NASA-inspired airless bicycle tires are now available for purchase::undefined
Misleading title. They’re not “available for purchase”. There’s a kickstarter.
And the link is https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/smarttirecompany/space-age-bicycle-wheels-using-nasa-technology/ Might as well skip the noise
Wow, I saw this tech on Veritasium’s channel and wondered how long it might be before we might see it. And here it is. Just like that, a future where bike tires never go completely flat may almost be here.
I’m hoping they actually make it to production and they’re a fantastic replacement to pneumatic tires.
BUT, it’s a Kickstarter, with estimated delivery almost a year from now. I’m withholding my excitement until they’re actually in use by regular people in the real world
ya, im done throwing my money away on kickstarters
Yea I really think that an established brand would pick this up if it were really viable. They have the r&d capacity to make this work where I’m not convinced a startup does.
No they’re not
This is Kickstarter scam #3752726, don’t waste your money
I guess it would be cool if these worked. There are already similar products in the market and they suffer from being difficult to install, deadening and heavy.
My biggest worry on this would be where you’d get them re-threaded.
Interesting tech but there are already decent available solutions such as the Schwalbe Marathon Plus and similar that are effectively glassproof, I have these on my bike and they work really well, one is over 15 years old now
glassproof
No, I like glass in my tires, thank you very much
You should ride around the city centre here, you will have so much glass in your tires in no time flat, you’ll love it!
How are they for coming off ? The various reinforced tires I’ve tried (randoneur, gator, 25mm) are really hard to put back on. Like you peel the skin off your hands trying. I’ve notice that most tires, even cheaper ones, don’t give you trouble for the first 500 miles. So have gone back to a medium grade tire that doesn’t require special tools to replace.
I dont know, I have never had to replace one, so never had to take one off. The one time I ever had one fail was when I hit a piece of timber with multiple nails in it, and I got my local bike shop to swap it. Tyre was already over ten years old at that point, and given I ride somewhere between 200 and 600kms a month probably had well over 10,000 kms on it
I had airless tires on my BMX bike in the 80’s. Not so cool now, are you NASA?
Nah, they’re still pretty cool: NASA invented this tech in the 60s.
The tires on my bike right now are airless.
Because they’re flat?
Airless tires exist since forereve though.
I always thought this tech was cool, and this implementation seems promising, but I’ll definitely be taking a wait and see approach.
Any notion on weight limits? Didn’t see it in my skin of the article or the kickstarter.
Neat.
How heavy are they?
It’s in the article. 450g
Yeah, for 700x35c. That’s not bad at all
… I somehow glossed over that lol
Not bad!