Got some questions about tire squishyness for trials/street:
1: whats a good tire presure/squishyness? (
2: when you land drops and you can feel the tire bottoming out, is that causing signifigent damage to the rim?
I seem to have forgoten my last question so I’ll post it once I remember 
A good tire pressure is whatever keeps you from bottoming out. If you bottom out, you could damage the rim and are very likely to give yourself a flat.
The right pressure depends on your weight, the size of the tire, and how big your drops/hops are.
a good thing is 1 psi per 10 pounds of weight.
Personally, I like it as low as it’ll go without the risk of bottoming out. You definitely don’t want that. My DX got down to about 20 psi before I had to pump it up a bit…I overdid it just a bit, and now it’s at ~37.
Mornish, are you saying I should have my tire at 15 psi? I weigh 145 lb, and, I started almost-bottoming out at 20 psi…I don’ think there is a set formula for psi…I’m sure there are riders who like it as pumped up as they can get it…as long as you’re comfortable, and there’s no risk of you bottoming out, or your tire popping, you’re good.
oh yea, that’s for trials unis or munis. it works for me and most of my friends.
just pump it up until it feels good.
yeah, I think mornish’s formula is pretty good, but it probably depends on how wide your tire is. on my 2.5" tire, I like it at 15psi and I’m 130 pounds.
on my KH trials I have it at about 6-7 psi and I weigh about 70 pounds. I don’t bottom out much except on pointy objects.
wow, thats like nothing, lately I’ve been riding w/ 50 lbs and my tire almost bottomed out when I didn’t feel like doing a roll out off of a 4’ drop
its all personal preference
An extension of mornish’s idea
just pump it up until it feels…hard but you can still squeeze it slightly
^^for trials annyway^^
a dude in an extreme sports shop told me this 
P.A.Z
Re: Tire presure/squishyness
On Wed, 16 Aug 2006 11:52:52 -0500, mornish wrote:
>a good thing is 1 psi per 10 pounds of weight.
Expressed like that, it’s easy to see that that gives you a 10 square
inch static contact patch (minus some because of sidewall stiffness).
The weight should be total weight, including unicycle and other gear.
Klaas Bil - Newsgroup Addict
“I’m slowly but surely stealing Wales and bringing it back to my house on the wheel, frame and cranks of my muni. - phil”
my unicycle says on the wheel 35-50 psi or something in that range. it was pumped up to 50 when i got it and i swear i jumped down one step and it felt like i had no tire, i just landed on the posts 
it was SO hard. anyway i let the air out to 35 but it was still practically impossible to ride. i let out more to 20 and it was better but still hard to jump with. i let out more air, this time without a gauge, but i ended up bottoming out way too much so i took it someplace and it turned out to be at 10 psi. i had it pumped up to 15 which is working for me right now. i guess it’s all preference. i liked it at 10 because i could jump so high with so little effort but it bottomed out way too much and i didn’t want to damage my rim. oh for the record i weigh about 100 lbs.
I guess I’m just fat.
The 1psi per 10 pounds seems to be a good general idea for wide tires… I’m 220 and have about 23psi in my 24x3. BUT… a narrow tire will require more air. Riding on the 24x2 on my other uni I need at least 35psi, and more like 40-45.
FATTY
me too…
185 pounds…
i think i cant ride with only 18 psi…
i normaly ride with 20-25
I think 30 is about good for me. I’m 'bout 185 and I bottomed out hard doing a 5 set when it was at 20psi. thanks for your help guys and girl
6-7psi mornish omg thats insane.
I can barley stand 35psi it just so squishy and takes so much more energy to jump. I run at 40 and am thinking about going to 45. It’s soo much easier for me to jump with high pressure. Landing is rough but I just learned to roll out and it’s fine:D
No…You run your tires like that because its the only way you can muster a mediocre hop.
I can tuck now!
I’m now running around 13 or 14 psi. my tire is all hard.