vol

I just had my first flat in 3+ years since I bought the bike. Fortunately it was discovered at home, about an hour before I was going to leave (ended up taking the subway). I'm interested to know the bad experiences of those of you who had flats or other mechanical failures during your commute, which caused significant inconveniences. Some day, if I were to have similar experiences, I may feel some comfort of not being alone in recalling these

alan s 

Had a flat the other day from a shard of rock that worked its way through the casing. Replaced the tube, pumped up the tire, and I was on my way. No big deal. Took about 15 minutes all told.

vol

Was it front or rear tire? Rear would take significantly more time?

blakcloud

Flats are easy fixes. Front rear it really doesn't matter. Taking the rear wheel off and on may add another 30 seconds.

Twice in the last 7 years of daily commuting I had problems outside of flats. Once a freewheel died on me in the middle of nowhere in a downpour. Took me an hour to walk to the subway and get on with my bike. The second time a seat post snapped in half on the way to work and I had to return home, standing the whole time. That was a workout. Popped in a replacement and off to work I went.

So out of around 1400 commutes, twice there was something worse than a flat.

vol

Reminded me of what happened to me once: while riding on the street, suddenly the saddle fell to its lowest level--the quick release of the seatpost got loose. Re-tightening the seatpost was futile. So I rode the rest of my trip like I was riding a kid's bike, or like a clown.

HydroG33r 

I've just started commuting this year (June). Had my first flat ever a few weeks in. Must have happened JUST before I got home (construction within a block of my house), because I was fine when I put my bike away that night, but when I rode out the next morning I was on my rim. I was CLUELESS and unprepared at the time (no tools, spare tube, or anything); was the rear tire and I didn't even want to mess with it. I was lucky I was at home when I discovered it... else I would have been helpless. Ended up taking my whole bike in to the LBS, who only charged me like $15 for parts & labour to fix it. Being that it was so cheap, I figured it'd be easy to fix myself, though never bothered to figure out how... until...

Got my second flat ever last night on my way home from work. I knew I'd run over something, but rode a few hundred metres and it wasn't until I turned a corner that it felt like my rear tire was drifting and unresponsive as I was turning. Fortunately that was just as I was turning into a park, so I had a nice car-free area to pull off and start trying to figure out how to use the new tire levers, spare tube, and CO2 cartridges I bought after my last flat.

After exhausting both my engineering degrees trying to sort out just how to do this, I finally pulled out my iPhone and queued up a how-to video. Not long after that, I was good to go. All-told, my GPS timer was paused for about 30 mins. Lucky for me it was a sunny day; rare for Vancouver in October. The previous two days I got so wet it was like I'd ridden my bike along the bottom of the river. Would have been miserable trying to teach myself basic bike repair skills in the pouring rain.

LOVING the CO2 system though... it was my favourite part, and I'm almost looking forward to my next flat just to get to play with it. Or better yet... perhaps I'll come across a damsel in distress who's already changed her tire (because she's a self-sufficient damsel), but is exhaustively trying to pump up her 700C tire with a miniature bike-mounted pump. :-)

MNTC

Other than one or two slow leak flats, I once had a rear tire blow off the rim due to a misinstalled tube (oops ). Fortunately I was moving pretty slowly uphill, I stepped off within a revolution or two and thankfully the rim was fine.

jrickards

I had a flat which is no biggie except that I had forgotten to replace my tire levers in my toolkit so I had to call my son for a ride the rest of the way to work where I left my bike overnight so that the next day, I would bring my levers, swap out the tube and ride back the second day.

nelson249

I was writing to work a while back with my laptop bag over my shoulder. I just about lost control of the bike when I stomped down on the right crank and it snapped off.

dramiscram

The worst thing that happened to me on a commute is a frozen freehub on my winterbike. I couldn't coast at all, I had to keep pressure on the pedals at all time or the freehub wouldn't engage for a few minutes. That night it took me almost 2 hours to go my usual 27.4 kms, at -20 celcius it was a nigthmare. It was all clogged up with old grease and grime so I cleaned it all up and lubed it with some synthetic lubricant and it's now fine. After that my coldest commute was at -27 celcius and everything went just fine.

