Is this par for conti tubies?

[cadence231]

Saturday with 100 miles on my new wheels with accompanying Continental 440 tubulars, tires I get a blow out. I did not see what I hit and I back tracked after I put my spare on and found no offending object. Here is what I found on the rear drive side sidewall: http://i103.photobucket.com/albums/m131/cadence220/conti1.jpg

Saturday nite I put the still good front Conti on the rear, figuring it would be heartier than a Hutchison Carbon that I have. I then mounted the Carbon on the front. So yesterday and another 70 miles, I get another blow out and as before I did not see what I hit and looked for whatever it might have been. At the side of the road while taking off the tire I saw this on the rear drive side sidewall:http://i103.photobucket.com/albums/m131/cadence220/conti2.jpg

After I got home I noticed that both cuts are almost equidistant from the valve stem. In the photo below the leaf is pointing to a twig that shows the distance that blowouts are from each other.http://i103.photobucket.com/albums/m131/cadence220/conti3.jpg

Has anyone else had probs with Conti 4000 tubies?
Is the area/drive side/sidewall coincidence? What is going on here?
This is kinda tough to take especially after switching back to tubulars last week after a 20 yr hiatus. Help!
Where is everyone getting their Veloflex's? :banana:
ps. I have tubie blisters on my thumbs now! More bananas.

[Blue Jays]

Similar tire pressure in both events? Interesting sequence yet I am inclined to believe entirely coincidental.

[Hardlyrob]

I can't speak to the 4000's, but I have sprinter gatorskins on the winter bike with about 1,000 miles and no problems. Is there a chance that you over-stretched them putting them on? Conti's tend to be tight, and it is possible to over-stretch a tire creating a bubble and localized weak spot.

I think I did that on the rear on the winter bike, and created my portable bump in the road (thump, thump, thump) - but no wear, or thin spots on the tread.

I get my veloflexs from either pro bike kit, or bike tires direct - both have good prices and great service. It depends more on who has what in stock.

Good luck, and welcome back.

Rob

[Hardlyrob]

:banana:
ps. I have tubie blisters on my thumbs now! More bananas.

Thumb tubie blisters are the mark of coolness...

[cadence231]

Similar tire pressure in both events? Interesting sequence yet I am inclined to believe entirely coincidental.

Yes same 120psi on both training days.

[mister]

i cut an old sprinter from some crap in teh bike lanes once. that was right after i flatted another because of some glass, and that was about 7 hours before i had flatted because of another piece of glass. yeah. 3 front tires in about 18hours.

haven't cut any sidewalls since though. and i definately wasn't on conti 4000's.

[cadence231]

I can't speak to the 4000's, but I have sprinter gatorskins on the winter bike with about 1,000 miles and no problems. Is there a chance that you over-stretched them putting them on? Conti's tend to be tight, and it is possible to over-stretch a tire creating a bubble and localized weak spot.

I think I did that on the rear on the winter bike, and created my portable bump in the road (thump, thump, thump) - but no wear, or thin spots on the tread.

I get my veloflexs from either pro bike kit, or bike tires direct - both have good prices and great service. It depends more on who has what in stock.

Good luck, and welcome back.

Rob

So bad stretching can do this? Hmmm...Weird because the mechanic that mounted them only stetched them for a day or two. He did this with the original tires mounted on the wheels and I noticed a bump in those as well and we thought it was a bad Hutchison hence the mounting of the Contis. The Contis also had bad bumps. Do I need to bit the bullet and stretch them good and long? And for how long? I had no idea you could overstretch tubulars.

It's nice to be back Rob...I think!

[Too Tall]

You can't overstretch tubulars. However, if you pull and pull and pull so hard that you hear threads ripping you got a problem. Yes, I've done that. What goes is the stitching that holds together the two halves of the tyre and this will make for a lumpy tyre if you don't backtrack and fix it. If the sidewall threads start to tear than you have a cr@p tubular that should go back to the seller...it sat around too long or was improperly stored. That's my story.

[Hardlyrob]

Others have posted on this, and know more than I do (Too Tall, BostonDrunk), but yes you can overstretch the tire and damage the casing. This creates a bump, and a weak spot.

What Too Tall just said as I was typing.

Rob

[tbushnel]

TT - would you boot the tire in the first pic of just patch the tube? Seems like a boot might be needed, but oh so much easier just to patch. The second tire, well I'm thinking its a goner, but maybe a boot there too.

Ted.

[Blue Jays]

/\/\ Those tires are true "goners" and not worth reusing.

Since the failures happened is close proximity it might be worth a note to Continental to see if there have been reports of a bad batch of tires.
They might do something for you if you're willing to ship them in for inspection by their Quality Control team...

[mister]

i don't think gp4000's are repairable...are they?

i usually don't have a problem with stretching tires for only a few days.

[11.4]

Those are both tire cuts caused by something you ran over. You can see the cut damage from the outside. The similar location is purely coincidental. They are both rather big to repair -- you'll get a bulge or at least a higher likelihood of an inner tube blowing out at the patch.

Tubulars teach one how to watch more for road hazards, and that's unfortunately a benefit for you from riding them.

[junior2189]

i have them on my tt wheels. i run 140psi in them and have not had any problems with them. i have about 200 mile on them.
JUNIOR

[cadence231]

Tubulars teach one how to watch more for road hazards, and that's unfortunately a benefit for you from riding them.


NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO! @#*&%!

Ahhh. Okay much better now.

[terrytnt]

This is really tough luck, I've never seen nor experienced such a blow-out (and tubulars is all I've ever used 20+ years).

As with many on this forum, I got the tip a few years back to ride Veloflex (criteriums and Carbons). The durability of these tires is amazing, I have over 3000 miles on my current tires and they are running well. This season I'm going to see how far they go (with of course regular inspections). As has been said many times before, we tubie riders are somewhat methodical, we routinely clean and inspect our tires, watch the road religiously and I tend to ride a little under-inflated 110 psi.

I buy from worldclasscycles.com and receive great service and price. I never used contis but from those on the forum have heard they can be really difficult to mount. Veloflex could not be easier... inflate on rim for 24 and follow you gluing process... works perfectly every time.

my 2 cents...

[RIHans]

But I gotta say I liked the leaf-twig pointer system in the damage photos...Really!

Totally co-incidental...You gashed the side walls on spring-road-crap.

[bostondrunk]

I've been riding the GP4000 tubies on a set of Ksyrium ES's. I usually inflate them to about 120. I did have one puncture, but it wasn't a blowout like yours. Otherwise they've been great, and one of the things I like the most about them was how easy it is to mount them straight and with no bumps, given the new base tape.
That said, I got them on sale from PBK for about $49 each, but they've since gone up in price to about $70..

[cadence231]

I've been riding the GP4000 tubies on a set of Ksyrium ES's. I usually inflate them to about 120. I did have one puncture, but it wasn't a blowout like yours. Otherwise they've been great, and one of the things I like the most about them was how easy it is to mount them straight and with no bumps, given the new base tape.
That said, I got them on sale from PBK for about $49 each, but they've since gone up in price to about $70..

I must need to practice a lot more because all I get are bumps and side to side waves...even with the two other brands I have put on!