willydstyle

So I'm getting my first folder, a Tern BYB that comes stock with 42-406 Schwalbe Citizens. I've been riding 700c Panaracer Pasela PTs for *years* now, and have really settled on them as my ideal combo of weight/puncture protection/ride quality, and would love if they came in 20", but alas they do not. The Schwalbe Citizens are a *very* inexpensive tire, and my experience with cheap tires is that they are never really good, so I would love to upgrade them immediately. It seems like the most-commonly-available 20" tire is the Marathon family, and I *hate* how Marathon Plus rides, so those are right out. Some tires I'm considering are the Contact Urban (hard to find in the US) and the Marathon Racer (honestly I'm hesitant simply due to the Marathon name and how much I hate how the Marathon Plus rides).

With these facts in mind, what 20" tires do y'all think I might like that come in 37-45 mm width? What tires in this size range have the best combination of ride quality and puncture protection, similar to Pasela PT's in 700c?

ThermionicScott 

Have you tried the Panaracer HP406? Seems like it would be the closest in construction.

Jipe

If you are looking to a tire with very good rolling performances and very good puncture protection, I would recommend the Continental Contact Urban.

In 20"/ETRTO406, they exist in 32x406, 42x406 and 50x406.

willydstyle

I mentioned those and also they are very hard to find in the US. Do you know of a european vendor that has reasonable shipping rates to the US?

willydstyle

Why do you assume that? These are BMX freestyle tires and I would not assume that they are designed with commuting performance and puncture protection in mind.

ThermionicScott 

I meant, constructed like a Pasela, with 60-something TPI skinwalls and a sipe-y tread. I see no reason why it wouldn't be a suitable commuting tire. Labels like "freestyle" and "commuting" are just that, anyway.

Jipe

It seems that the shipping costs of https://www.bike24.de/p1360207.html?...ban&source=SRP to US aren't too high (19.99€ for 2 tires).

The ETRTO406 Contact Urban aren't in stock for the moment but its often the case, they come back in stock and are quickly sold-out again. If you place a warning, you will be able to buy them.

Fentuz

I am with the OP regarding the Marathlon, side walls are too stiff. I prefer the Big Apple or Big Ben depending of width.
I do like the continental tyres but I found that they are more prompt to puncture that the schwalbe. that said, the Double fighter is good in urban environment. I was impressed with the set I put family member bike.
Schwalbe black jack works for me too; it has a almost continuous center line that allows good tarmac rolling and when the terrain is a bit dirty, it grips.

That said, I have been commuting on the Kojak 35-406; they are comfortable and fast, only had 2 punctures in the last 4 years (going through a farm yard and a building site...). I even rode gravel in summer.

joey buzzard

I had a similarly low opinion of Schwalbe tyres until I got the plain old Marathons. Why Schwalbe persists with the Racers and the Plus is a mystery to me. The Racers felt slower with more drag than the regular iteration of the tyre. I read an article by someone who tested the rolling resistance of the Racer and he confirmed that it actually has inferior rolling performance to the non-racer standard issue version.

I rode from Belfast to Carlingford and then along the border through Armagh, Monaghan, Enniskillen, Donnegal and then to Derry on Racers. Puncture protection wasn't great and as mentioned above these didn't feel fast like their name suggests.

Replaced the Racers later on during the same trip in Nottingham, England with Schwalbe Kojaks, which in my opinion were junk. I got a flat on my 3km commute home from the bike shop. Also, the skinnier racing profile of these diminished the actual size of the 406 20" wheels reducing the gear inches and making the bike more jarring and less comfortable. They certainly didn't make the bike feel faster. The only thing I can say in the Kojak's favour is that these were light.

I persisted for a few weeks with the Kojaks, constantly repairing flats until while visiting a friend in a rural locale in Germany I gave up on them and replaced with some very cheap department store tyres which were clunky and nasty but better than the Kojaks because at least I wasn't fixing flats every several kilometers on average. But they were far from satisfying.

When I visited Box Bikes in Berlin (a shop that specialises in folders) they suggested Marathons. I was skeptical, but when they brought a tyre out for me to examine I could see immediately from the quality of construction and the ability to hold 100psi that these were a step up from the other Marathons and Kojaks I'd been using, so I bought them. A few weeks later I rode across a big chunk of Spain on these and then used them everyday while living up a steep riverbed (which I rode up and down daily) in the mountains in Granada province. Three years and thousands of clicks later one of the tyres is still going strong. The other I had to replace only because I wore my back rim out and had a point where the breaking surface snagged the brake pads locking the rear wheel so that the tyre skidded and wore down in one place creating a flat spot, so no fault of the tyre itself. Puncture protection is excellent and I almost never gat punctures and I really don't worry about this happening even when I'm out and about even a hundred kilometres from home. They're not super düper lightweight, but they roll well and get the job done with minimal inner tube maintenance.

