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When is the Conti Minion coming out? Apparently Black Chilli works really well in the winter.
Maybe rename the thread to a 'Tyres thread' or open a new one?
The first puncture came quite soon but I dismissed it as bad luck. But this weekend I had 3 punctures in a day.
Other than that I really like the tire, great grip, good rolling, easy to mount tubeless and great price.
But the casing looks to be really poor when it comes to puncture resistance - or is it just bad luck?
Did anyone else have a similar experience?
Before that I always ran WTB tough casing tires.
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I agree with you on the 4 positives you gave on these tires.
I havent run mine many times. It came up on the thin side and it's not super grippy. IT WILL LAST THO. You should see a mates...
I think I prefer the Wild Enduro with a Rimpact, but that's my personal preference only. Not to jinx my tyres going into winter but I've had great resiliance from mid weight Michelin tyres in full on Alpine riding all year long. My next experiment is to try an AM2 on the rear. At just over 1000g I am curious if it's strong enough. As I said, so far Michelin have put some lightweight, but strong stuff in their tyres so I hope that it will last.
I never run inserts, pressure is around 23psi, but I'm light at around 63kg with all my gear.
I don't associate the wire bead with inferior tires, I see it as cost cutting option and I don't mind the weigth increase it brings. But I was expecting these to be one step lower that the race line DH 34, but to me it looks like the casing is nowhere close and the tire does not deserve the same DH34 name.
If they made the casing stronger it would be the perfect rear tire - at least for me.
I did get a cut/crack on the top of the casing which might be similar to what you experienced, but not deep enough to cause leaks, and the tire saw plenty of use anyway. You could try to raise the pressure a little bit, maybe that helps.
I doubt higher pressure will help much since I'm slicing them at the thread and I'm already running them quite high for my weigth.
Like I said I don't want to give up on these tires since I really like them, but if I have any more punctures on the next one it's not bad luck anymore.
I had around 6 of WTB tough tires on the rear and have never had a single puncture and I was riding the same terrain as with the Michelin.
It is interesting to hear you run 1,6 bar on a DH casing and cut the tyre at your weight... I run EXO Maxxis (on a 150 mm bike) with an insert in the rear at 1,5 bar (front and rear) and there are no problems at 75-ish kg plus gear. I can easily do Krvavec, I did Finale Ligure (only needed one tubeless plug in 5 days), etc.
They all loose a bit in the cold but it is more noticeable.
I really liked them in warmer weather and softer dirt though.
The pressure I run is usually sufficient to prevent any rim strikes on most trails, I add a few psi extra if I know that the trail is fast and rocky.
I didn't go to Krvavec this year but since all of the punctures were from more rocky trails (coastal region) I would guess that I would not complete a single clean run on Krvavec 😉
I also checked the weigth of the racing line DH34 and there is some difference - which I'm guessing is in the casing.
I have a max grip assegai on now and haven't noticed any significant changes in grip in the cold. I was rolling through snow the other day. I have the big betty on the rear in soft compound and it still seemed to handle the temperatures pretty well but lost a bit of traction.
https://nsmb.com/articles/michelin-wild-enduro-tire-review/
As for Maxxis, like I mentioned, the MaxxTerra does lose a lot of grip (it's really playing on my confidence for the past year or so when it gets cold, as there is virtually no grip). I even tried a dual compound last year to see if that would fix it, but in snowy conditions it doesn't really help.
Kind of hoping Continental finally makes their Minion clone, apparently the Black Chilli rubber works really well in the cold?
I live in New England, so 99% of what I ride is rocks and roots, and I'm wondering which tires I should go for. I'll be riding mellow-ish trails fairly often, but will also be racing enduro. Particularly I'm wondering if the Wild Enduros would be ok for my application, and whether I should go for the regular construction or if I should look at the Racing Lines.
There is no way in hell I'm putting 1,5 kilos of tyre on each of my wheels, an EXO Assegai in 29x2,5WT is a heavy and slow SOB as is, it really kills the speed of the bike noticeably.
Dh22 and Assegai with Maxxgrip compound (Chose casing which you whant EXO+, DD or DH) is the best tyres for roots/stones (wet or dry)
(my conclusion from forums)
(some ppls say that Continental Der Baron Project Apex is also good in that cind of scenario ..... but naah :-/ )
The Magi-X is the grippier of the two, but Gum-X I’ve found to be a great compound that lasts a decent amount of time.
I’ve run Wild Enduro Front Gum-X (non racing line) front and rear before and really liked it. Cornered great, but rolling resistance was noticeable. I’ve also run the DH34 Racing Lines front and rear and that was awesome, but the Magi-X was also noticeably draggy and wears quicker.
As a side note, I now run the new 2.6” Force AM2 front and rear on my enduro bike and it’s my favorite yet. Extremely fast rolling (which is what I was mainly after) and the 2.6” (vs the 2.4”) tread is open enough that it’s fairly decent in soft conditions. Cornering is great for an “XC” tire.
They’re all rugged enough in my opinion unless you just continuously monster truck through sharp rock gardens.
For rear a proper DH 34 would work well rather than a bike park version if you say drag is not an issue.
That is until I checked them last night and they felt pretty hard, got the durometer out and sure enough they’ve gone hard as nails (49-50 on the side knobs). Tested against a brand new Dissector MaxxTerra and that measured 31.
Was I being unrealistic hoping to use them again? I’ve done it in the past with MaxxGrips without the compound going hard…
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