[Happymtb.fr]

Well, I manage to burp my ghettocored 26" rear wheel on my hardtail... i suspect that it was mostly since I had way too low pressure in the outer tire to start with combine with too little and too old sealent. I could still finish my ride tho!

On the 27.5 wheeled Troy with ghettocore at the rear, I managed to puncture a grid casing twice while riding trails (around 1000km) and found some minor dents in my Mavic EN 827 rims while changing for an Onza Ibex...

Cushcore sounds attractive but I will wait for them to ship from within Europe as the price with the toll fee is too expensive.

 

[kidwoo]

No flats after 2 and a half weeks in Whistler with Super Gravity casing tires on a DH BIKE! That's a first for me.
PUT YOUR MONEY WHERE YOUR UNICORN IS, WOO!

Seriously though, you need to try them.

I might on my trail bike. I've flatted on my dh bike like once in the last 10 years. I just put air in my tires.

 

[Olga_icannot]

My cushcore experience has been the opposite of @mtg and @buckoW, after spending a good 30 minutes swearing to get the damn thing installed I smashed my rear wheel hard enough to split the rim at the welded seam. 27.5x2.4 High Roller II DH casing running 25psi on e13 lg+ wheels, 140lb pilot. It was the second day on the wheel at Whistler, it had never been ridden without the cushcore. Luckily getting the whole CC back off was way easier than installing it, I cut a couple notches in the rim and just crushed it until the tire and CC popped off. I mostly blame the rim, I think the e13 rims are pretty soft, my riding buddy only got one day out of his wheel (no CC) before it would no longer seal.

 

[rollertoaster]

View attachment 126384 My cushcore experience has been the opposite of @mtg and @buckoW, after spending a good 30 minutes swearing to get the damn thing installed I smashed my rear wheel hard enough to split the rim at the welded seam. 27.5x2.4 High Roller II DH casing running 25psi on e13 lg+ wheels, 140lb pilot. It was the second day on the wheel at Whistler, it had never been ridden without the cushcore. Luckily getting the whole CC back off was way easier than installing it, I cut a couple notches in the rim and just crushed it until the tire and CC popped off. I mostly blame the rim, I think the e13 rims are pretty soft, my riding buddy only got one day out of his wheel (no CC) before it would no longer seal.

The e13 alloy rims are very soft. The reasoning being that they will dent before a heavy casing tire pinch flats, not really what you want when using cush core.

Installed a cc on my e13 trsr carbon rear wheel with a Magic Mary super gravity at lunch yesterday. Took me a solid half hour to swap tires which is a bummer considering I watched Phil's install video a couple weeks ago to make sure knew what I was in store for.

Holy shit is this wheel heavy now. I did a loop last night and proceeded to steer directly into every rock i could find. I'm pretty impressed with performance of the cush core. I'm 200lbs geared up, not a smooth rider either. I was able to run 21-22psi (certainly could go lower), and smash everything that normally requires 29psi. The corners were pretty great too. I really couldn't feel the casing roll normally associated with low psi.

I don't think I need cush core for most of my riding (that's why I use 2ply tires). I only installed it for the enduro at Blue Mountain this weekend. It's heavy and my legs did not enjoy that. If I end up running it full time it would definitely be with single ply rubber.

 

[Gary]

Fannies chasing the holy grail of ultimate low pressure get rewarded by ULTIMATE LOW PRESSURE.

sounds fair to me

 

[saruti]

have you seen this?
http://www.bikemag.com/gear-features/blueprint/blueprint-enve-eliminates-pinch-flats/
well, I do this for a year now, with a thick ghetto tubeless...

 

[slimshady]

So this guy claims he used an "IT backer rod", -it's meant to be used in pavement sealing- and has had good results:

 

[aenema]

I have a good buddy who is faster than me and rides twice as much that is swearing by cushcore after also trying hucknorris, and says I have to do it. I fully realize that it will do what it claims and improve your downhill experience. I can even overlook the weight of them to a degree but one thing I will not do is pay ~150 USD for TOW PIECES OF FOAM that just sit in my rim. I truly cannot wrap my head around that much money for that little return. If people want to spend that, that's fine and go right ahead. I will instead continue to compromise by sacrificing a little traction and keeping my pressure up where its safe. Its not like I am not having fun as is. I spent a week in whistler running tubeless on my DH bike and kept the pressure around 32 in the rear and had no flats. In fact, no flats in the two seasons on the DH bike with two sets of DH tires so I'm not clamoring for a solution there.
Maybe, when anybody and everybody is making a similar product and the competition has brought pricing down to reasonable levels I will revisit this. But more likely, the circle jerk that is the biking industry will see that we are willing to pay this money and they will collaborate on their pricing structure to keep these things at stupid levels of expensive.

