Peaty’s Products have had a tubeless tire sealant in their range for years but it hasn’t had the best reputation for sealing. The ‘unicorn sex crime scene’ caused by disco glitter additives left inside tires or anywhere it got sprayed/spilt put some people off too. That’s why Peaty’s have spent the last three years working through a whole range of recipes to find the best sealing, easiest to use, biodegradable mix. After a bunch of riding in all sorts of tires and workshop assaults with deadly weapons we reckon they’ve nailed it and created the best tubeless tire sealant available.
Design and specifications
The new sealant uses a water based latex with no ammonia so it doesn’t smell like a urinal and can be rinsed out easily when you change tires. This solution carries a mix of various sized biodegradable starch platelets which act as the main scabbing agent to clog and seal punctures. The new mix also includes biodegradable cellulose fibers now which Bryn the developer told us was a game-changing move in terms of how fast the sealant matted together to seal bigger holes.
Although Peaty's tried mixes without any sort of glitter in to please the disco haters, the sealing performance dropped off dramatically so they added it back in. The glitter flakes are gloss black not ‘Peaty’s Turquoise’ in the new mix though so it’s much less obvious when spilt. There’s no eco-evil plastic fibers in it either and all the packaging can be recycled.
Performance
The good news about it still having glitter in is that it’s super easy to see when you’ve shaken the sealant into an even mix ready to load into the tire. It mixes really easily too, with none of the big lumps of residue you find in the bottom of many sealant bottles. The reusable ‘trail pouch’ has a plastic nozzle and the bottles have rubber tubes that slide snugly over the valve to stop spillage. It is quite a thick solution though so narrow or older valves will need patience to get the appropriate dose through. Trying to force it through under pressure with a syringe tends to lock it solid too so just take your time.
Once in, it lubes tire beads nicely to help with inflation. It coats carcasses really well too, stopping sidewall bubbling on tires that have been too porous to use with other sealants. Although Peaty’s list life at six months, tires I loaded up well before winter still have plenty of mobile mix in them when I’ve peeled them to check. It doesn’t separate out into curds and whey or form weird clumps of rubber coral either and the long term tires have sealed fine when test stabbed.
As well as running the mix in various brands of MTB tire – Maxxis, Schwalbe, WTB, Specialized, Pirelli, Wolfpack, Michelin, Bontrager, Vittoria, Teravail, Continental and Hutchinson right down to mid teen pressures – I’ve also used the sealant in gravel and road tires up to 80psi. While trail/road testing will always be anecdotal rather than exact we’ve regularly found small spatter patches on frames, sealant scabs on tires or thorns through treads when switching rubber over. I’ve had to stuff plugs in some of the really big rips but otherwise the only non-sealing trail flat I’ve had was when I ripped the sidewall out of a particularly fragile Teravail ‘Light and Supple’ tire right at the rims edge which proved too gashed to hold a plug securely.
The extremely impressive on trail results are backed up by lab stabbing comparisons with all the popular sealant brands including our previous Muc Off benchmark. Running from 2 to 8mm screwdriver holes punched through a Specialized Butcher Gimp tire the Peaty’s sealant would essentially plug anything up to 4mm instantly. That gives it a clear edge over most of the rest but where it really wins against other sealants is in the 5-7mm range where it would repeatedly seal at a teen psi pressure that was still high enough to finish a descent on. It could then be re-inflated back up to 30psi in some cases, but would consistently be OK to ride on again at 25psi. It was the only sealant tested to have a good go at sealing an 8mm shank wound, although flex of the carcass unsurprisingly caused a slow leak when I started riding. That’s why I’d always recommend sticking a plug into any hole big enough to get one into if you want a long term fix.
Because it lasts well and it’s response speed and efficiency means you don’t need much of it to seal holes it’s a good price too (120ml £7.99, £19.99 500ml and £29.99 1L). Especially as those are the same prices as the previous sealant which was way behind the new one in comparative trail and lab shank testing.
Verdict
No sealant will seal every hole every time and preferences and loyalties for various milky mixes often seem to be held with a level of fanaticism normally reserved for religious wars. Even though it’s black now and it’s a real help in making sure you’ve mixed it up right, the glitter element of Peaty’s new mix will make it a no go for some too.
As far as on trail and lab stab testing goes its the best all round sealant I’ve used by a consistently repeatable margin though, particularly when it comes to healing serious wounds. It’s a reasonable price, easy to clean up, lasts well from freezing to mid-40 degrees (that’s the extent of my test range, Peaty’s say -15º to 50º) and won’t unduly damage the planet.
That’s enough for me to put it straight into pole position when it comes to the gash fixing Grand Prix.
Prices: Peaty’s Holeshot Biofibre Tubeless Tire Sealant
- 120ml: £7.99 / €9.99/ $11.99
- 500ml: £19.99 / €22.99 / £29.99
- 1 liter: £29.99 / €34.99 / $44.99
