Tires and fixing flats on unsupported rides
#51
Senior Member
tons of times
so while I've never done the reach down and clean off tire with glove thing, my stationary thing is doing the same thing, just slower.
#52
Junior Member
I don't see the story of flying debris landing sharp side up as statistically convincing. Cool story, nice image, but not data.
I think I've had more rear flats than front, but that could be just because they are more annoying to fix on the road thus more memorable. I have no data, and even if i did that's only one person and really just another story.
Stories are cool, and even convincing, but not because they are correct. Good data and good statistical analysis is boring AF, often not convincing to the general public, and more often actually correct.
I think I've had more rear flats than front, but that could be just because they are more annoying to fix on the road thus more memorable. I have no data, and even if i did that's only one person and really just another story.
Stories are cool, and even convincing, but not because they are correct. Good data and good statistical analysis is boring AF, often not convincing to the general public, and more often actually correct.
#54
Senior Member
Just as well since IME in the realm of cycling forums many of the data driven ones seem to use flawed logic and misinterpreted data any way.
#55
Junior Member
I’ve struggled with this as well. I opt for a tire which mounts easily, period. For instance, I love contis, but they are a pita with my wheels so I went with a tire that’s nice (but not as nice) yet a breeze to mount. If it takes more than 5 minutes to have a tire off then I’m over it. I’ve also had great luck with wheel liners. In fact, I can’t remember ever having a puncture when using them (other than the giant piece of metal that went into my sidewall) which looked to be something used in road construction.
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#56
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I recently bought a Schwalbe Billy Bonkers (20"). I was shocked how easy it was. In fact, it was so "loose" that I thought I had received the wrong 20" (i.e. the larger 20"). I have to admit, that I would have preferred a bit tighter fit out of slight fear of (a lack of) retention at lower pressures. I mean, I don't even need a lever to take off the deflated tyre.
#57
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#58
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Goathead. Aka Tribulus terrestris. Around here we call them tackburrs as well. Nasty little buggers. They grow in disturbed soils but don’t like competition. As soon as grass grows over the disturbed ground, they go dormant and call lay fallow for up to 50 years and still germinate. They probably came here in Russian wheat.
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Stuart Black
Plan Epsilon Around Lake Michigan in the era of Covid
Old School…When It Wasn’t Ancient bikepacking
Gold Fever Three days of dirt in Colorado
Pokin' around the Poconos A cold ride around Lake Erie
Dinosaurs in Colorado A mountain bike guide to the Purgatory Canyon dinosaur trackway
Solo Without Pie. The search for pie in the Midwest.
Picking the Scablands. Washington and Oregon, 2005. Pie and spiders on the Columbia River!
#61
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-to begin with, I have gone through 2 boxes (100 each) of Rema patches, and am well into my 3 box, in the last 10 years.
-I started out the morning with a flat that I had to patch before I broke camp. I got less than 10 feet down the road with a loaded bike when I heard the pop of another puncture.
-3 or 4 blowouts in 26 miles. The first one was just 2 miles from the start in front of a car tire shop...scared the guy outside. One stampeded cows but at least I’d made it about 20 miles and the last one was overnight during a torrential rain storm with lightning so close that I could hear the thunder before I saw the lightning. There may have been another one in there somewhere. Spent the night in the brick bathroom of the campground. I was prepared for flats but not for that many blowouts. Someone was nice enough to give me a ride to town where I got 6 tubes and didn’t have a flat over the next two weeks.
-A blowout on the top of Lolo Pass after I fixed a flat on my daughter’s bike. 50 miles from anywhere. (Both of these incidents happened with Continental touring tires which I will not use again)
-a day trip into goathead country here in Colorado. We had 4 people and 24 flats. My wife got one...I forgot a tire liner one of her tires..., the guy running ghetto tubeless got 3 and his girlfriend got 20. Again, I plan for flats and bring extra tubes as well as lots and lots (and lots) of patches. She blew through all of them and more. She finally had to resort to pumping up the tire and riding as fast as she could to cover as much distance as possible before having to pump up again. It was a slow final 3 miles (out of 8 total). When we got to the trailhead, I did a little happy dance because if you do the math, you discover that I had zero flats.
-which brings me to the sad moral of the next ride into the same area. Because I had mocked the mighty god of flats and his goathead attendants, they did smiteth me mightily! In the same 8 miles, I stopped counting at 63 goathead punctures on one tire! I had to actually carry the bike the last mile because the tires came off the rims. I had to throw away the tires, tubes and tire liner. There were just too many goatheads and goathead spines imbedded in all of them.
The mighty god of flats and his goathead attendants can be appeased, however. I have since gone into the same area with Slime filled tubes, tire liners and sacrificial tires...old tires I will just throw away after the ride... and not experienced a single flat nor even picking up a single goathead. If you are willing to ride on awful tires that weight a ton and aren’t all that responsive, the mighty god of flats might be appeased.
On the plus side, I’m really, really, really good at fixing flats!
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Plan Epsilon Around Lake Michigan in the era of Covid
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Gold Fever Three days of dirt in Colorado
Pokin' around the Poconos A cold ride around Lake Erie
Dinosaurs in Colorado A mountain bike guide to the Purgatory Canyon dinosaur trackway
Solo Without Pie. The search for pie in the Midwest.
Picking the Scablands. Washington and Oregon, 2005. Pie and spiders on the Columbia River!
Stuart Black
Plan Epsilon Around Lake Michigan in the era of Covid
Old School…When It Wasn’t Ancient bikepacking
Gold Fever Three days of dirt in Colorado
Pokin' around the Poconos A cold ride around Lake Erie
Dinosaurs in Colorado A mountain bike guide to the Purgatory Canyon dinosaur trackway
Solo Without Pie. The search for pie in the Midwest.
Picking the Scablands. Washington and Oregon, 2005. Pie and spiders on the Columbia River!
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#62
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A couple years ago I did the ACA Big Bend van supported trip in West Texas. Second night, I accidentally rode my bike into the campsite instead of getting off the bike while still on pavement and walking into the campsite. Spent the next 10 minutes removing the thorns that I collected in the campsite, photo below.
I was more careful for the rest of the trip.
The group was over a dozen riders, and there was only one person that had a flat, and she only had one.
I was amazed how lucky we all were.
Before the trip, we were warned to expect flats on our sleeping pads too, I do not know if anyone had a pad puncture, I did not. They suggested a foam pad underneath any inflatable pads, some people did that but I did not, instead I rolled the dice that I could pick a good tent site each night. I had a plastic sheet under my tent, that collected some thorns.
I need to also thank you for having some of my flats for me, made my touring much more enjoyable. If I meet you in a campground sometime, remind me that I owe you a couple beers.
I was more careful for the rest of the trip.
The group was over a dozen riders, and there was only one person that had a flat, and she only had one.
I was amazed how lucky we all were.
Before the trip, we were warned to expect flats on our sleeping pads too, I do not know if anyone had a pad puncture, I did not. They suggested a foam pad underneath any inflatable pads, some people did that but I did not, instead I rolled the dice that I could pick a good tent site each night. I had a plastic sheet under my tent, that collected some thorns.
I need to also thank you for having some of my flats for me, made my touring much more enjoyable. If I meet you in a campground sometime, remind me that I owe you a couple beers.
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