 

[Happymtb.fr]

I have been running Huck Norris with a tube lately. The HN was placed between the rim and the tube.
It went almost well until I got a slow puncture and the pressure got so low that I managed to snakebite the tube...
While fixing the puncture I noticed that the HN was heavily compressed, around or more than half its original thickness, this was after 10 days inside the tire. My riding mates using HN the regular way don't notice any change in thickness so that I am willing to take back my claim that a tube will apply pressure the same way a traditional tubeless setup would.
So @Udi if you're still thinking of running CC with a tube, I don't think it is a good idea any more...

 

[bagtagley]

I happen to have access to a laser cutter, a capable student, and a pile of yoga mats my wife doesn't use. Any reason not to make a CheapNorris?

 

[jonKranked]

Holy shit is this wheel heavy now. I did a loop last night and proceeded to steer directly into every rock i could find. I'm pretty impressed with performance of the cush core. I'm 200lbs geared up, not a smooth rider either. I was able to run 21-22psi (certainly could go lower), and smash everything that normally requires 29psi. The corners were pretty great too. I really couldn't feel the casing roll normally associated with low psi.

horeee shet i'm like 10lbs heavier than you and i can't imagine running pressures that low. once things get below ~25psi it just feels too squirrely / inconsistent, like im' riding on a flat tire.

 

[jonKranked]

have you seen this?
http://www.bikemag.com/gear-features/blueprint/blueprint-enve-eliminates-pinch-flats/
well, I do this for a year now, with a thick ghetto tubeless...

you really think an inner tube has the same durometer as the rubber they're using?

 

[captainspauldin]

I don't think I need cush core for most of my riding (that's why I use 2ply tires). I only installed it for the enduro at Blue Mountain this weekend. It's heavy and my legs did not enjoy that. If I end up running it full time it would definitely be with single ply rubber.

To add my 2 cents, installed cushcore and went down to the thinner casing version of my tires(went from GRID casing to Control casing, it looks like specialized dropped the control naming convention for the slaughter and butcher, they're just the standard casing now). I had to run more pressure than recommended in the rear tire to keep it from squirming, I started at 25psi and settled at 29psi. Which is only about 2-3psi lower than what I ran with the GRID casing and no CC. Had zero issues with the front tire, I think I'm running around 25psi up there. Big dude factor also, so my pressures are probably higher in general than most normal sized humans(250lb suited up). Pretty happy with how it feels on rocky trails, crazy how much better my hands felt after some rocky sections that used to destroy me. It is barely noticeable on trails that aren't rocky. That being said I would say it's not dentist-approved, even though the pricing suggests the opposite..

 

[Happymtb.fr]

I happen to have access to a laser cutter, a capable student, and a pile of yoga mats my wife doesn't use. Any reason not to make a CheapNorris?

Yoga mats are much softer than HN

 

['size]

horeee shet i'm like 10lbs heavier than you and i can't imagine running pressures that low. once things get below ~25psi it just feels too squirrely / inconsistent, like im' riding on a flat tire.

exactly. i never understood the 'i can run super low pressure with tubeless' evangelists. no matter what's keeping air in my tire i still need the tire to offer support and not get all flippity floppity. tbh i probably run a tad more psi tubeless than i did with tubes to get the same support and tire profile when i'm actually on the bike. currently 190 geared up and running 25 fr / 27-28 rr with a HN in the rear. 140mm trail bike in the rox.

 

[jonKranked]

exactly. i never understood the 'i can run super low pressure with tubeless' evangelists. no matter what's keeping air in my tire i still need the tire to offer support and not get all flippity floppity. tbh i probably run a tad more psi tubeless than i did with tubes to get the same support and tire profile when i'm actually on the bike. currently 190 geared up and running 25 fr / 27-28 rr with a HN in the rear. 140mm trail bike in the rox.

disclaimer on that: i'm running 26" x 2.3" & 2.4" tires.

