bblair

Must be the combo. I have American Classic wheels and have no problem with new Conti 4000 or 5000 tires.

But Michelin tires on Shimano wheels? Even the local shop struggled. They were on sale and I told the guy (Performance Bike, may they rest in peace) that I would only buy them if he put them on. So, off to lunch and 30 min later he is still sweating. Maybe that's why they went out of business.

rm -rf

GP5000 has been changed in the last year or so?

I've used GP4000, then GP5000 on my 8 year old HED "tubeless ready" wheels. They "used to be" easy to mount and unmount.
I really like them, with long life, good grip and smooth rolling, and the tire wear indicators.

It's very difficult for me to get the most recent installed (non-TL) GP5000 bead to unseat.

Trying both thumbs pushing, or 8 fingers pull from the other side, either method is extremely hard now. The bead is too tight in the rim to fit any thin tool to pop it out. I eventually got it off after quite a few tries.
Supposedly, a couple of local bike shops have stopped carrying them, just too much trouble. (That seems pretty unlikely though).
I'm assuming Continental modified the bead slightly, and it's now a bit too tight.
I'm seriously thinking of switching to Vittoria or similar tires.

I notice it's somewhat more difficult to mount the tires now, but not extreme. It used to be an easy assist with one tire lever, now it's more effort.

My old Tight Tire howto (from 2010!, with later edits) has the step by step details. This method is still effective when mounting these tight GP5000 tires. The key is to lift less than an inch of bead at a time, slide the lever a little, and repeat.


from the howto:

surak

I used to carry the Koolstop in one of my jersey pockets along with phone and wallet. Not much of a size difference compared to a typical minipump, it doesn't need its own pocket or anything.

I recently mounted a new GP5K S TR by hand on my Light Bicycle AR56 rim so don't feel the need to carry one anymore when out on that particular bike. In contrast, the TL version did require using my bead jack.

Tires tend to loosen up a bit with use so once I've ridden on my other setups a bit, I'm not that worried about remounting difficulty.

LarryMelman

I sure wish I'd seen this thread before I asked Santa to bring me a set of GP5000's. I had gotten sick of Gatorskins wearing out prematurely due to the tread layers apparently separating. The GS's were always a struggle to get on my Reynolds rims. I put the GP5000's on an old pair of wheels just now, and I'm pretty sure it will be impossible to get them onto the Reynolds when the time comes. They are much much more difficult that the GS's ever were.

zastolj

There are issues with rim-tire interfaces that the industry has still not been able to completely solve! There are probably a combination of factors like rim design, different batches of product, quality control and tolerances for both tire and rim! I had a Vision T30 Team wheelset.. It was a nightmare to get any tire on the rim and I've had shop experience too for a few years. Some rims have no center valley to speak of for the tire bead to go during mounting and it makes life difficult. My DT Swiss rims take almost any tire with relative ease and I'm glad for that because I've had to deal with punctures a dozen times for those wheels.

seypat

I do have a tendency to clinch my teath/jaws during tough roadside repairs like remounting a tight tire. I find something to put between my teeth and bite down on it. Maybe take off a glove and bite down on it. Cracked teeth can be expensive!

freeranger

Have a friend that bought a Kool Stop tire jack just so he could use some Continentals he had. Once it was time to change them out, he started using Michelin, because of the mounting headaches. No first-hand experience with some of the newer Continental offerings, but I'm sure I read on this site that Continental had designed some of the GPs so they wouldn't be such a headache to mount. Maybe someone can verify this and add which Contis now mount easier? Or add which rims are more difficult to mount tires onto.

MinnMan

I'm not sure why Contis are so hard to mount - particularly GP5000s, which have such thin sidewalls. Generally, tires with thicker stiffer sidewalls are more difficult. i.e., GatorSkins. But the GP5000s, particularly when new, are a bear. '

Conti 4 Seasons aren't quite as bad in my experience.

79pmooney

+1 Vittoria Corsas and Panaracer Paselas (for city and off road) for me. Almost all of those tires I can mount with less than young hands that were never strong. Plastic levers work just fine for me when I need that little extra.

Yes, I get more flats from glass and debris with the Vittorias. A trade-off I will take in exchange for better road grip and fewer slides and crashes. (Different Corsas vary in road grip and glass attraction. The older Open Paves with the green tread stripes were great for grip and attracting glass (great at attracting glass not being "good" ). The various G+ are much better at the total (grip plus glass resistance) and vary like-wise as to the trade-off. Haven't spent much time on 2.0s as I bought a ton of G+s while they were the thing.

Paselas are not a performance tire. Just a great compromise, not stellar at anything but no bad habits. Wear well, have OK grip, don't get a lot of flats and when they do, the reason is seldom hard to find. When big enough to not pinch flat, much better off road than they look. And to this thread - a joy to mount. QC is excellent. No surprises. (Do make sure nothing scraps those sidewalls. They are very strong but not tough at all. Ignored brake shoes and carelessness around curbs will kill them fast.)

thin_concrete

You can add me to the list of GP5000 detractors solely because of their difficulty in mounting. I was trying to put them on my Boyd Podiums and could not do it, even with the bead jack and levers. I later learned that Boyd issued a notice advising against their use on their fully carbon wheels. I tried heating the tires too and had no luck.

I can’t find good reviews on any of the current Michelins, so I went to Schwalbe Pro One TLE. The bike is on a trainer for the winter, so it’ll be a while before I can comment on them, but after having several sets of the GP4000 S2s, I had high hopes for the 5000s. Maybe I’ll look at them again in the future, but for now I’m staying away from Contis.

thin_concrete

Also, I bought this for my saddle bag. It’s a tight fit, but it’s small enough to go in a jersey pocket if need be.

https://ezclincher.com

It’s every bit as effective as the full size Kool Stop Bead Jack, which I leave with my other bike parts in the basement and is incredibly useful.