I had many flats so far, the last one was last wednesday, but that's life, not a failure.

DX-MAN

Had several flats; seems that one year, I might get ONE, then the next, I'll get 6. Twice, I've snapped a chain -- remove the broken links, re-press the good ends together, and roll. (Every 9-speed chain I've ever had has snapped, and then served perfectly for 2 years after repair.....)

sci_femme

This self-sufficient damsel is rocking bike-mounted Topeak Road Morph AND a 16g CO2 system in the saddle bag. And she is married to an engineer, which kinda explains her need of self-sufficiency in the first place....

zonatandem

One flat in 3+ years?!
Had two punctures in 11 miles yesterday. No, it was not in the same place in the tube.
Carry 2 tubes and patch kit. Worked out just fine.
Without complications takes 5 to 7 minutes to remove wheel, check tire. remove/replace tube and pump up tire.

droy45

A few flats, broke a chain taking off at an intersection. Almost fell trying to unclip from the pedals without any forward motion. Had a crank arm come loose so now I always locktight the retainer bolts. Thats about it.

KenshiBiker

If you do find such damsel, before you hit her tire with a full 16 gm of CO2, remember to deflate the tire first (ask me how I know ).

Sixty Fiver

Getting cut off and broad siding a car and getting clipped by a pick up at 45- 50 kmh rates as the worst commuting experiences... the occasional flat tyre should be expected.

ursle

32 miles, early, northeast direction, looked up, an arrow point of dark clouds overhead from directly behind, three minutes later 60 mph winds 2" hail stones, into the ditch, bike wasn't any cover arrgh

jralbert

Crank arm snapping off is probably tops on my list of nightmare scenarios - I don't really know how you'd prevent it or see it coming, and the results are potentially disastrous (broken crank arm impales my calf, while the sudden weight shift onto the broken crank arm's side of the bike causes it to veer off the road and over the guardrail, both of us plummeting hundreds of feet into a ravine and bursting into flame, never to be heard from again). Is there an item of maintenance I should be performing to ensure that never happens to me?

lawnerd

WORST EXPERIENCE EVER. I have a 22 mile each way commute. So I used to carry two tubes and two CO2 canisters. I keep my bike in my office at work. One day around 3PM I hear this hissss and notice my front wheel go flat for no reason. No biggie. I change the tube and fill it up with one of my CO2 canisters. On the way home, about 5 miles in, I get a flat from a thin nail in the road. When I change the tube I have a problem with my CO2 and get no joy! I am now stuck with no way to fill my tire. I had just recently read an article about emergency measures of stuffing grass into your tire to get you home. I stuff grass into my tire and then ride the next 10 miles to Poolesville MD, where I got to a bike store and bought a new tire (the old one was shot at this point). That was the slowest suckiest ride ever! I now carry a mini hand pump, two tubes, and a bunch of patches, I find CO2 to be unreliable and limited.

alan s 

Rear. Extra time needed to loosen fender to remove wheel and to pump up high volume tire with an HP pump. Also, wasn't in a real hurry.

HydroG33r 

Is that a crack at engineers?

HydroG33r 

This sounds like a good story... How DO you know?

Sixty Fiver

One needs to make offerings to the bike gods under the full moon.

vol

I suppose most flats are caused by sharp objects on the road? How common is my case, i.e. flat caused by a small tear of the rim tape, which caused the small puncture of the tube by the spoke?

Cityroller

A few weeks ago, I was rolling down a slight grade, passed through an intersection and in a shocking second, felt a jolt, heard air escaping and then felt like the back wheel was striking a rock, over and over again. Pulled up on the grass to have a look and found a screw sticking out of my tire. My wife was off work that day, and took me to work from there. Lucky that.