New (road) tires for a cannondale F400 mountain bike?

[Hector13]

I am new to biking, but I plan to use my bike solely for exercise by biking around the new york city
area (ie, on "paved" roads mostly, not on any mountains).

I plan to do some 30-50 mile rides over this summer and I have heard of people putting thin
("slick"?) tires on their mountain bikes.

My question is, is this an easy/possible thing to do on my bike? The current tires on the bike are
2.1" (I believe). Can I just get a set of 1.25s or 1.5s and throw them on the bike or do I need to
get new tubes as well? Also, when people say "slicks" do they mean tires that are 1.25 to 2" or can
you actually get road-size tires for a mountain bike (I mean in width, I realize they have different
diameters).

Lastly, if it is possible, is it something a newbie could do with perhaps the help of a bike
maintenance book (any recommendations)?

Thanks for any help.

 

[David L. Johnso]

On Mon, 31 Mar 2003 22:09:37 -0500, hector13 wrote:

> I plan to do some 30-50 mile rides over this summer and I have heard of people putting thin
> ("slick"?) tires on their mountain bikes.
>
> My question is, is this an easy/possible thing to do on my bike? The current tires on the bike are
> 2.1" (I believe). Can I just get a set of
> 1.25s or 1.5s and throw them on the bike or do I need to get new tubes as well?

You need new tubes, since the old ones are for fatter tires. But they are $2-4 per tube, nothing to
lose sleep over.

> Also, when people say "slicks" do they mean tires that are
> 1.25 to 2" or can you actually get road-size tires for a mountain bike

Not really road size (23-25mm or so -- less than an inch) since your rims are wider than road rims.
But you can easily find 1.25 and maybe even a bit smaller.

> Lastly, if it is possible, is it something a newbie could do with perhaps the help of a bike
> maintenance book (any recommendations)?

There are a number of reasonable bike maintenance books for newbies. You want something that shows
you how to fix flats, adjust things, replace the chain, etc. Should be lots at your local bike shop.

--

David L. Johnson

__o | Enron's slogan: Respect, Communication, Integrity, and _`\(,_ | Excellence. (_)/ (_) |

 

[David]

"hector13" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> Also, when people say "slicks" do they mean tires that are 1.25 to 2" or can you actually get
> road-size tires for a mountain bike (I mean in width, I realize they have different diameters).

You can certainly get road-size (28mm) tires for your MTB. Not sure how good those are on MTB-width
rims. 32mm tires (touring-size?) work great on regular MTB XC rims, and of course change your
gearing less.