Jedneck

tubulars are my goto

DangerousDanR

The 25mm GP5000 TL were hard to mount on both Rolf and Light Bicycle wheels. A Kool Stop tire jack and tire mounting lubricant from a local farm supply made it much easier, and the S TR version is easier, but still required levers.

The 32mm TL on Spinergy can be mounted hands only.

My experience is that I have had zero repairable tire failures with the GP5000s in any of their tubeless forms, so ease of roadside repair is not an issue.

Sy Reene

Here's a whole thread that just might offer some ideas for solving these issues
RIMS Too TIGHT

Koyote

Are you trying to punish us?

ryan7727

Last year I fitted Vittoria Rubino Pro Control Graphene to a set of Fulcrum Racing 4 DBs, would have been completely impossible without the Kool Stop and even with it was a challenge

momoman

I carry the VAR tire jack tool. It’s helped my friends with hard to mount tires when they get a flat. I chose to find tires that aren’t difficult to mount on my rims and not risk the frustration of trying to mount a tight fitting tire on the road.

From my experience, the Conti GP5000 black walls are easier to mount than the Transparents. The Cream TDF GP5000 are the most difficult to mount. I tried all 3 models in the 25mm size on my Light Bicycle carbon rims. It was extremely difficult even with the Koolstop tire jack, with the cream wall’s giving the feel that the rim or the tool was going to snap. I mounted 28mm black wall GP5000’s instead and didn’t need any tools to mount the tires. I had to buy new brake calipers to clear the 28’s but love the ride quality with lower psi’s.

edit:

Tried mounting 25mm GP5000 cream wall TDF on H Son Plus TB14 rims. I gave up.


I tried mounting 25mm cream wall TDF 5000’s on H Plus Son TB14 and gave up. I own 30 sets of wheels and have mounted a variety of tires over the years but this combo was near impossible. I mounted 25mm Michelin Lithion.2 tires I had laying around instead and they went on without much difficulty. Some tire/rim combos just don’t work well.

Bob Ross

My wife has had this issue in the past. She had a pair of handbuilt wheels with DT Swiss RR465 (I think?) rims that were ridiculously difficult to get clinchers on or off of. On group rides if she got a flat it would often turn into a He-Man Contest to see who could succeed and win the prize. Her solution when riding solo was to flag down the next passing cyclist and beg for assistance. Finally she switched to new wheels with HED Belgium rims and she finds them much easier to mount/unmount tires.

btw, we used to have one of those Kool Stop bead jacks in our home toolkit. I rarely needed to use it, but the last time I did it snapped in half!


^^^This. One of my bikes has a pair of 16-year-old Mavic Ksyrium Elite wheels and no matter what brand or model of clincher I'm using getting them on or off those rims is trivial ...like, what's that expression? "Throwing a greased hotdog down a bowling alley"? Much easier than with any of my other wheelsets.
If I didn't hate Ksyriums so much I'd use them on all my bikes.

DaveSSS 

Not given enough emphasis is the fact that tires become easier to remove after being ridden awhile. I have used a bead jack a few times on new tubeless tires, but never in the old days with 23mm tubed tires on 15-17mm internal width rims. I've owned a lot of wheels in the last 35 years and never failed to mount Continental, Michelin or Pirelli tires. For many years, I only used a single quik-stik or my thumbs to mount tires. Keep as much of the bead sitting in the center channel, as possible.

​​​​​

wheelreason

Patient: "Doctor, I can't get my tires mounted on the rim when I get a flat on a ride"
Doctor: "Get tires that aren't difficult to mount"
Patient: "Yes, but the TPI, and rolling resistance..."
Doctor:: "Get out of my office!"

rumrunn6

yes, the Kool Stop bead jack. it works very well on thin tires. I have 1 at home & 1 in my rack trunk

also, aside from regular plastic tire levers I have 2 of these, 1 at home & 1 in my rack trunk. it provides useful features & benefits & I use it with every tire change
Crankbrothers Speedier Lever

and because squeezing the bottom of the tire into the valley & keeping it there can be tricky I also carry 2 toe clip straps. so I squeeze the tire into the valley & use the straps to clamp it down in there, while I get the remaining bead over the rim

see post #6 here

I also carry knee pads in my car, w/ the spare tire. I'm too old & cranky to be a minimalist

bblair

I don't know jack squat about tubeless, so no contribution there. But I offer this strictly anecdotal observation:

A few weeks ago, a member of our group had a front flat. Conti tires, Roval rims. Two guys came to her rescue and fought with that damn thing for the longest time. Tire jack, two-person struggle. Eventual success, but when she got a second flat (found some glass I think), there was some talk of walking, returning with a car, calling for a ride...whatever.

Admittedly, I am not a master mechanic, but changing that tire took me maybe 5 minutes. Same tires, same rims, same day. I can only concluded that the squeeze the tire into the valley technique is the variable. Heck, I have seen the mechanic at the shop fit tires in half the time I take.

DaveSSS 

Squeezing the tire bead into the rim valley also becomes easier with a used tire.

terrymorse 

I tried the "squeeze bead into the valley" method on my last roadside repair (almost new GP5000).

It helped a little, but I still needed a tire lever for the last few inches.

msu2001la

I get that some tires are very difficult to mount, but is mounting a tire without using a lever really a requirement for some people?

I've been riding road/MTB since the last century, and I have always carried two tire levers in my bag. Sure - I don't always need them, but most of the time when I'm changing a tire I use a lever just because it makes the job easier. It's not difficult to use a tire lever in a way that doesn't damage a tube.

I don't really understand the premise of this thread.