Tubeless tires have become increasingly popular in the sport of mountain biking in recent years, and for good reason: they reduce the risk of punctures, and they can run lower tire pressures, improving both traction and ride quality. However, running tubeless tires does come with some drawbacks too. Read on to find out if a tubeless tire setup is right for you and your mountain bike.
Tubeless tires: Advantages and disadvantages
Advantages of tubeless mountain bike tires
- Reduced risk of punctures
- Fewer flat tires
- Ability to run lower tire pressures
- Better traction
- Improved ride quality
1. Reduced risk of punctures
One of the biggest reasons mountain bikers choose to ride a tubeless tire setup is to eliminate the possibility of pinch flats. Pinch flats are a type of flat tire that happens to the inner tube on a non tubeless setup.
Pinch flats are caused when you ride into something that causes a sharp impact – this could be a rock, large roots, or other obstacles on the trail, and is more likely to happen when hitting these obstacles at speed. Another factor that makes pinch flats more likely is running lower tire pressure.
These sharp impacts cause your mountain bike tire to be compressed so much that the inner tube gets pinched between the tire and the edges of the rim. This leads to two small holes on the rim side of the inner tube that almost look like fang marks.
Tubeless tires completely eliminate the possibility of getting a pinch flat on your bike, even if you run low tire pressure. Punctures can still occur, however most punctures are no big deal since the tire sealant, a rubbery liquid inside the tire, will fill the puncture hole and solidify on its own, creating an airtight seal with no effort required on your part.
Some larger punctures can require repairs if the puncture is too big for the sealant to coagulate across by itself. More on that a bit later.
2. Fewer flat tires
Fewer punctures, whether they’re pinch flats or otherwise, means fewer rides disrupted by getting a flat tire out on the trail. Every seasoned mountain biker knows the pain of having to cut their ride short, and either fix their tire trailside (if they were lucky enough to have the right tools and small bike pump with them) or walk out of the trail, sometimes for miles.
Getting flat tires can really reduce the amount of riding you end up getting in, and for those of us with limited time to ride, its a real buzzkill.
If you regularly ride rough terrain with lots of rocky, rooty sections, you probably know about this even better. Pinch flats can become something that happens to you every few rides, and if you can avoid that and keep your rides going uninterrupted, it makes a lot of sense to do so.
3. Ability to run lower tire pressures
The ability to ride your mountain bike with lower tire pressures is another big benefit of going with a tubeless setup on your MTB.
If you’re riding with inner tubes, you’ll need to keep your air pressure fairly high to avoid having pinch flats become far too common, but running high pressure in your mountain bike tires can make for a much rougher ride because your tires won’t be able to deform over obstacles as well, but instead will just hit them harder.
4. Better traction
Having to ride with higher pressures also reduces the traction your tires have on the trails, because they’ll have a smaller contact patch with the trail. Lower pressures allow the tires to deform slightly under your weight which increases the amount of rubber in contact with the trail at any given time.
This is why fat bikes run very low tire pressures, especially for riding in snow, ice and otherwise slippery conditions – lower pressures increase traction.
5. Improved ride quality
The overall quality of your mountain bike rides will improve if you’re able to ride a tubeless setup compared to riding with inner tubes.
Not only will it be more pleasant thanks to the smoother ride resulting from riding with lower tire pressure, and the peace of mind that comes with knowing a flat tire during your ride is much less likely, but you’ll also probably notice an improvement in your riding abilities.
If you’ve only ever ridden with inner tubes in your tires, switching to a tubeless setup is a great way to take your riding to the next level.
You’ll have more confidence because of the smoother ride, and because of the much improved traction you’ll be able to get with a tubeless setup. You may find yourself taking more aggressive lines and hitting corners with more speed than you have in the past.
Related: Are you riding the right mountain bike tires for you?
Disadvantages of tubeless mountain bike tires
- Initial setup can be challenging
- Ongoing sealant maintenance
- Potentially messy repairs
- Compatibility and costs
1. Initial setup can be challenging
The biggest downside of riding with tubeless tires is no doubt the initial setup of them. When things go well you can have tubeless tires installed in around 15 minutes, but if things go poorly you could take hours and be left with a mess of sealant all over the place.
The difficult part when setting up tubeless tires is getting the tire to seat in place on the rim quickly. Getting the tire bead to seat on the rim properly is crucial to ensuring an airtight seal, and in some cases you could have difficulty getting the bead to seat evenly, which can lead to air leaks.
2. Ongoing sealant maintenance
It’s not the end of the world, but every few months you’ll need to check your tires and usually add more tire sealant to them.
Over time, the sealant inside your tires will harden, meaning its not still sloshing around to fill punctures. Also, any punctures that do happen will reduce the amount of sealant as it will have hardened to fill the puncture.
3. Potentially messy repairs
One upside of using inner tubes is when you do need to repair or replace one, its usually as easy as popping your tire off, patching or replacing the tube, popping the tire back on and pumping it up.
Not so with a tubeless tire setup – for bigger punctures you’ll need to fill the hole from the inside meaning the sealant from inside your tire can cause a mess and get all over the place.
