Scubaquarius

Hey simple! In your opinion, what company makes the best bicycle street tires? You may list more than one company.

Thanks so much for your opinion,

Scubaquarius

Flip Flop Rider

conti and schwalbe

stevel610 

We can end the thread here.

DaveSSS 

Michelin has all of my business for road bike tires. My power endurance tires were great and so are my latest tubeless model. I have four in use and four new spares.

Scubaquarius

Now that's what I call a prompt, clear, helpful reply!

Thank you so much,
Scubaquarius

Troul 

Pirelli Velo has impressed me with there performance & puncture resistance.
Very wet conditions, 15+ head winds, temps 60+ & I was able to easily stay the mostly straight course peaking 36+ MPH at times without any doubt. Ran thru some unavoidable debris on other occasions & hardly any was impregnated into the rubber.
In the past, I used schwalbe & Vittoria, the Vittoria's were close to the Pirelli, but if the ground was cold, the MPH would dive a little, any turns & all bets were off. schwalbe was great for taking harder higher speed impacts during its early installed life & seemed to provide a more stable feel within the turns in the wet areas. Average speed suffered though.
That was just my experience with select models within those brands.

The more "whizbang" the tire offers that is not positively directly effecting the compound, I tend to shy away from. Example: Would opt out of having reflective sidewalls if given a choice.

Iride01 

What is your criteria of "best"?

dmanthree

Conti, Schwalbe, Michelin, Pirelli all make good tires. But there is no single "best" tire since we all want something different. Do you need increased durability? Lowest rolling resistance? Something good in rain and cold weather? Tell us more about what you need.

pdlamb

Don't forget Panaracer.

Viich

Vittoria......

Bill in VA

Continental and Rene Herse (by Panaracer)

urbanknight

No matter what I try, I always end up going back to Vittoria.

Scubaquarius

I am interested in "least" rolling resistance.

Scubaquarius

Scubaquarius

Lowest rolling resistance.

Scubaquarius

skidder

A specific brand is my least concern. My criteria are puncture-resistance, easy to get on/off the rim, and the right size (of course!). A little tread always helps, too. That being said, I used to like the house-brand tires at the old Performance Bike Shops. They met all my criteria and were inexpensive. Only downside was they were heavier than other brands of the same size. .

Iride01 

Least is hard to say. Certainly I'll have no way to compare "least" with any other respondent here other than to go by what BicycleRollingResistance says. Although many seem to have an issue claiming the numbers of BRR have no semblance to real world cycling. And that the wattage isn't the wattage loss they have with those tires on their riding surface.

Still it seems to me that it's a good comparison of the relative rolling resistance of one tire to another. I'm not going to use their wattage loss number in some calculation to try and say I will have beaten someone in a race, but was handicapped by my tires. <grin>

So while I can't really tell you what is the least, I can tell you that for me the most rolling resistance I had was in a Continental Ultra Sport. However that particular model of Ultra Sport they don't even make anymore. And I've not tried any other Ultra Sport.

Since then I've ridden Vittoria Rubino Pro's (which they don't make that particular model either anymore) , Specialized Turbo Cottons and Continental GP 5000's. all rode very nice.

dmanthree

https://www.bicyclerollingresistance...corsa-speed-g2

Be sure to bring a patch kit!

Iride01 

But you forgot. The OP only wants to know the "best" tire, which by them is rolling resistance only. <grin>
.

mstateglfr 

You want an opinion on something that is quantifiable?
Just google rolling resistance and go from there if thats the only thing that matters.

I have Panaracer and Conti on all my bikes because rolling resistance is important, as are cost, look, size, weight, feel, reliability, etc.

Good luck on your search for opinions on a subject that has actual measured data.

Scubaquarius

Thank you all for your very valuable opinions!

Scubaquarius

urbanknight

The best I have tried (in my limited foray into tires) are the Vittoria Open Corsa models. They are the only clincher I have ever run that felt like tubulars to me.

Iride01 

We can't give anything but opinions. Even if we were to show a study, there'd be things the study didn't deal with that might be material to your conditions.

And if there was one and only "best" tire..... most of us would be riding it.

dmanthree

Correct. And the tire I linked is the fastest, but does NOT have very good puncture protection. That's why I suggested the patch kit.

phughes

Even within a particular brand's offering, you will find many varying degrees of rolling resistance. Schwalbe makes some that have more, and some that have less rolling resistance. It depends on the purpose for which the tire was designed, and even within a particular bike purpose product line, such as say, touring, there are varying designs that have more and some that have less rolling resistance, depending on other factors like flat resistance, etc.

So as far as good brands go, yes, Schwalbe and cContinental make very good tires, but they have some with little rolling resistance, and some with much more. At the same time, there are plenty of tire manufacturers that make tires with minimal rolling resistance, and of course, some of their tires have more rolling resistance. You cannot go by manufacturer when it comes to something like rolling resistance. It all depends on the particular tire's design, and what you are willing to give up for low rolling resistance. Everything is a compromise.

urbanknight

The confusion was with the OP's first question, asking about the best MANUFACTURERS. Now it has morphed into a question of which tire is FASTER.