Thanks for digging up that information. I often wondered if thy actually worked or were similar to deer whistles that you put on your car's fender to frighten deer away? Some scientific research is in order. The deer whistles turned out to be bogus.
@
DouglasB Your skepticism is of course reasonable.
They worked really well for us on the road bikes with HP tires.
Basically from our years of practical experience (not scientific research) is - what happens with thorns and glass and sharp grit
without a tire saver/wiper is - the tire initially picks up the thorn or glass sliver on first contact and typically with forward wheel motion (rotation) rotates through to the next rotation or rotations, combined with the weight on the bike, which then "drives home" the thorn or glass/metal fragment deeper into the tire tread and or inner tube. Road bike tires are pretty thin so it only takes a rotation or two to puncture the inner tube then you had a leak to repair or if a bigger cut, a blowout. The tire saver/wiper basically flicks off the threat
before it can be driven home/deeper on subsequent rotations.
With tire savers/wipers the thorn/glass/metal/sand/grit fragment on the tire surface is wiped/flicked off and taken away with the air flow and falls back to the road surface becoming a threat to follow-on tires. Note: a few thorns or glass fragments if positioned correctly (in a bad way) of course may enter the tire and tube deeply on
first contact, and those will result in a required flat repair, but in our experience that was a rare occurrence. We later added Mr. Tuffy tire protector liners in the tires as extra insurance beyond just the tire savers/wipers, with a slight weight penalty, and had never had a flat on the road.
We'd give these tire savers/wipers a shot on MTBs or FTBs but realistically the knobby tire treads are
NOT fully compatible with these tire savers/wipers so we use Mr. Tuffy tire protector liners on MTBs FTBs. Repairing flats or changing inner tubes roadside, or in the shop, is not what I consider fun (especially if it's raining). You do repairs when you must, but we'd rather avoid repairs entirely if possible.
Some addl. observations: while riding, when you look slightly askew and down from the handlebar neck/stem and watch the tire saver/wiper and the tire, you can watch the dynamics of this wiping action happening on the top of the tire in front of you. Back at home/in the shop, you can actually inspect/see the wear on the wiper's wire-to-tire contact surface after many miles/years of use (the wire is polished, shiny, and ever-so-slightly thinner). The drag if of course tiny/almost immeasurable.
...Ride On!
