Mountain Bike Rims and Tires | Is Wider Better? | Starring: November Bicycles

What's up guys, Jimmy from Mountain Bike Travel League here and today we are going to talk about rim width and tire size. As you guys know, I'm not an expert. I'm pretty new to mountain biking. The one thing I have learned in the past year or so is that your tires and rims can be one of the most important things when you're out on the trails. It controls your traction and is basically your full contact with the ground. So I went over to November Bicycles in Newport, Rhode Island to talk with David Kirkpatrick and get the full rundown on what it's all about, what rim width you're looking for, and how to match your tire size with that to improve your riding. So before we jump too far into this, let's talk about exactly what your internal rim width measurement is and how to measure your tire size. So for the internal rim width, it's literally the measurement from the internal flanges of the rim. So for the rim that I have here, you will see that this is a 27 millimeter internal. They're usually always measured in millimeters and can range anywhere from 20 millimeters up to 50 millimeters at this point for downhill bikes. As far as the tire size, we are talking about the measurement from the exterior sidewalls. So from one outer sidewall to the other. For this tire here, we are looking at about a 2.5 inch measurement from one end to the other. So now that we know how to measure your internal rim width and tire size, why does it matter? Let's start with the rim. Now first things first, the narrower the rim, the less material it's going to take to build it, which means that your rim is going to be lighter. Lighter equals faster, right? Well, there are a lot of other factors here as well. The next one is going to be strength. Now obviously, the wider the rim, the more strength you're going to have both horizontally and vertically. So if you have more material in your width, obviously the ability to crush the rim vertically is going to be harder. It's going to be a lot stiffer. You're also going to have more horizontal strength. So when you're powering through corners in that room, it really wants to flex side to side. It's going to be a lot stronger, therefore going out of true a lot less. The other factor there, of course, is going to be what the rim is built out of, whether it's aluminum, carbon, that's going to adjust the stiffness as well. But we're not talking about that in this video. The next thing is going to be the tire size. So the narrower the rim, the narrower the tire, which means there's going to be less surface contact with the ground. The less surface contact with the ground, the faster you're going to be able to roll through and pedal. It's also going to make climbs a lot easier, but you're going to lose a lot in traction. So the less surface contact with the ground, the less tire knobs are going to be there to keep that traction and allow you to really power up those hills and press through corners. Now the next factor, and what I think is the most important, is going to be your tire roll. So if I have a 25 millimeter internal rim with a 2.5 inch tire, basically what that's going to do is give you more of a light bulb effect. So you have this really wide tire squeezed into this really narrow rim. So it's really narrow at the bottom and it comes out and bulbs out to the top, which means there's not much strength in that connection there. So if you go really fast into a corner and really roll and put a lot of pressure on that tire, it can burp the tire off the rim or even just rip it all off completely. But if you run a 30 millimeter internal rim with that same 2.5 inch tire, it's going to dull down that light bulb effect, making it a little wider at the bottom, which means your sidewall strength is going to be stronger and your ability to allow the tire to roll back and forth is going to be much better without the tire burping or being ripped off the rim. Now along with allowing your tire to have more strength rolling back and forth, it's also going to increase the weight distribution. Because the tire is wider, the pressure of your body weight pushing down and the forces pushing down on the tire is distributed more evenly, so you can run lower pressure. By running lower pressure, you're going to have better traction, it's going to make a little more absorption of the shock and the big hits that you're taking, so helping out your suspension there. And overall you're just going to be able to feel the trail a lot better, so it allows you to be able to move with the tire and really bounce a little bit more and just have that extra traction. So with all these factors in play, you might seem like you just want the widest tire possible, but that's not the case. Obviously it depends on your riding style, whether you're XC, enduro, whether you're straight downhill, how hard you're really working the wheels. But once you start to get too big, the first thing is you're going to get too much drag. If your tire is 2.8 inches wide, obviously it's going to be a lot of surface contact and your ability to pedal that bike and really get it moving quickly is going to fall. The other thing is it's not going to be as agile. So for me right now, I run a 2.5 inch tire on the front, which allows me to be able to hammer through some of that chunkier stuff and the tire is really able to pick its own lines. If I was to run a smaller tire, like I used to, it's going to be a lot more agile. I'm going to have a lot more play and really be able to put the tire where I want. But if I ran anything bigger, for me, I think I'd lose a lot of control. The tire is now so wide that it's just going to pick where it wants to go and you're not going to be able to move it around as easily since it's covering such a large surface area. So for me, I run 2.5 in the front, which gives me just enough to push through some chunky stuff and to hold on some roots. And I run 2.3 in the back. You don't exactly need to guide with that tire since it's not on the front wheel. It's more of the follow tire. So I run a little bit smaller, which allows me to go a little bit faster and have a little more control over my back end. So all that being said, what is the best rim width and tire for you? Again, it's all going to depend on what you're trying to ride. When it comes to XC, something below 25 millimeter internal is going to be perfectly fine. You're not going to be putting as much pressure on those wheels and you want them to be a little faster because you're pedaling a lot more. When it comes to me, I race Enduro, which has a lot of downhill tracks in it. I started with 27 millimeter internal, was punching through them pretty quick. Went over to November Bicycles and they built me up these wheels, which are 30 millimeter internal, so a little wider. Allowed me to bump my front tire up to that 2.5 inches I was talking about, giving me a little more traction and play up front. So after spending some time at November Bicycles with David and learning all about how these rims and tire sizes work, decided that the best build for me is going to be what I have here. So I run again the Race Face Arc 30s, which are 30 millimeter internal. On the front, I run a Minion DHF, which is a 2.5 tire, giving me a little more grab on the front. On the rear, I usually run a Maxxis Aggressor, which is more of a fast trail tire, and that's a 2.3 in size. But your tires are always going to depend on trail conditions. David built me up these Industry 9 Torch Hubs. These have 120 points of engagement, which means that your crank will engage with the wheel every three degrees. So that means no matter where you are in your pedal stroke, you're always going to have that forward motion there for you to give all your power when you need it. Really, really good hubs. These are 32 hole, and then Dave actually three cross laced them. I'll let Dave explain that for you because it's kind of out of my league. These wheels being 32 holes are three by laced, and what that means, or three cross laced, and what that means is that each spoke, so if we take this one here, which is a heads-in spoke, it crosses over this heads-out spoke, it crosses over this heads-out spoke, and then it crosses underneath. It's interwoven with this heads-out spoke. Now the spokes that David used on these are 1.8 millimeter stainless steel spokes. They're butted spokes, which means that they get a little thicker and flare out around the nipple and then down at the elbow. Now what that does, as explained by David, is basically allows them to have more strength any time that a spoke gives or snaps. It's usually going to be around the elbow and sometimes around the nipple, so that just gives you a little more of that strength and allows you to hammer down on those spokes a little more without having any issues and having much less breakage. Now the guys at November Bicycles were awesome. David was super friendly. They have a great shop down in Newport, Rhode Island, so if you're in the area, anywhere near them, I highly recommend you give them a call and check them out. They have really, really good pricing, and again, I am no wheel building expert, so I leave that to the pros, but I hope this video was helpful for you guys. I hope that you learned a little bit about rim width and tire width and what that does for you, and feel free to leave a comment below and subscribe if you like the video. Thanks, guys.