

Can’t be, he expressed a clear opinion using comprehensible english

Mboy. Could you mail me. Him@shedfire dot com.

Have a new model i’d like your thoughts on.

Rusty, read this re. tyres with a gap between central and side knobs: http://www.leelikesbikes.com/followup-specialized-eskar-tires.html

In short I believe the open channel on the inside of the side knobs allows their inside edges to grip the ground, especially on softer surfaces where they can dig in.

Anyone had any luck running these tubeless yet? Tried them on my Crests (which give them a nice profile) and they dont seem tight enough to me to get a decent seal.

As for not gripping/biting on soft ground, well they seem fine to me (thay have replaced Mud-Xs), certainly the grip on rocks and roots is fantastic, but also lent over they grip well and when they do let go it’s all nice and predictable, not sudden and scary.

Nick did you get them to run tubelessly at all on Crests? I’m looking at the 29″ version if it’ll run on Crests…

£14.99 now

Free postage?

BTW there’s some ex mayhem display ones at PX now for £15, plus that postage dont forget 😉

http://www.planet-x-bikes.co.uk/c/q/clearance_corner/mayhem_mud_bath

I fitted mine the other night and got out for a local loop on them.

These replaced some 2.4″RRs (Front) and 2.1″Ignitors (Rear)
Rigid 29er, SS.

Width:
On a 20mm rim, RR = 60mm, ignitors = 52mm and the Smorgasbord = 57mm
On a 30mm rim, RR = 61mm, ignitors = 53mm and the Smorgasbord = 59mm.

20mm photo

30mm photo

RR comparison on 30mm

First of all, the ignitors are still my favourite do it all tyre. Hook up brilliantly, plenty of grip at the back when honking the SS, dont break away unexpectedly.

RRs work very well on the front, very fat on the 30mm Gordo rim, and I rarely take them off – maybe only for Stouts if off to wales to bash rocks etc.

My local loop in the current conditions goes something like: tarmac, hardcore/compact stone track/bit of gloop. Then descent on hardpack/gravels, soft loam/squidy bits.

Good things: the Smorg is neither a good nor bad roller on the road. Not as bad as a Stout, not as good as RR or Ignitor. Front didnt let go straight away on off camber root, nor off camber slop, but….

Bad things….it wasnt brilliant. On the rear it’s not a great SS tyre on loose or soft ground. Just doesnt seem to deliver the traction as well as the narrower pentagular knobbled ignitor. Twice the rear stepped out unexpectedly: once on a wet rock descent and on a soft off-camber one.

So not an unmitigated success on the varied malvern surfaces. I guess it’s probably a tyre borne of hebden/todmorden/northern monkey rocks and steps. But it’s too wide and lacking in knobs to dig into the soft stuff (unlike the knobbles on even fatso RRs) at the front, and on all but coarse grit-dressed tarmac it just doesnt get the traction down for SS climbing use Im afraid.

I’ll def give it another go on the front if it every gets summeryer around here again. The positive was definitely on hard packed stony/gravelly descents.

Nick did you get them to run tubelessly at all on Crests? I’m looking at the 29″ version if it’ll run on Crests…

Mine went up first time with a track pump. The same on Bontrager wheels as well.

No not gone up yet, but I’m a little more hopeful after seeing Shaggy’s response so I’ll give them another go when I get the chance.

Just been out on them and it’s really really mucky and wet out there, but didn’t find them lacking at all, mind you I’ve just got a gopro hero 2 camera so was trying really hard to keep the (better) rider in front of me in shot and so was pushing things a bit.

EDIT: Best not risk upsetting STW they changed the link for a reason

do we know where shiggy is from?

and I should probably emphasise when I say “gravelly” I mean hardpacked small stone, with larger stone rock, rather than really loose stuff.

EDIT

The positive was definitely on hard packed stony/gravelly descents.

Almost like it was designed for use somewhere dry and dusty ?

you cant hide just like that junky. What am I missing? 😉

Mail me 😉

First post on here and I’m going to extol the virtues of a commercial product. Pinches of salt all round I guess but I’m typing regardless. Sorry for the long post – I guess this is my way of saying hello too.

I’m new to mountain biking having purchased my first real bike in February this year via the cycle to work scheme. 600 miles later and I’m officially hooked on it. So is my 9 year old son and we regularly frequent Whinlatter, Sherwood Pines, Lee Quarry etc. I also like to ride on my own from the house and I’m becoming proficient at OS reading, Google Earth zooming and Bridleways spotting.

