This week’s Nerd Alert episode came about after consumer-direct wheel company Hunt released a 1,213 g ultralight disc brake road wheel with a hookless tubeless rim.
Where some of the other more prominent hookless road wheels have 23 to 25 mm internal widths to supposedly support the tyre at lower pressures, Hunt’s have a marginally narrower 21 mm figure. And with that, some readers raised questions through our Mailbag column over whether the recommended 72.5 psi maximum pressure actually makes sense for riders of average weight and on popular road tyre widths of 25 and 28 millimetres.
As a technical consultant to some winning WorldTour teams, Josh Poertner of Silca flicked us a message with some thoughts on the matter that only raised more questions. And that got us thinking, perhaps it was time to check-in again on where we’re at in the world of road tubeless, what’s new, what’s coming down the pipeline, and what still needs to be fixed.
Join Dave Rome, James Huang and Josh Poertner as they discuss all things from hookless road woes, tyre pressure calculators, and how tyre sealants work (or don’t) at road pressures.