4. Compatibility and costs
Whether you have tubeless ready tires and tubeless compatible rims is another thing you’ll need to consider if you’re considering running a tubeless setup.
While most higher end mountain bike tires come tubeless ready, not all MTB tires do. And whether or not a bike has tubeless ready rims can be hit or miss.
If your bike doesn’t already have tubeless compatibility, your costs to run tubeless tires will be a lot higher because on top of just paying for the sealant and possibly some labor at your local bike shop, you’ll be on the hook for new tubeless compatible rims and possibly even some new tires.
Converting your bike to a tubeless setup
How to tell if your wheels and tires are tubeless ready
By looking at the specs for a new bike, you’ll be able to tell if the tires and wheels are tubeless ready. You can also check the outside edges of your tires which will have a logo stating they are tubeless ready if that is in fact the case.
For your wheels, check to see if they have spoke holes. If they do, that will allow air to escape and means they are not tubeless ready.
What you need to convert to tubeless setup
You will need to have tubeless ready tires, tubeless ready wheels and tubeless valves. You’ll also require tire sealant, which keeps an airtight seal and closes punctures when they occur.
Tires and rims
Tubeless ready tires are less porous than normal tires, which allows them to hold air in. They also come with stretch resistant edges, which reduces the chances of the tires coming off the rims while you’re riding.
Tubeless ready wheels will need to have an airtight rim bed, meaning no rims with spoke holes. Hookless rims, which lack bead hooks, can only be used with specialized hookless tires.
Tubeless valves
Tubeless valves are just normal Presta valves, but with special seals on the inside and outside of the rim that prevents air from escaping through the valve hole.
A major difference between tubeless valves and non-tubeless ones is the tubeless valve stems, which come with removable valve cores. The removable valve cores allow you to fill your tires with sealant and is also useful to able to clean and even replace the valve cores when necessary.
Sealant
Tire sealant is the thin rubbery liquid that sloshes around on the inside of tubeless tires. If the tires get a puncture, the liquid fills the hole and solidifies, providing an airtight seal.
Your tubeless tires will typically require around 90 milliliters of sealant per tire, which varies depending on how big or small your tires are.
Normally, when you get a puncture on a tubeless setup, you’re unlikely to even notice it since the sealant does its job so effectively.
How to repair tubeless mountain bike tires
While rare, you may need to repair your tires if the sealant isn’t able to do the job on its own. This would usually only happen with larger punctures in your MTB tires, not minor ones.
How to fix a tubeless puncture
If you’ve got a puncture that the sealant didn’t handle for you already, your options for fixing it will depend on just how severe the puncture is.
If the puncture isn’t too major, you can fix it while out on the trail by stuffing a special plug into the puncture which the sealant can stick to and seal the remaining gap. There are different types of plugs to use, including sticky strips and little darts.
More severe punctures will need to be fixed off trail. You’ll need to fix these punctures from the inside with a vulcanizing rubber solution along with patches.
This can get a little messy since you will need to remove the tire from the rim with sealant inside of the tire. When doing these repairs, its very important that you clean the tire surface where you’ll be making the repairs well and use a proper non-stretching patch.
Frequently asked questions
Yes tubeless tires are a great choice for mountain biking because they eliminate pinch flats and allow you to ride with lower tire pressure than you otherwise could on tires with inner tubes. The lower pressure improves traction and makes for a smoother ride. However, there are some downsides to riding with tubeless tires including a potentially challenging initial setup, ongoing sealant maintenance and the possibility of having to do messy repairs.
While this does depend on a rider’s personal preferences, tubeless setups are preferred by the majority of better mountain bikers because they are less prone to flats and allow riders to use lower tire pressure, improving traction and smoothness of the ride.
Yes tubeless tires need sealant to keep an airtight seal and so that small punctures can be repaired on their own with the sealant hardening over them.
Tubeless rim tape is to cover up spoke holes and ensure there is nowhere for air to escape from your tires. Tubeless rim tape also helps to tighten up the rim – tire fit if its slightly loose.
To add sealant to your tubeless setup, simply remove the valve core, add sealant, and replace the core once you have the right amount of sealant added (usually around 90ml).
If you get your MTB converted to a tubeless setup at your local bike shop, it will probably run you between $100 to $200, but if you need to buy new tires and rims, the conversion could be much pricier.
While you can mix tubeless sealants mostly without issue, the results of mixing them can be unpredictable, and your best bet is to use one type of sealant at a time.
You should change your sealant every 3 months or so, depending on how much riding you do. If you don’t change it often enough it can harden and not do its job of filling small punctures while you ride.
A good starting point is 22 PSI in front and 26 PSI in the rear for tubeless tires, but this can vary depending on your weight and riding style. Check out our full guide on MTB tire pressure for more on how to gauge the proper tire pressure for you.
Conclusion
While the effort required to get a mountain bike setup with tubeless tires isn’t for everyone, its undeniable that running a tubeless setup has its benefits, and can make a real difference in the smoothness of your ride and the grip your tires have over the trail.