Ooooo, at last, my turn to do a what tyre thread…

As per title – Thought I’d give ’em a try as they’re cheap.
Bought one of each as rear tyres to use over the winter. Have been running a UST Larsen TT up to now but finally admitting defeat as it’s totally overwhelmed and providing zero traction up or down. A bit more volume wouldn’t go amiss either.
Typically riding Lakes/Peak/Calderdale/Lancs.
Front tyre won’t be changing, that stays as a Super-Tacky Minion.
Will be run tubeless on Flows. Orange 5. Not really a particularly delicate rider!
Purgatory is control 2.2″ and 60/70 compound
Storm is control 2.0″ and 55/65 compound

The question is… which one to try first?
Storm sounds like the obvious choice but a bit worried that it might not have enough volume.
Thoughts and experiences please.

Ta

I’m running 2 purgatorys at the moment, great tyres IMO, not draggy, grips OK in mud (it’s not brilliant, but its a lot better than I expected) and was fine on general loose natural trail.

The Storms are good winter tyres too, not sure I’d want one on the back of a FS though with something big on the front, might encourage you to ride beyond the tyres limits. Saw a guy running them frotn and rear on a 5 last night and he seemed to be doing well.

If your spending time riding rocky lakes stuff and some muddy stuff then I’d go purgatory f+r. If it’s muddy stuff with occasionaly rocky rides I’d go for storms and learn to ride smootley or swap tyers for those rides.

Storms don’t work in the dry at all though I found.

As for 2 blis, mine went up fine with a track pump and 4 layers of electrical tape to seal the rim (DT X470), deflated and added sealent.

been running Purgatory as front and back tyres for the last two years in the lakes, so not a whole lot of mud, and they have been pretty good. The side walls are quite thin so I now have an ignitor LUST on the back, the purgatory had more grip.

Cheers TINAS, what do you mean by

not sure I’d want one on the back of a FS though with something big on the front, might encourage you to ride beyond the tyres limits

Front S/T Minion is only a 2.3
Were you assuming a 2.5 when you said “big”?

Limits of which end were you thinking about?

I meant it’s an XC tyre with a corespondingly thin casing, I think the rear would pinch flat long before the front lost grip on rocky trails.

And the Minions quite a dry weather tyre IIRC (never used one so only going off the basis that high rollers are the allrounder, minions the dry and wet screams the wet tyres in their range). Would make more sense to run 2 storms if its muddy where you ride and take it easier over the rocks, or 2 purgatorys if its more rocks with occasional mud. I suspect having 2 missmatched tyres would mean the back end’s comprimised on rocks and the front doesn’t work on mud.

[edit] mathcing tyres is probably the wrong description, complimentary?

OK cheers, that makes sense.
Purgatory will be going on the back then.
If I don’t get around to trying the Storm on the Five then it can go on the hardtail instead.

Anyone know if the Storm comes up any bigger than a 2.0 mud-X ?
…which is what’s currently on both ends of the h/t but they’re stupidly skinny and often pinchflat both ends simultaneously (with tubes)

Nope, but they do a mud type DH tyre that’ll be up to the job

Hi Ian – I’ll just add my 2p worth !

I’ve run the Storm on the back for the last 2 winters on both the 5 & HT and I like it. Plenty of traction in the mud and it’s quite a tall tyre for the width so at good pressures it resists pinching and still grips. And yes it is bigger than the Bonty, I found the Bonty’s good but a bit narrow ie less than 2.0 like 1.9 but the Spec is a bit bigger more like 2.1. I run them with Maxxis FR tubes (like I do everything) so that may help !?

Been thinking of trying the purgatory as well but see that as more of an alternative to my much love high rollers so not for Winter & mud.

I’ve got a storm on the back of my spicy at the minute and so far so good. It’s a fair bit skinnier/lower volume than I’d normally use, but I just pump it up a bit harder.

Well, they’ve turned up in the post yesterday and I’ve had a chance to sit ’em side by side and compare (but not fitted either yet).

Laid out flat, the Storm does look almost as big as the Purgatory (bead-to-bead measured flat) so shouldn’t be that much less in volume.

I know that Marcus (Steel4real) rides mostly the same stuff as I do, so I think I’m about to do a total about-face and try the Storm (tubeless, stans) first on the back of the Five.

Thanks all.

Been thinking of trying the purgatory as well but see that as more of an alternative to my much love high rollers so not for Winter & mud.

I swaped form HR’s to Eskars on the Pitch, massively more grip at the expense of some drag.

The Purgatorys feel like a slightly better rolling, slightly less grippy, and better mud shedding alternative to the Eskars. But I’ll qualify that with my purgatorys bing on a 29er and the eskars on a 26er so there may be differences in grip/rolling resistance due to that as well.

After years on Maxxis I’ve become a bit of a specialized tyres fanboi! I had Storms on my winter singlespeed, then some Eskars on the Pitch, now Purgatorys on this years winter SS.

Yikes !

As mentioned I use thicker than standard tubes in mine !

You’re going tubeless !! You may need to run quite a high pressure.

Worth a try though.

P.S. Where did you get them from, I’m interested in a Purgatory or Eskar for the spring instead of old faithful HR.

hargroves cycles

About £20 each if you factor in 5% Quidco too.

What thisisnotaspoon said, but I’d say the storm is to the purg what the purg is to the eskar (though eskars shed mud almost as well as a purg if you run then at a slightly higher pressure). If I were you I’d have a storm on the back, but YMMV

Wow, those Eskar’s look good value. Specialized to the rescue with Maxxis stoopid UST prices.

Eskar is a really good tyre… Could do with a softer central rubber IMO but they’re still good as they are.

not good in mud

Slight detour, but still on the subject of Specialized tyres…. is the Clutch 2Bliss (single ply) still available anyway? I can’t find it online, only the SX (1.5ply) and DH (2ply) versions.

Think the clutch 2bliss is only available on complete bikes.

I was looking for a 2bliss Clutch back in the summer but couldn’t find one. In the end I got an SX.

Tonight I got the Storm mounted, not without some initial dificulty but I learnt something worth sharing in the process

tonight’s lesson learnt

I really rate the sotrm – awesome in the mud! Used on a HT and just a bit more pressure than larger volume tyres.