Tonight I had my first trip out with a friend and we covered the back 16 miles of the Holme Valley challenge.
I’d decided earlier on in the week that I was going to put new tyres on my bike for this trip as the Kenda Blue Groove that came on my bike were just about worn away.
I hadn’t bargained on MTB tyre choices and opinions being so varied though and whilst searching and reading stumbled across this thread.

Brants comment on the price going up due to this thread absolutely made my day (im a halifax boy born and bred) and the subsequent fallout was typical Internet forum gold. I also happened to be in the Rotherham area the next day so it seemed fate had chosen my tyres for me.

So it was, I took a trip to on one this morning, was greeted extremely warmly at the door, listened to in great detail and advised to try the enduro compound on my 120mm full sus Mondraker. I was also advised that some tyres with splashes of mud on them were for sale at 15 quid each. I promptly bought 4 and ran to the car before they changed their mind. I looked pretty hard but couldn’t see the mud splashes either.

I took the blue grooves off my rims and had these fitted in no time at all. They are a wider tyre but still fit my bike very well. They also look good but if anything the tread is maybe a little less pronounced than expected. I doubt they will last as long as the blue grooves did.

I took the bike out of the car in Hade Edge this evening and set off. 300 meters on Tarmac and then down some bridleways of mixed and very wet terrain. The instant tell was the speed. I’ve read a lot recently about fast rolling, low resistance tyres and can only assume the Blue Groove is a slow roller. The difference is night and day. The bike is far easier to pedal and far more eager to pile on the speed when gravity does its thing. I was shocked at the difference.

The next thing I noticed was grip. Now this is harder and my lack of experience must be taken into account by anyone reading this. My blue grooves were pretty bald and these were new tyres so obviously grip levels are going to be better.
However, changing from one surface to another, the Smorgasbord tyres felt really well planted all of the time. There were a few 30mph+ downhills on loose rocky terrain and several, soggy uphills punctuated with wet slabs and cart track ruts. The tyres were faultless IMHO.
However, there were two things of note. Firstly, when deeper mud was unavoidable, the tyre struggled for grip as much as my blue grooves did. They shed the mud much faster however. Secondly, when sand was the surface of choice, the tyres seemed suddenly slow and inexplicably weaker performing. I cannot explain this really other than to say that on sand I lost my confidence a little.

Overall, I’m genuinely stunned that a tread pattern can make that much difference in rolling resistance. The Smorgasbord tyres on my bike may have only covered 16 miles so far but, for me at least, those 16 miles represent exactly the variety of terrain I ride on most of the time, and the tyres performed well beyond my expectations. Maybe a set of Maxxis High Rollers would have given me the same or better result but they wouldn’t have been £30 a pair and they wouldn’t have been produced for a local company.

Internet forum recommendations are such a pile.
You don’t know me. I’m not the worlds best mountain biker and I’ve got next to no experience of other tyres. Couple that with the fact this is my first post on here and I could be just some on one troll and where does that leave the value of my opinion?

My recommendation – visit on one in person and postage costs become irrelevant.

Brants comment on the price going up due to this thread absolutely made my day (im a halifax boy born and bred) and the subsequent fallout was typical Internet forum gold

and yet you opted not to pay the new comedy price mmm interesting

Very interesting to hear your comments stoner, and that they’re pretty close if not identical to my experiences with the tyre. Still looks too round in profile even on your Salsa Gordo rim for my tastes.

Brant, sorry only just seen your reply on here, have now emailed you…

just re-read your report mboy, and yes they are similar. Only difference is I didnt notice much “squirm” or tallness – I think it’s a fairly tough carcass. More a feeling of vagueness in the soft stuff.

and yet you opted not to pay the new comedy price mmm interesting

Yup, absolute internet forum Gold.

Do you know what, I think the weather has been better since I bought these tyres. Ill have to tell On One and get them to put the price up again.

For those that are interested they are down to £14.99 in the PX/OO Clearance Corner now.

Yup, absolute internet forum Gold.

I know you told me any chance you could explain why you did not pay the new comedy price? After all that is what I commented on
Surly it would still have been funny if you had paid £40 more for you 4 tyres than you did?

I know you told me any chance you could explain why you did not pay the new comedy price? After all that is what I commented on

I’m struggling to think of a reason why I would have paid more for a tyre that was available for less. The ‘Mud damage’ is non existent – at least on the four I got.

If the tyre had been available only at the ‘comedy price’ I would still have purchased them. That was my intention when I drove there after all as I clearly stated.

Surly it would still have been funny if you had paid £40 more for you 4 tyres than you did?

