A place to ask bicycle repair questions, and for bike shop monkeys to share advanced non commercial wrenching resources (no YouTube self promotion). This is only for repair related topics.
This tire has about 300mi on it and I am already missing a good chunk of rubber in this spot
I am riding fixed 46x17 so I have plenty of skid patches.
The Ultra Sport III I replaced was pretty evenly worn by the time I removed it
I mainly run Gatorskins but they typically hold up better. Is anyone else noticed a quality issue?
My commute used to be 52 miles every weekday. Gatorskins very quickly proved themselves to be a hard no. Those tires somehow magically merge low traction and low longevity. Tread wears out quickly, sidewalls degrade quickly, and flat resistance was on par with tires that don't claim to be hard-wearing. I've had sidewalls start to delaminate in under 500 miles. After about a year of that chaos, I switched to Vittoria Rubino Pro III on most of my bikes and never looked back.
While I have no love for Conti Gatorskins, that chunk looks like it was initiated by a lateral cut. The top edge looks very clean, while the remaining edges look torn.
I generally mistrust Conti tires regardless of mode. I had a new car and motorcycle that both came with Contis. Just terrible. Switched to Michelins on the motorized vehicles. That resulted in better traction, better ride, and better wear.
Thanks for that; I have been considering looking at some Vittorias lately!
Your tyre is also basically done already, I wouldn't keep riding that with that amount of damage and expect it not to fail on the next ride tbh
You do you obviously but that's ready to pop imho
Even if it won't fail, this gonna be a very uncomfortable and bumpy ride.
My last pair was bought in like 2018 and went for between 6 and 8k miles. That sucks if they are lacking quality now
Rest assured. I am hard on my tires.
Based on person above and what I did see initially I could’ve skidded on a sharp rock or something to start that damage. I am rough on my bike
Damn, I'm at 2,540+ mi on my CST tires, and they still have another 500+ of tread still in them. Maybe another 1,000+. I think they are using a hard af compound, but still are pretty grippy.
I will have to look into those.
Buying bike tires is something I don't hate doing (I just am looking for more bang for the buck these days)
I'm using CST Adventures, but you may need to try something that fits your wheel. They are honestly pretty solid.