1

Don't judge me as stupid just yet, I'm not sure if mine's a tubular or tubeless tire but everyone says tubular tires are glued to the metal wheel. However, mine isn't. It consists of a smooth, inflatable tube inside, covered by a rough, durable cover. There is absolutely no glue used so I'm pretty confused. The way it stays on the wheel is because the wheel has a rim that keeps it from falling off. If it helps, by bike is a GMC Denali with 700C wheels. Please help, I really have no idea.

Alex
  • 21
  • 2
  • It sounds like you are running tubular tires on a clincher wheel. If so, this is probably not that safe. Pictures of both (with tire off of rim)? – Ken Hiatt Jun 21 '13 at 06:20
  • It sounds to me like you have what is commonly (though somewhat mistakenly) referred to as a "clincher" -- the upper-left picture in James's answer. This is the most common style by far -- probably 99% of the bikes in the US use this style. – Daniel R Hicks Jun 21 '13 at 11:11
  • 1
    Since your tires have no adhesive, you aren't using tubulars. Your bike uses a fairly basic 700c clincher tire, with an inner tube. – zenbike Jun 23 '13 at 17:13

1 Answers1

4

A normal clincher tyre will have a "bead" as shown in the following diagram.enter image description here

It's possible you have a "tubalar clincher" like this: enter image description here

If none of those quite look right, could you provide a photo?

James Bradbury
  • 6,615
  • 3
  • 30
  • 54
  • The other possibility, of course, is tubeless -- basically the first picture but with no tube inside (but probably some sealing goo). – Daniel R Hicks Jun 21 '13 at 11:10
  • 4
    The GMC Denalli is avialable at Walmart, and I am therefore 120% sure it's using clinchers. – Kibbee Jun 21 '13 at 13:33
  • @Kibbee ...and indeed if you look at the Walmart link, in the Q & A section, there are Qs and As that all but confirm this (talking about innertubes etc.) although I didn't explicitly see the word "clincher" anywhere. – PeteH Jun 21 '13 at 21:38
  • The Tufo tubular clinchers are objectively the worst tire on the planet. Replacing stock WalMart tires with those would be a downgrade. Just sayin'. – joelmdev Jun 23 '13 at 15:00
  • @Jm2: Speaking as someone who's been riding the Tufo C Elite Jet tubular clincher for almost 2 years now, I'd fairly strongly disagree with that evaluation. I am curious why you make it though. – zenbike Jun 23 '13 at 17:11
  • FWIW, historically a "clincher" was a tire/rim combo where the rim had J-shaped hook cross-section on the edge of the rim, and the tire had a corresponding J-shaped edge molded in, with no wire bead. Thus the two "clinched" each other. However, the term "clincher" has come to mean the modern wire-bead tire. – Daniel R Hicks Jun 23 '13 at 20:01
  • Also, in the past "tubulars" were often referred to as "sew-ons" or "sew-ups", since to repair one you'd open up the stitching on the inside diameter, extract the tube, patch it, then sew the casing back together. – Daniel R Hicks Jun 23 '13 at 20:03