I think it would still have been funny, yes. And don’t call me Shirley. No matter how badly you spell it.

I’m struggling to think of a reason why I would have paid more for a tyre that was available for less

its comedy gold apparently…they could have just asked you for more for those tyres than the £15…I feel sorry you missed out on a good laugh now

its comedy gold apparently…they could have just asked you for more for those tyres than the £15…I feel sorry you missed out on a good laugh now

Keep up the good work on bouncing this thread to the top. Cheers.

Glad I started it 😉

Happy too as it shows what you think of your customers qnd the reviews have, at best , been indifferent/not great.
Any chance you could explain, as required by law, when you charged £29.99 for the tyre? You seem to have charged every price but that price
Perhaps you could explain how your pricing policy complies with the law?
Oh of course pricing is not your thing eh
PS why has the link to the tyre design been removed…surely all publicity is good even the stuff that shows it was not designed with UK conditions in mind?

Any chance you could explain, as required by law, when you charged £29.99 for the tyre? You seem to have charged every price but that price
Perhaps you could explain how your pricing policy complies with the law?
Oh of course pricing is not your thing eh

Pricing isn’t my thing. I am a product designer, hired by Planet X and On-One to design and work with production facilities for them.

PS why has the link to the tyre design been removed…surely all publicity is good even the stuff that shows it was not designed with UK conditions in mind?

I have no idea why a link has been removed.

Googling for “Smorgasbord tyre design” brings up plenty of info.

Anagram of Smorgasbord is Drags Mor,Sob. Spooky eh?

Anagram of Smorgasbord is Drags Mor,Sob. Spooky eh?

Anagram of Junkyard is “Rad Junky”

its comedy gold apparently…

Oh, I see your confusion now.

they could have just asked you for more for those tyres than the £15…I feel sorry you missed out on a good laugh now

They could have. I arrived, knowing nothing about the £14.99 mud damaged tyres but they had the decency to tell me about them. I’m interested to hear how you’ll spin that into a negative.

Anagram of my name is ‘Christ I’m Hard’. Beat that!

Anagram of my name is ‘Christ I’m Hard’. Beat that!

A guy I went to school with has an anagram of his name that’s “Violent C**t”.

Anyhow.

Vincent Lout?

For anyone that’s interested still… And I’m sure brant will be pleased to hear.

The Smorgasbord makes a MUCH better rear tyre than front IMO. It rolls pretty quickly, it’s got plenty of traction in most conditions (though not so much deep mud), it’s very stable under braking and pumped up reasonably firm (around 38psi I think I put in, enough to mean the tall profile didn’t squirm at all) it was a whole lot better than running it on the front where I found it totally lacked any bite in the corners. It was even respectable over wet roots too. Predictable grip in most places and a fairly predictable drift I’d say, quite like a Kenda Nevegal but with a rounder profile and much much faster rolling.

It’s not perfect, but it’s a fairly good rear tyre in a mix of conditions I’d say. I still prefer the Rubber Queen in Black Chili flavour, but they’re £45, and at the price On One sell these for they’re better VFM if you get me. They definitely roll faster than a Rubber Queen, though not as fast as a Crossmark or a Racing Ralph for instance.

Well after a weekend at Afan/FoD of running one of these (60a/42a dual compound on the back), I’m a convert!
I usually run a tubeless nobby nic in the rear, but this just blows the NN out of the water for out and out grip. They roll just as well as the NN to boot.
Ok, they are 300 odd grams heavier than the nic, but I’ll live with it. It didn’t put a foot wrong at any point on the wet slate of Wales. For £14.99? Very happy here.

Have done another 4 rides on this tyre now, and…

Well, it’s not for me. It’s really quite good if you only ride dry, rocky trails. Sticks to them very well, rolls fast, provides plenty of cushioning etc.

But for most of my riding, especially in this British “Summer” weather, it just slips and slides all over the bloody place! I quite like a relatively loose tyre on the back of my bike, I’d rather the rear drifts than the front, but this is way too drifty for me on my normal trails.

If anyone wants it, it’s in great condition, done about 100 miles tops, all offroad, no visible signs of wear… I just need something with more bite in the medium to loose conditons that are prevalent in the UK, not a rocky trails tyre as this seems to be.

Mboy – can I recommend an ignitor. Great Malvern tyre imo.

Haven’t ridden Malvern or smorgasbord since my post as have been riding in France for the last four weeks. Top tip though is sb8’s are just as good in 35c as 2.1″ on dry dusty trails 😛