Space-Age Bicycle Wheels Using NASA Technology by The SMART Tire Company — Kickstarter

Lol! So I ride a Cannondale road bike with 700x25 tires, so your comment is just that much funnier to me. Well done. :)

@negativeyoda

@perishthethought

Comming to an "S-works" dealer near you soon (for an unreasonable markup" ... the aero healmet shrimp backs are already forming lines to purchase this

ded

I go in with an open mind, but there were a few red flags for me:

• they keep confusing "tires" and "wheels" on that KS page. You know the difference, right? Why don't they?
• they repeat that NASA design bit over and over, and even provide a link to a NASA web site but the tire shown there is very different from the design in the KS. I fear that the economics of the NASA design would never work out in the marketplace, but that's not stopping them from pushing this sale.
• as someone else pointed out, they claim the re-treading process would be cheap and easy, without saying how it's done or even who will do that.

Also, there have been quite a few previous inventions which claim to improve upon mostly rubber, air-filled tires. None of them made enough economic sense to replace what we've had going for many, many years. I'll be happy to learn I am wrong and this company can really do that, but starting at $500 for two tires seems like a bad start to me. We will see...

If they are as good as they claim, we’ll see them on a pros bike at some point

Maybe, but the goals of pros are not entirely aligned with the functional/recreational bike market. If these tires offer even slightly lower speed than the best traditional tires, we're not going to see them in races, but we might still see them on the street.

For example, pros won't care as much about longevity and maintenance, because they will gladly replace components frequently to achieve maximum performance. I, on the other hand, would much prefer something that runs "well enough" with minimal maintenance for as long as possible. And I'd be willing to pay a reasonable premium for it. I mean, if I cared about eking out every bit of performance on my bike, I'd quit drinking beer first. I just don't care about marginal performance gains in my gear, with the exception of brakes (to a point) since that's a safety issue.

I look forward to maybe seeing these on the market in the future, but I'm skeptical too. The "re-treading" part sounds like a possible deal-breaker. I don't want tires that need their own tires, and certainly not if that's something that can only be done by professional service.