So, the long and short of my long winded tale of the life and death of my recent tyres is that you might want to take another look at the standard Marathons. But don't bother with any other Schwalbe product in 20" as in my experience these really are at best underwhelming and at worst total crap.

Fentuz

What pressure did you run? under 60PSI, you will get snake bite puncture. My wife was on 40 psi through that farm yard and puncture. Since the tyres are back to 75psi, all good and it goes through this farm yard 6 times a week.
My daughter runs them too on a frog 52 as she s training for a kid tarmac race.

BobbyG

I'm happy with my Schwalbe Racers but can only compare them to the old, worn-out Kendas that came with the bike.

I like supple tires with pliable sidewalls, but I bike commuted for 28 years so I needed better flat protection. On my 700c and 26" bikes I went with ight, supple tires and tire liners; Mr. Tuffys and the Slime-brand ones (not the gooey Slime itself).

So my custom-geared Dahon Boardwalk now has 20-inch Schwalbe Racers with tire liners. While the sidewalls aren't as supple as I'd like, the bike is as fast as my 2015 Charge Plug 700c (and weighs the same).

I may go for even lighter tires when the racers wear out.

Jipe

If you look at the measurements of Bicycle Rolling Resistance they fully confirm what joey buzzard is writing: the marathon are very good, much better than the Marathon Racer and Kojak, much better puncture resistance comparable rolling resistance, very strong and long lasting tire.

The only tire that perform much better in rolling resistance while having also a good puncture resistance are the new Continental Contact Urban. The only weakness of these tires is the sidewall resistance. But its the price to pay to have a less rigid tire that weight much less than the Marathon.

willydstyle

The rolling resistance is less of a concern for me than the ride quality. The thing that makes me dislike Marathons isn't that I think they're slow, it's that you can really feel every bump in the road because of their rigid sidewalls.

tcs

20x1.5 Scorcher Kevlar, perhaps?

willydstyle

That's an interesting option, but suffers from the same problem that almost all the non-marathon options that still have puncture protection do: I can't find them in stock anywhere.

tcs

I dunno. Shows in stock; let me put two in the cart.

https://hostelshoppe.com/products/gr...er-kevlar-tire

willydstyle

Oh, I saw the "pickup" option at the bottom of the page which didn't indicate available shipping options, but when I do add them to my cart then shipping options appear. Those are definitely an option though the high price and lack of good information about them online does give me pause.

Schwinnsta

I rode Paselas when I rode full size bikes. They are nice tires, at a good price. For 20-inch bikes, I like Big Apples 406 x 50. They are supple with thin side walls. Not all 20-inch bikes will fit them. I also found by going to wide tires that its like having larger wheels.

seat_boy

I like Tioga Powerblocks or Powerbands. It's relatively supple for a 20" sized tire.

willydstyle

They have zero puncture protection right? I feel like a lot of people are recommending BMX tires that have no puncture protection. I want tires with a combination of decent puncture protection and good ride quality. Is there something about 20" bmx tires that makes them more puncture resistant without actually having puncture protection layers under the tread?

Jipe

The Greenspeed Scorcher are among the fastest tires available in ETRTO406 (and also ETRTO349).

They were developed for racing trike by Greenspeed for their race trike which has ETRTO349 and ETRTO406 wheels.

The Scorcher Kevlar version is the one with a good puncture protection. The Scorcher 120 is the fastest one and even this one has a decent puncture protection that I would rate similar to the one of the Kojak but its a much faster tire and has a rubber that last much longer.

Compared to the Continental Contact Urban, the Scorcher Kevlar is probably faster (I never tried the Scorcher Kevlar, I used the Scorcher 120 which is much faster), has probably a lower puncture protection and is much more expensive.

joey buzzard

​​​​​HAvent tried these personally, but I thought that they looked like an intriguing option if I ever decided to build a Swift up with 451 tyres. One of my main beefs with the 451 standard (apart from tubes being rarer) is that most of the tyres manufactured for these wheels seem to be skinny profile road bike style things that once mounted make the difference in circumference between 406 and 451 much of a muchness but with inadequate material to deliver a comfortable ride. Hence I was excited by the 451 Powerblocks as these seemed a beefier tyre for 451. With the right v-brakes I figure these might just be doable with a Swift. Have you any experience with these yourself?

seat_boy

I don't think they have any puncture protection belt, but the tread is relatively thick. I haven't seen them to be especially flat prone (actually, I don't think I've ever had a flat in them).

seat_boy

No idea these even came in 451... mine are 406. I think small wheels need bigger tires, so I don't see much use for 451.

Jipe

You are right: ETRTO451 is a size for narrow road tires while ETRTO406 was a size for wide tires both having a similar total diameter including tire, this is why both are labelled as 20" while the rim size of ETRTO451 is 45mm bigger than the one of ETRTO406.