My wife got me a KHS Urban Soul for commuting. I didn’t realize the tires were this thin and the streets where I live can be a bit rough. Anybody know of bigger new wheels I can replace them with?
by RIVALONENORTHSHORE
My wife got me a KHS Urban Soul for commuting. I didn’t realize the tires were this thin and the streets where I live can be a bit rough. Anybody know of bigger new wheels I can replace them with?
by RIVALONENORTHSHORE
4 Comments
What size tires do you have now? They look like 700c x 28mm. If you have room, consider going to 35mm tires.
You haven’t given us a lot to go on, but it looks like that bike has 700c x 28mm tires by default.
There are lots of 700c road, commuter, and gravel tires larger than 28mm – and 700c is technically the same size as a 29″ MTB tire, which has even larger air volumes available.
However, I don’t know how much larger than 28mm your frame will fit. What’s the gap between the sidewall of the tire and the fork, chainstays, and seatstays?
One simpler option to soften up the ride would be to run lower tire pressures, whether just by reducing the air pressure in your tubes or by converting to tubeless if the former approach results in pinch flats in the tube (not sure your rims/tires are capable of going tubeless). Don’t inflate the tires to the pressure listed on the sidewall – likely 85 PSI? – that’s the max recommended pressure. Try more like 60 front/65 rear, or go lower until just before it’s squirrely or sags enough that you think it would pinch flat on an unexpected pothole.
Rim brakes will limit you to the maximum tire width.
Get some gatorskin tires and you’ll never get a puncture flat.