Every bike I own is set up tubeless, including all of my road bikes. I've been using tubeless setups on the road excusively since late 2018, I've completed something on the order of 30 different tubeless setups myself on road bikes, gravel bikes, mountain bikes and fat bikes. I am a believer in the technology after many, many thousands of miles of using road tubeless. For reference, I typically run 28s on the road at 74/77 psi F/R.
My tubeless opinions:
1. If you can't get the bead to seat, spray the bead down with soapy water / any cleaner on hand and try to pump it back up again. The beads should then snap into place more easily.
2. If you have a lot of bikes that are set up tubeless, buy a cheap compressor and a Prestaflator. This costs about the same as a tubeless chamber pump and makes mounting any tire really easy.
3. The biggest annoyance with tubeless for me is the tape. Tubeless tape is very fragile, annoyingly expensive, a pain to get seated correctly, prone to moving when you mount a tire, prone to leaking over time etc. A better option for me is rims with a solid rim bed. Mavic pioneered this design with the UST design, Shimano's "Road Tubeless" standard is also based on a solid rim bed. Manufacturers like Farsports and Light Bicycle offer good quality carbon rims with solid rim beds. Downside: if you break a spoke, it's harder to fix... athough if you break a spoke on a taped setup you have to pull the tape, fix the spoke and then retape... so maybe it's a wash.
4. In my opinion, hookless rims on the road aren't as versatile as hooked rims. The tire limitations and pressure limits are minor annoyances but stil annoyances. All else being equal, I'll get a hooked rim for road use. Note: I actually prefer hookless for lower pressure applications like gravel and MTB. In my experience hookless rims seem significantly stronger in the rim wall than hooked rims.
5. Dynaplugs work a bit better than Stan's Darts athough both work pretty well.
6. I've had good luck with regular od Stan's sealant. I run 74/77 psi F/R on the road and I've had Stan's seal up small punctures just fine even there. I put the sealant in through the valve stem after mounting the tire, seating the beads and pulling the valve core. I have not tried the Silca stuff yet.
7. I usually use Conti 5KTLs or Maxxis High Road black sidewall tires, both are very reliable. The only tires I've tried that weeped sealant at the sidewall were the otherwise excellent Rene Herse tires I once used on a gravel bike. IMO, black sidewall tires are a bit more reliabe than skin wall tires.
My tubeless opinions:
1. If you can't get the bead to seat, spray the bead down with soapy water / any cleaner on hand and try to pump it back up again. The beads should then snap into place more easily.
2. If you have a lot of bikes that are set up tubeless, buy a cheap compressor and a Prestaflator. This costs about the same as a tubeless chamber pump and makes mounting any tire really easy.
3. The biggest annoyance with tubeless for me is the tape. Tubeless tape is very fragile, annoyingly expensive, a pain to get seated correctly, prone to moving when you mount a tire, prone to leaking over time etc. A better option for me is rims with a solid rim bed. Mavic pioneered this design with the UST design, Shimano's "Road Tubeless" standard is also based on a solid rim bed. Manufacturers like Farsports and Light Bicycle offer good quality carbon rims with solid rim beds. Downside: if you break a spoke, it's harder to fix... athough if you break a spoke on a taped setup you have to pull the tape, fix the spoke and then retape... so maybe it's a wash.
4. In my opinion, hookless rims on the road aren't as versatile as hooked rims. The tire limitations and pressure limits are minor annoyances but stil annoyances. All else being equal, I'll get a hooked rim for road use. Note: I actually prefer hookless for lower pressure applications like gravel and MTB. In my experience hookless rims seem significantly stronger in the rim wall than hooked rims.
5. Dynaplugs work a bit better than Stan's Darts athough both work pretty well.
6. I've had good luck with regular od Stan's sealant. I run 74/77 psi F/R on the road and I've had Stan's seal up small punctures just fine even there. I put the sealant in through the valve stem after mounting the tire, seating the beads and pulling the valve core. I have not tried the Silca stuff yet.
7. I usually use Conti 5KTLs or Maxxis High Road black sidewall tires, both are very reliable. The only tires I've tried that weeped sealant at the sidewall were the otherwise excellent Rene Herse tires I once used on a gravel bike. IMO, black sidewall tires are a bit more reliabe than skin wall tires.