Ghetto tubular for MTB. Genius or hack?

Seen this today and thought I’d share. Not sure I would try this but a cool idea.

https://youtu.be/0R8uyY0Yytg

that’s how Stan’s got started before anyone was making tubeless equipment. Which is funny, because I spent 15 minutes on a group ride listening to a diatribe about the dangers of this kind of setup from a Stan’s employee. I don’t really like the name ghetto since it was invented by hillbillys.

I see absolutely no reason to do it now though, just use tubeless ready tires and rims. It’s particularly more dangerous with smaller tires, I have heard of rapid loss of pressure instances when people tried it with road setups. Well, “burping” was pretty common when people tried it with mtb tires, but the ramifications are somewhat less dire.

Did you watch the full video, @eekeller?

This is ghetto tubular is more than the ghetto tubeless of old. It goes pseudo-tubular with the additional step of gluing the tube and rim strip to the sidewall of the tire. It effectively makes burping impossible.

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Have you used carbon wheels? My tires practically need cut off the rim after a season of sealant has dried them together.

But I don’t see any reason to not try it. In 2011 I experimented with ghetto tubeless and it worked fine this is just taking it a step further.

For sure, that depends on the particular tire and rim combo. There are real variations in fit.

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