After being thoroughly impressed by the Continental Mountain King I reviewed a month or so back, we decided to get a few sets of Conti’s freeride tyre, the Diesel.
Here’s Conti’s spiel about their Diesel tyre:
The Freeride Powerplant
A 2.5 tire has to withstand a lot of heavy freeride abuse, that’s obvious! The Diesel doesn’t just withstand a lot, it is lightweight as well. The Diesel excels not only on downhill stretches, but it makes things a whole lot easier when heading uphill too. A true all-rounder.
The favourable wire version was equipped with additional reinforcement for bike park use, where the only thing that counts is the durability measured in drops and jumps.
The version we managed to track down was the cheaper steel beaded, non folding, Taiwanese model. This version came in at a bargain 138 RMB (around $20 U.S) but weighed a portly 1200g a tyre!!
Mounting the tyre to my Atomlab rims was easy as pie, but riders using Single Tracks found mounting and unmounting for puncture repairs a bit of a chore.
Once on the bike and pumped up to 40psi they sit with a very rounded profile, this is due to the large volume of the 2.5 Diesel and also partly due to the tyre’s tread design. The design of the tread is again a group of odd low profile triangle shapes with very little in the way of sidewall tread, this gave us concerns over the Diesels cornering ability. The tread is directionally specific, as per the Mountain King, meaning the tyre sits in one direction for the front and the opposite direction for the rear.
On the road to the trail every rider using the Conti Diesel was amazed by how quickly they rolled along the tarmac, and we quickly lost the other riders using ‘bigger’ tyres. This is great for those of us who have a long asphalt ride to and from the local trails.
When we finally hit the dirt our smiles of joy due to the fast rolling on the road quickly dried, shriveled and fell from our faces when one after another we punctured! The first rocky downhill of the ride had two of us looking really gutted and worrying about the state of our rear wheels. The tyre is designed for freeride, so we are guessing smooth trails with lots of skinnies and ladders, but once your in the rough stuff the Diesels tend to give up and deflate, preferring to be gently pushed down by the rider rather than ridden! Not good! And it wasn’t just the rocks the Diesels had an interesting time with, but also thorns which they attracted by the dozen.
With all this practice changing tubes the riders who originally had trouble getting the Diesels on and off had become professionally proficient by the end of a single ride.
When the Conti’s decided to hold their own and keep the air from gushing out with amazing gusto, they rolled well and gripped well in hardpacked dirt conditions, they also climb very well too, however you take these babies around a loose corner at speed and they’ll have you sliding off the track and down the side of the trail!
As you can probably tell I am not impressed by the Diesel, they puncture easily and the front has little to no grip in the corners. However they do roll well. The only time I would recommend the Diesels is if you ride extremely smooth trails, with smooth jumps and transitions, and even then I would recommend a Maxxis up front, OR if you do what I and some other riders have done and ride with a DH tube in the back and swap the front for a Minnion or similar, this way you still get a bit of relief from the ride to and from the trial and don’t suffer from the puncture and traction problems.
Save your money get some Maxxis and suffer on the road rides.
If your going to be in Qingdao, China for the next few weeks during the Olympic Games, your going to need to get yourself on a bike. Qingdao has so much to offer, from expensive shopping malls to beautiful green mountains, the beaches to the beer festival. Unfortunately the public transport is a little unreliable and getting on a bike really gets you places and see spots you wouldn’t normally see.
