tire sidewall separation

[John Casteen]

A tire question.

I'm riding 32 mm Continental Sport Contact IIs-- the basketball tire-- on Velocity A23 rims.  They've been great for about 18 months and 1000 miles, generally run at 55 rear / 50 front psi, which has worked for both paved and gravel roads.

Both tires have begun shedding fine white threads in a ring about 1 mm outside the rim.  It's as though they're unraveling.  Where they've come completely out, there's a gap or groove of about .5 mm width-- both sides of both tires.  This is unlike sidewall failures that I've had before on Compass tires and Paselas, which bubble and blister on the gum part when they get old and worn out; this is right down near the rim, all the way around.

Have others had trouble like this?  I read up on the relevant page at Sheldon Brown's site and didn't see anything obvious.  I'm on the road with this bike now, and hoping I can get through the rest of the trip without worrying that either or both tires are about to blow out.

Thanks in advance for any advice--

John

[Tom Wyland]

Did you check to see if your brake parts are touching the tire there as they open and close?  Seems unlikely to happen with both tires at once, though.

[John Casteen]

Tom--

Thanks!  Yeah, I did, and good idea.  The brake shoes don't touch the tires.  The weird thing about this damage is that there's no abrasion-- just a concentric whitish ring where the threads are unraveling.

John

On Thu, Aug 8, 2019 at 7:51 AM Tom Wyland <tomw...@gmail.com> wrote:

Did you check to see if your brake parts are touching the tire there as they open and close?  Seems unlikely to happen with both tires at once, though.

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johncasteen.net

[John Casteen]

I got an interesting answer to this question from the incredibly helpful and friendly Kingdom Bikes in Blue Hill, Maine.

Continental and perhaps other tire manufacturers include a piece of fabric that wraps from the inside of the tire, around the bead, and out onto the lower/inner part of the sidewall. It's meant to prevent problems from chafing. When the tire rolls, the fabric wears; my sidewall wasn't failing at all. The tire was just doing what it's supposed to do. All good!

And if you own the Redwood that's at Kingdom for service: nice bike!

[Coal Bee Rye Anne]

Makes me wonder if this was a similar occurrence on a prior set of specialized branded knobbies... Forget the model but they were lower end wire bead budget replacements from the early/mid aughts. I may or may not still have them around in storage to inspect further (can’t recall if they were donated in the last purge or not.). After only moderate use they each began to fray around the circumference just above the bead/hook and bottom of sidewall and it did appear to be some kind of reinforcement with no sign of sidewall damage otherwise. No brake pad wear on the tire or anything... I checked and double checked pad alignment too many times to count.

Brian Cole
Lawrenceville NJ

[aeroperf]

Thanks for your info, and that from Kingdom Bikes.

My Sam rides Continental Speed Ride tires.  As a guy who spent 40 years doing airplanes, I am a believer in periodic inspections, including tire rotation.

At about 1500 miles I started noticing fine threads from near the rim.

I just nip them off with wire cutters when I wash the bike, and now have 5000+ miles on the tire set.  So I'm not seriously concerned about failure, but I always wondered what was going on.

[Wilson Wilson]

The only time I have seen this happen is from a brake pad worn down, replaced new, or combination of rim worn concave at the brake track. I have had it happen on a tire which I later realized the wheel was not completely seated in the dropout. Again, forcing the brake pad to come in contact with tire slightly.

[Eric Floden]

My Speed Rides are doing the same...even on my second set.

EricF

Golden Lake Ont

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