 

[mtg]

Yoga mats are much softer than HN

But the internet told me that pool noodles, yoga mats, and tire inserts are all foam, therefore they're all exactly the same material and available at the hardware store in unlimited quantities for 10 cents. I am confuse.

 

[jonKranked]

But the internet told me that pool noodles, yoga mats, and tire inserts are all foam, therefore they're all exactly the same material and available at the hardware store in unlimited quantities for 10 cents. I am confuse.
View attachment 126647

it's the same generic nonsense as saying "i want it made out of plastic"

 

['size]

disclaimer on that: i'm running 26" x 2.3" & 2.4" tires.

same. butcher, slaughter, rock'r2, HR II. i can run the michelin lower because the sidewalls are almost DH tire territory but for standard sidewall TR/EXO/GRID stuff 23-25 psi is about it for me before things feel weird.

 

[troy]

have you seen this?
http://www.bikemag.com/gear-features/blueprint/blueprint-enve-eliminates-pinch-flats/
well, I do this for a year now, with a thick ghetto tubeless...

700g rim with 1050$ pricetag.

 

[Udi]

horeee shet i'm like 10lbs heavier than you and i can't imagine running pressures that low. once things get below ~25psi it just feels too squirrely / inconsistent, like im' riding on a flat tire.

exactly. i never understood the 'i can run super low pressure with tubeless' evangelists. no matter what's keeping air in my tire i still need the tire to offer support and not get all flippity floppity.

Regular tubeless, sure - but CC (not HN) is very different to that scenario because once you remove over half the volume, the pressure increase proportional to compression is much more aggressive. It means you can have most if not all of the traction that is offered by running very low pressures, without the casing instability that usually comes with it.

If you imagine a tyre as a spring/damper unit, a conventional pneumatic tyre is a positive-only air spring with little to no damping. It's stiffer than ideal at the start of the travel if you run enough pressure to support the mid and end stroke; also keeping in mind a hard bottom out often causes damage unlike with suspension. We try to compensate for this by running heavier, thicker casings which is mildly successful but a blanket fix. By adding a bottom out damper (imagine an MCU - it's not just a spring, it's also a damper), you can now run your spring rate softer. The natural volume reduction means you get more support in the midstroke, and the bumper softens the harsh bottom outs. Finally, now that no casing compensation is required for bottoming out and causing pinch damage, we can (sometimes) go down one step in casing thickness to compensate some of the weight gain.

Disclaimer: I don't own or use any of these products. CC is very expensive, it's a hassle and a mess, and not everyone needs or wants what is offered. If that's you too, great, welcome to the club. However I do think it's a big step towards better solutions for a huge problem area in MTB.

Also, some very good riders on here (eg. buckoW) run it, and I've ridden with him enough to know that if he thinks something is good then it probably is. As a direct result, he's also gone from the full DH casing Schwalbes to SG casings on both ends of his DH bike; which is truly impressive considering the (low) pressures he's running and the riding he does.

While fixing the puncture I noticed that the HN was heavily compressed...
So @Udi if you're still thinking of running CC with a tube, I don't think it is a good idea any more...

I haven't given any more thought to it (so it's not happening in the near future), but I don't think HN and CC are even close to the same thing - the substantial weight difference makes that clear. HN looks like someone pulled a long piece out of a foam offcut bin and tied it together in a loop, the shape alone is downright stupid. I wouldn't be surprised if the material properties are less than spectacular - particularly the "closed" in closed-cell foam.

I appreciate the heads up, but if you really want to know how two very different products behave, you can't extrapolate from one to the other, you have to try both.

 

[bagtagley]

But the internet told me that pool noodles, yoga mats, and tire inserts are all foam, therefore they're all exactly the same material and available at the hardware store in unlimited quantities for 10 cents. I am confuse.

Dense, closed-cell foam. Seemed worth a shot.

 

[jonKranked]

Dense, closed-cell foam. Seemed worth a shot.

the base polymer that's used for the foam is just as if not more important than the density.

 

[troy]

the base polymer that's used for the foam is just as if not more important than the density.

They are made of EPDM foam.

 

[jonKranked]

They are made of EPDM foam.

synthetic rubber foam.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EPDM_rubber

 

[captainspauldin]

synthetic rubber foam.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EPDM_rubber

 

[FlipSide]

I've been using HuckNorris for my rear tire all summer and I am quite satisfied. I will put one in my XC hardail as well and enjoy a slightly lower tire pressure than usual.

