tyrion

Sniffing new tires is nothing to be ashamed of. Sniffing saddles might be a little suspect.

ThermionicScott 

I love the smell of new tires, too. Can't explain it, but I have since my childhood.

rhm

In before the lock!

The Golden Boy 

You need to shop here- EVERYTHING from here smells like tires.

fender1

https://janheine.wordpress.com/2015/...e-performance/

Steve Whitlatch 

Oh my. From the guy selling $80 tires.

I am just saying the price is high. I am also saying I really appreciate quality tires. For $160 I would be rocking some ultra high end Tubular tires from ribble.UK. My tires are ridden by professionals. How many of Jan`s tires were on the bikes in the Paris Roubaix?

fender1

davester

I think that's entirely dependent on whether he outspent his competitors sponsoring P-R teams.

Classtime 

So...
1. If you want race/event type suppleness in a 32mm clincher, Compass is the way to go.
2. Mileage is pretty good for a nice riding tire.
3. GP 4000s only come in 28 but a 32 GP 4000 would be as good as the Compass.
4. Other Panaracer offerings are not as supple in the sidewall as the Compass.

Which makes me want to use my Bday $ and get a pair of Stampede Pass EL instead of Gravel Kings like I planned.

AlmostTrick

Are you saying your tires are made from actual 320 TPI material, and it's not the tire company's marketing department counting layers as Jon claims? Please clarify. And if yes, please provide evidence.

AlmostTrick

How much did you spend on your bike? There are loads of ways to “blow” way more $$$$ on bike gear than the difference in dollars we’re talking about here. On stuff that often doesn’t even offer a discernable difference in performance or comfort.

My experience on Compass tires has been outstanding, so I have them on three bikes. For me they are worth the small premium in price, especially given the mileage I get out of them. (and my cheapskatness in other, less meaningful areas!)

Salamandrine 

It may surprise some of you, but I think Compass tire prices are totally fair. High quality tires have always been expensive. Decent racing tubulars were always more than $100 each, adjusted for inflation. Now that most people ride clinchers, and still want that top end ride, it follows that equivalent quality in a clincher is going to cost around the same. Smaller production niche market items are always priced a little higher than mass market items, due to the lack of economy of scale. Additionally, Panaracer has always made tires as well as anyone IMHO, and in fact they do make professional level tubular tires as well. European pro racing, being based in Europe, naturally is more inclined to use European sourced tires.

Anyhow, as has been pointed out, tires make a big difference, and the cost relative to a bike is pretty small. If you've got a nice bike, it is perfectly sensible to put very nice tires on it. It's almost dumb not too. That said, the extralight (I haven't tried them) seem a bit on the light side for me, but it depends.

As far as I can make out, Panaracer makes private label tires for all of the companies listed below. There may be one or two I missed. There's a bit of overlap, but mostly they are all a little bit different, for different markets and applications. I think Compass is the only one offering a the extra super light casing, but maybe Grand Bois does now as well. Harder to source though, since they are in Japan.

Grand Bois
Fairweather
Compass
SOMA
Rivendell
Pacenti
Sim Works
Swift
Bruce Gordon rock n' road

ThermionicScott 

@Salamandrine, IIRC the extra-light casing originated on Grand Bois tires at Jan's prompting. Then when Compass introduced their own line of tires, it was a no-brainer for them to include extra-light versions.

And the Pacenti Pari-Moto is available in two variants: 66 tpi with tan sidewalls, and 120 tpi, black sidewalls only. I don't know how the 120 tpi casing compares to GB/Compass's extra-light casing, but I've heard it rides better than the 66 tpi version.

CO_Hoya 

Are you guys riding your Compass tires tubed or tubeless? Does anyone have an opinion on how that changes the tire performance?

Spoonrobot 

IME Compass tire flats were almost always due to tiny shards of glass working through the tire over the course of a few rides or tiny steel wires (the "michelin thorn").

Using sealant in my tubes and then eventually going tubeless completely stopped these flats. Tires feel faster but the weight savings are so small I would not put much stock into that as it's probably just placebo effect.

Having handled a few different tires from the different re-badges I think the sidewalls are more similar between all the tires than the tread area. Compass tread area is much more supple in the hand that any of the others and when testing different pressures it seems the sag is caused quite a bit more from the tread than the sidewall. I haven't gone as far as measuring the contact patch at the same sag % but it would not surprise me if there were vast differences there as well.

Cyclist0108

This bike was about $1K in 1987. I recently dumped about another $2K into it, including about $750 on wheels.

skillasw

I second that, best tires I've used. For that price $160 you could almost buy 2 pairs, and they have the classic gumwall. Not mention superior performance.

davester

At the probikekit sale price those are a deal, though note that the retail price is about the same as the Compass/Soma retail prices. Also, is there any actual data showing that they have superior performance?

palincss

Actually, experimentation with the EL casings began with Grand Bois tires, before Compass released its tire line, and you can still buy Grand Bois tires with EL casings. It's actually not much more difficult to buy from Grand Bois in Japan than it is to buy from any other online vendor, especially if you use Chrome as your browser (it can automatically translate the Japanese into English). There's one extra step: you order as you always do - put items in your cart, etc. - and then wait for them to contact you by email with the shipping. They'll send you a PayPal invoice, and you pay it as normal. Products come via Japan Post, and it doesn't take any longer than ordering from stateside.

If you'd like to browse, I scanned the Grand Bois Spring 2018 catalog and posted it on my google drive here. Or, their online shopping site is here.

Cyclist0108

But it isn't exactly instant gratification:

My experience with the Royal Mail is that it was quite a bit faster than the USPS. But that was 1993-1997.

Steve Whitlatch 

Well I never counted. It's marked on the side of the tire. I only said that as way of showing I like quality tires. Are you saying team Sky is stupid for using veloflex tires over compass? I am not trying to say compass tires are bad, but please do not try to tell me they are so superior to all other tires just because Jan is a good marketer.

ThermionicScott 

Aren't most pro teams still on tubulars rather than clinchers?

AlmostTrick

Graphene? It sounds like one of the ingredients in Kool-Aid.

But more seriously, how can a tire with flat protection layer(s) roll better than a quality tire without them? It's just extra, unnecessary material to slow things down.

I only had one flat in about 7000 miles on Compass tires. Seems plenty good to me.

Steve Whitlatch 

i am sorry I said I think the price is high. I don`t want to argue. Many people, including my wife, think I pay too much for my tubular and clincher tires too. There is a good selection of very high quality clinchers out there in 700 x 28 . Buy what you like.

AlmostTrick

One of the bikes I'm running Compass tires on is a $300 BD FG. And why not? It makes the bike ride like a dream.

Unlike some high dollar gear, I always consider quality tires as money well spent.