Originally Posted by
Psimet2001
Tubeless just isn't the solution to anything other than flats on road.
Yeah, well - I live and ride in a rural, heavily wooded area in Minnesota. Stopping for even a very short period of time at the height of summer can be exceedingly unpleasant from a mosquito perspective - as in practically intolerable. (Been there done that.) I can change a flat pretty fast, but I can plug one even faster and most of the time, I never even know I had a puncture because it just seals up. So flats on the road can be a big deal.
Originally Posted by
terrymorse
Included as an important subset the proverbial but rarely experienced pinch flat on the road.
Out of all the I-don't-know-how-many thousands of miles, I've had a total of one pinch flat, from a cattle guard when I wasn't paying attention.
Well, I wish I was lucky enough to ride on roads that had no avoidable defects and I wish I was built like a world tour racer, but neither are true for me. Switching from tubes to tubeless means going from 6-10 flats per year to one every other year while riding 4000 miles per year with about half of those being pinch flats. Hard to argue with those results.
As far as mounting tires, it's tricky the first time or two but after that not so much (unless you're a slow learner). There are tire/rim incompatibilities, which hopefully diminish with some upcoming rim and tire standards, but once you figure out what works, it's pretty simple. The biggest thing to avoiding having to install a tube on the road is having a plugger kit. When you get a puncture that doesn't seal in the first rotation or two, jump off, put a thumb over the hole and dig out the plugger with your free hand. Put the plug in and add any air you think you need. Total downtime: less than 30 seconds if you're good. Not even enough time for the mosquitoes to realize you're there.
I'm a fan.