I’ve been running the Delium Steady, Light Casing, in 29″x2.4″ size, on the front of my full suspension bike for about 8 months. This involves 30 rides, according to my Strava records. It was $38, $32 with a vendor discount when I bought it, so I put this in the category of a very cheap tire. I note Delium is still listing this for $39, so the prices are holding up against fluctuations in the industry.
It’s been working very well for me. The tread is grippy enough in my usual riding conditions (dry), grippy enough in wet and mud from the unusual amount of rain we have been having. It rolls well on hardpack, doesn’t squirm around, seems to shed mud fine, isn’t very noisy on asphalt, and basically functions like a good tire. I’m running the pressure at 29-30 psi, which is where I settled for all MTB tires these days.
I wouldn’t say it is the best tire ever in all conditions, but that isn’t what the tire is designed for. It sits at second least-grippy, or second fastest, in Delium’s four tire lineup. These are not particularly light weight, as this one weighed in at 1021 grams when I received it, which was heavier than the claimed 960 grams. The carcass feels appropriately tough, perhaps marginally heavier than a Maxxis EXO casing, i.e., it is not a silly-light racing tire by any means. The tread is also pretty normal, with an average roundness over the shoulder lugs. And that is how it behaves. Normal. Average.
I got this general impression of the tire in the first few rides and have never had a different experience.
The reason for the update however, is the wear. This was the biggest unknown from the start and I have finally noticed some wear / disintegration of the shoulder knobs. As you can see in the picture the wear is on the inside edge of the lugs and is pretty consistent all around the tire. There is no sign of similar damage on the center blocks, they are not worn through the siping yet. Overall, the tire is still performing well with no obvious degradation in performance. The Delium technology page states that the side lugs on the Light carcass tires are 50A in durometer, and the center lugs are 65A.
I took a look at the Aggressors, and you can see that the side knobs have also lost some integrity. I rotated these front to rear at least once so I can’t estimate relative time on front and rear for this tire. But it was probably on the front more than the back….the other Maxxis is looking much more worn, especially in the center.
Still, this thing has at least 3x the miles on it and it is in similar shape, with respect to the side lug integrity. The lugs appear more worn, in comparison with the Delium, perhaps obviously given the mileage. And this was my rear tire for part of its lifespan. This page says the current Maxxis dual compounds are a 51A (side knobs) / 60A (center) durometer but I’m not sure what Aggressors I have. They don’t say anything about the compounds on them but the Maxxis website seems to say they only come in the dual compound. Certainly the 51A/60A for the Aggressor and the 50A/65A for the Steady would be consistent with the wear patterns. And yes, the durometer comparison between tire brands is only a rough one, wear (and grip) can be affected by other factors in the rubber.
The knobs on the Fast tire on the rear still look visually intact without undue wear. This is no doubt because of the lower mileage.
I added the Fast/Light to the rear about five months ago, since my initial experience with the Steady tire was so good. And you can see that the Aggressor I had on the back was starting to look very worn down the center. The Fast Delium is also performing as expected, with about 19 rides on it so far. The website listed the knob height as 4 mm, only a little smaller compared with the 4.5 mm of the Steady. From this you can tell that despite the name this is not some modern take on a XC race tire. It’s a serious general purpose tire with a slightly faster tread design, in my eye. In riding, it seems a trifle faster and a trifle less grippy when pushed, in comparison with the Aggressor (I’d been running the same tire model front and rear). But it is only noticeable when at the limits of drive traction, which is where the obvious design limitations come in. The Fast has a middle section build more for speed and not for maximum grip. Cornering is fine. The profile of the two tires seems to match pretty well with them both acting predictably similar when leaned over. I tend to prefer this in my riding. There is a place for different profiles, ime, but I’m not doing the kind of riding where I want to shift a lot of weight on the front wheel in a hard corner, or where I desire the rear to break away to complete turns or any such shenanigans.
Is a half-priced Delium tire a good deal compared with a premium priced Maxxis tire?
If you are the kind of rider who tends to blow tires catastrophically because of large punctures or hard hits long before the tread wears out, these Delium tires might be an economical choice.
If you are the kind of rider who wears out the tread, well the lower cost of the Delium may come with a slightly lower lifespan. YMMV, since I’m only reporting the first signs of wear and the tire is still working fine. Also, I put a lot more miles on the Aggressors and can’t really recall when they first showed wear. I am just assuming I would have noticed if they’d been similarly chunked after 8 months of use. Probably the lugs on the Delium will continue to break down at a relatively rapid pace but I don’t know that yet.
Sun Dappled Forest 
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