WTB Nineline Tires: Out Of The Box- by Guitar Ted
Recently we introduced a few new tires that have come in for test/review. (Seen here) The WTB Nineline tires are part of this group and this post will introduce you to them and in the upcoming post, I will have my first impressions on these new XC tires from WTB.
WTB Nineline
Introduction: The Nineline represents the XC racing tire from WTB for going fast, but also with an eye toward traction. WTB took a lot of feedback from racers on what they felt was lacking in XC racing tires for 29″ers. The Vulpine, WTB’s former XC racing tire, was fast, but it did give away a lot of traction to get that speed. WTB used the popular “micro-knob” design style for the tread and a “Race” tube specific casing or a supple TCS casing for tubeless set ups and fast roll. The Nineline is listed as a 2.0″er and retail price is $64.99 for the Race version or $69.99 for the TCS version.
Measurements: The tires we received are the TCS version and feature WTB’s squared off bead that is manufactured to UST dimensions. These tires came out to be 580 grams each on my official fish scale of doom. (That’s an official term, by the way. 😉 )
I mounted these up to the Shimano Deore XT wheel set, (seen here), and with that wheel’s narrow 19mm inner width, the Nineline came out to be 48.6mm/1.9″ in width over all. Yessiree! A skinny shoe for going fast, that she is. Mounting was easy-peazy, by the way. UST dimension tires and rims are amongst the easiest to set up tubeless for 29″er fans.
Initial impressions are that, although the tires are a bit narrow, all those squarish knobs look grippy and the casing does indeed feel supple in the hand. With the ease of mounting and signs that the pressures hold well in these tires, all that is left to do now is to report my first impressions of these on trail. That will be coming very soon.
WTB sent these tires to Twenty Nine Inches at no charge for testing and review. We were not bribed nor paid for these reviews and we will strive to give our honest thoughts and opinions throughout.
How would you compare these against the thunder burts or the wtb nano’s ?
Im currently ridding nano’s but im gearing up for a 100 km xc race where i want to do really well (;
Sorry wrong button,ment to end that with:
Thanks,mick
@mick: I do not have any experience with the Thunder Burt, but in terms of the Nano vs the Nineline, I can give you some feedback. The nano is a very capable, versatile tire with more volume. The Nineline maybe beats it in terms of speed, but has about the same amount of grip, only it is a smaller volume tire. Much smaller than a typical Nano. So if you were to say, run a single speed with a rigid set up- I might opt for the Nanos. For a fast full suspension XC bike, I might go with the Ninelines. But make no mistake, the Nineline is not what I would term as a trail/AM tire by any stretch. Pure XC action here.