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on such a bike i'd go Romy Diagonal Race front and Wicked will rear
The thing is that I already have a wheelset with Racing Ray/Racing Ralph, I am searching for a secondary wheelset for more agressive riding in the mountain.
I fear that Romy/Wicked Will won’t be a huge improvement, but I have never tried those I admit
Great post! I have a trail and gravity casing 2.6 Big Bettys (soft) waiting in the wings, which I planned to start using. But over recent years I've seen a few references to the shortcomings of the BB, and of course now it's been discontinued,,,which doesn't give me the utmost confidence. What's confusing is that I've seen references to pro riders finding the corner knobs too supportive and unforgiving if they got off line, so they were reducing/cutting down the corner lug height, which doesn't fully add up. Further confusing, the Tacky Chan seems to be the evolution of the BB, but then why are the corner lugs so massive...on the latest 2.5 Radial (which I LOVE as a front in loose conditions), the corner lugs measure something like 7.75MM, and are very well supported...so why are they so big? I was staying away from running TC in the rear, thinking I'm "supposed" to run a rear tire with less aggressive cornering lugs, not more aggressive than my front tire.
I picked up the BB tires because the corner lugs looked about perfect for what I was looking for...6mm in height, and I liked the spacing (good all around, but probably too tight to clear mud well). And certainly the corner lugs are stiff and well supported...which I "thought" was what I was looking for.
I don't know, any further insight would be helpful, thank you!
Just mount em up and shred the shit out of them, they’ll be fine.
then it makes sense for the other more aggressive options
After a couple of seasons riding on my DH bike with Michelin DH22/DH34 and DH22/DH16 combos, I moved to Schwalbe:
SCHWALBE Magic Mary Gravity Pro 29 x 2.50 | Ultra Soft Radial TLR | black - front
SCHWALBE Tacky Chan Gravity Pro 29 x 2.50 | SOFT RADIAL TLR | black - rear
As I'm waiting for the tires to arrive, it would be nice to hear what the possible changes will be? I've been riding 1,6bar (23,2psi) pressure.
Nice...that's what I'm talking about!
I'm not sure why more people don't run the Tacky Chan up front...with this new design on the 2.5 Radial, I suspect we'll see more people doing that! The MM sample I have weighs 1,460g, and the TC weighs 1430g, so it's fairly stout. I actually "suspect" you'll end up running the same pressures as you did before...as I'm really not sure the "add 3 psi" rule-of-thumb is going to apply with the Gen 2 Gravity casing. Maybe add 1.
I'm going to assume you're going to run the tc in back and that's just a typo. But I find the schwalbe tires to be somewhat similiar to the 22/16 combo you mentioned, just a little less on on the spectrum of gnarly. I found the TC to roll faster, have a bit softer casing, and not bite as much under braking compared to the 16. The side knobs felt stiffer to me when turning compared to the 16 though. I haven't ridden the lastest radial MM, but the previous version I thought had a lot less sidewall support than the 22s.
Honest question for the peanut gallery: anyone have any advice for picking the Kryptotal Front vs. Rear as a rear tire?
I've only ever used the Kryptotal Front DH Super Soft, and it's been great as a rear tire. Super long lasting, fast rolling, and accceptable braking, cornering, and casing. Curious if I'm missing out on anything by not using the "Rear" tire as a rear tire.
The rear specific tire is lighter and flimsier. Never seen a casing break in and become so much more pliable before. I nuked a rim before I figured out I needed a 2-3psi more pressure than the dhr2 I had used before.
I tried the non-radial TC as a front tire, and found the extreme ramping and wide spacing to cause it to carve either left or right instead of tracking straight, and far too much transition gap unless you went “full commit”. However, I am really excited to try the radial 2.5 up front - I think it will be better in both regards.
Thanks for the feedback. You said "The rear specific tire is lighter and flimsier." Have you tried the front specific tire in the rear, too?
I have. I only liked it in the dry, it packed up in the wet unless I could really open it up. Not ideal for me locally.
My current setup is HR3 front DD and DHR2 DH both with Cush Core. Much better when things get slimy, which is too often.
+1 on mount and shred them!
I think the unforgiving cornering you reference has more to do with the overall knobs geometry than just the height.
Big Betty sideknobs are quite square and wide. Whereas the TC, with a more open leading edge corner, allows corner entry to be less aburpt.
Also now that the TC has a more widley spaced pattern on the tread cap for the 2.5" radial version, it also has less off a dead spot. When you add in the radial casing defelction, it's pretty much elimianted.
Compare that to the cornering behaviour of a Big Betty, it was very on/off, and i think many riders would get lost in that dead spot. Not what you want in a front tire.
Thanks for bringing back an old post!
@schwalbai Do you have any idea if this tread pattern is going to be released in 2026 ?
🤷♂️
Great thread, and great feed back, thank you! I feel like a proper tire nerd already!
Okay, so I rock the Big Betty! Likely I'll run in Squamish and BC Bike parks this summer...thinking it will be good there. Problem is, I already have a couple variants of the Tacky in soft compound, for rear tire use, in route. So I don't know if I can get enough riding time to burn them all up...it's quite the problem. But I'll try!
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