Are your rims ready for tubeless? This guide will help you identify whether or not they are.
Many factory-produced wheelsets will say if they are tubeless compatible with rim stickers, information on the manufacturer’s website or in a handbook. If your wheels are hand built, check with the wheelbuilder.
Below are two examples of road bicycle rims. One is a tubeless compatible rim profile and one is not. The tubeless rim, on the left, has the characteristic ‘lipped well’ in the centre, which has two functions: the first is to make tyre fitting easier by effectively reducing the diameter of the rim while you’re fitting the tyre, and the second is to help encourage the tyre bead to stay at the edges of the rim during inflation/deflation instead of returning to the middle.
The rim on the right has neither of these capabilities and is therefore not tubeless compatible.
Most rim manufacturers will market their rims as tubeless if they are so. Look for stickers on the rims or the bike manufacturer’s supplied specification. Alternatively if you don’t have access to these, ask the retailer or seller you bought the wheels from, or consult a professional bike mechanic or wheel builder who is familiar with tubeless systems.
If you have hookless rims, you must only use tyres which say they are safe for use with hookless rims. If you fit tyres that are not approved for use with hookless rims, they can blow off the rim causing catastrophic damage to you and your components.
It may be possible to set up your non-tubeless rims as tubeless. If you’ve tried it and it works, congratulations. I hope it works out for you. It usually doesn’t work, however, and I simply cannot recommend doing this as it may result in serious injury or death.
