Rollin' on ma six-fo'

Out for a pedal this morning to have a few words with the black dog. I had fitted the front 24" Halo combat rim with 24x3" Halo Ception tyre to the Inbred and wanted to see how it went.
The rolling radius is smaller on the front, despite the much larger volume tyre, though probably by about 3/4", so not much. There is definitely more rolling resistance though.
I picked my way along some of the trails I know around the local area, it's about a 10 mile loop roughly and a mix of paved roads and slarry bridleways.
There's also a few areas where the streams are the bridleway.
So why the 3" front then? Well I really love fat (tyred) bikes though the cost is pretty salty, so when the option of borrowing the wheels from my mate Phil came up (cheers Phil) I jumped at the chance. There's a matching rear, but with a measly 2.6" tyre on. Long term plan is to build a singlespeed with them. Anyway.
The stream above has a swirl pool about 2' deep just as you get to it, but you can make it through by going to the far left along an underwater rock ledge. I almost made it...
Along a bit further and after a cracking set of rock steps to descend (just visible in the background) there was a fallen tree to deal with.
Here the SPDs made life a chore and I wished I had my beartraps still fitted.
This trail runs out by a river, which you can cross if you don't mind wet legs as again it's about 2' deep.
You can see tyre lines from other vehicles making it. Tempting isn't it? Maybe in the summer, as we're only about halfway round at this point. The chicken run is to back up a little and make use of a narrow plank bridge about 50yds further along.
That duly done it was out onto the road then back up another hill into some woods.
The ground was still pretty cold and there was the odd patch of ice to crunch through, which was fun.
Then I was tempted by an off-piste run through the pine trees, mossy hummocks and rabbit holes. This was really enjoyable until I got a branch in my left eye and promptly fell off through a small pine tree as I was unable to get out of my right SPD. Grrr...
Once able to see again I went to snap a pic only to discover the phone battery had died. Ah well.
Turning round I headed back on track and back towards home.
So what have I found out running a chubby front? Well it's actually quite fun (most importantly), the bike does float over the gunky muddy slarr a lot better and really the rolling resistance isn't too terrible. It's not like I'm doing the TDF on it. So roll on the parts collection for the singlespeed when I can run both wheels...