I think the relatively low weight of HuckNorris is quite reasonable for a pedally bike. I don't have experience with CC, Procore, etc, but I'd expect them to be too heavy for a trail/AM bike.

 

[SuboptimusPrime]

Has anyone run cushcore with Mavic 823 rims? Interested in trying this as insurance for a big Whistler trip next season. Given the difficulty of install, I'm concerned that the narrow ID of the 823 will make it an even bigger PITA. Any thoughts or experiences welcome.

 

[bagtagley]

I happen to have access to a laser cutter, a capable student, and a pile of yoga mats my wife doesn't use. Any reason not to make a CheapNorris?

Got HN several months ago. As soon as I got my hands on it, I realized the futility of this idea. At the time I thought you got a single insert for $75 bones. I found a two pack for fiddy, which is pretty cheap insurance. I’ve ridden a good bit on it, and besides partially tearing a shoulder knob off my rear tire, have had no flats. The dull thud is a nice change from the usual ping you get when bashing into something hard. Still early to say anything definitive, but so far so good.

 

[Cerberus75]

Anyone try the Huck Norries DH yet? Asking for a trail bike. I've been on a bike with cushcore, and it feels great. But the idea of being 15miles away and not being able to put a tube in, doesn't sit well with me.

 

[amishmatt]

I have one sitting in the garage but haven't mounted it yet. Not sure I will, as the regular HN only let me drop one lb. of pressure before pinch flatting. Doesn't really seem worth the weight/hassle for that.

 

[Cerberus75]

I have one sitting in the garage but haven't mounted it yet. Not sure I will, as the regular HN only let me drop one lb. of pressure before pinch flatting. Doesn't really seem worth the weight/hassle for that.

That's what I was afraid of. I really liked the cushcore's muting of chatter. I noticed much better traction due to no skipping. Didnt notice any of that with regular HN.

 

[toodles]

Fuck Cushcore/Procore. The future is now.

 

[Muddy]

Considering putting tubes back into my tires. Two seasons ago was a nightmare a week with Procore on alloy e.thirteen rims. Suffered the lightest of startup for flatspots on both ends, but no flatposts with the system. Many stuck valves, many tubes bursting as the bike sat. Tossed it in the dumpster for Flat Tire Defender. It was then I learned e.thirteen never recommends the system.

Barely rode my Iron Horse last year, first race w/ DD DHF Maxxis I made a pressure adjustment and ripped out the side of my tire; no rim damage. Snuck a DHRII DH tire onto the rim, managed an enormous flatspot to the rim at the next race.

It was then I found the last-remaining LG1r alloy rims on Spaceship Earth, and made an inquiry about what is touted as improvements vs. LG1+

Kermit at e.thirteen begins telling me how Carbon is not going to dent, how strong Carbon is - I reply with the 26" alloy version. Kermit (name actually may be different...) says attributes apply regardless of rim diameter. So I ask to be sent 26" carbon rims immediately. But, they'd stopped 26" rims production two years ago said the person I think is named Kermit.

Will be building DH rims this winter - have a few Hubsets and spokes left over. Seriously will consider tubes and tires and get over this nonsense of foam, gunk and people's names.

 

['size]

Fuck Cushcore/Procore. The future is now.

I kind of need sound with this.

 

[Udi]

Fuck Cushcore/Procore. The future is now.

"modern trailbuilding"

 

[Happymtb.fr]

http://www.mrwolf.bike/smartmousse/
Saw this today on PB. A lots of claims... but no need for tire sealant, which I like. Quite heavy and I doubt that the foam will keep its springiness and not collapse after a while. The foam might exhibit the right damping properties...
The product is not available yet.

 

[Westy]

http://www.mrwolf.bike/smartmousse/
Saw this today on PB. A lots of claims... but no need for tire sealant, which I like. Quite heavy and I doubt that the foam will keep its springiness and not collapse after a while. The foam might exhibit the right damping properties...
The product is not available yet.

Says it is designed for e-bikes. Probably massive rolling resistance.

 

[twenty666]

REI has some good deals going right now. 122 shipped was my price for 26" kit. Still not that cheap, but if it lets me run EXO's in the back it will be money well spent.

 

[Gary]

And REI is?
What was 122 shipped?