Robert A

I'm new to tubeless tires, and last night while inserting, then removing an inner tube for practice at home, I lost a considerable amount of sealant. When I reinflated the tire without the inner tube, it sealed up fine and held air. Before taking the bike out on the road, do I need to replenish the lost sealant?

WhyFi

Wh... why?

"Considerable"? Yes, of course you need to replace it.

Robert A

Three weeks ago, I flatted with tubeless and couldn't insert an inner tube to get me home. I wanted to make sure that wouldn't happen again.

Elvo

Yes

WhyFi

Oh, you're that guy.

Yeah, before worrying about inserting a tube, you should be looking at why it was necessary in the first place. Those punctures are highly unlikely with a proper sealant, though you never did say what sealant you're using. What are you using? For that matter, you never did find the puncture site, you only mention sealant near the valve stem, which makes me wonder if it was the stem install.

Sealant should take care of the vast majority of punctures and plugs should take care of those that are slightly too big for sealant. Bigger than that, you're looking at cuts that probably need to be booted, in which case, yeah, you'll need to install a tube... but they're rare.

Should you be able to break the bead in the field? Sure, but I wouldn't go so far as to shove in a tube and make a huge mess for the sake of practicing something that's not terribly common.

Robert A

Yes, I'm "that' guy, the one who is learning as much as possible about bicycle maintenance and operation. I don't know why the tire leaked in the first place, but it has held pressure ever since the LBS added sealant after the original flat.

Seattle Forrest

​​​​​​This is a thing, it's bit me in the ass. You can inflate the tire this way, so it isn't obvious if you're not looking for it, but it won't hold much pressure.

Robert A

Seattle, I don't know how the sealant was inserted, nor which product was used. The tire came preinstalled with the wheel.

Let's not go back to what happened before. I just want to know the correct procedures going forward.

WhyFi

How can you know the correct procedure when you don't know what failed and how it failed?

Again, what you're practicing for is something that should be very, very unlikely if you've done everything else right. I'm trying to help you make sure that you're doing everything else right.

Since you don't know what kind of sealant is in the tire, the first thing I'd suggest is replacing it with Orange Seal. Since you want to learn, take the opportunity to do it yourself - you'll get to practice breaking the beads and lifting them over the rim before mopping up the sealant inside. Then you'll get more practice reinstalling, reseating and injecting the replacement. Win-win.

Darth Lefty 

Think it through

You lost some sealant

There's pretty much no penalty to adding more

Add some more

Robert A

The LBS that repaired the flat said all it needed was more sealant. I've personally inspected the tire since and haven't found any obvious cuts or holes.

I'll check into Orange Seal. Meanwhile, I've reached out to the original wheel builder to see what kind of sealant he used.

Thanks for your comments and suggestions. I'll get there.

Robert A

WhyFi - I just picked up Orange Seal. Do I need to clean out the old sealant before adding the new? I don't know the type I have, but it is white.

WhyFi

It's probably Stan's, which doesn't seem to work very well at road pressures. Both Stan's and OS are latex sealants, so the mixing shouldn't be an issue (OS has little particles in it that seem to help hold/clog at higher pressures). If there's not too much sealant in there, you can just add. If there's a full dose, I'd soak up the bulk of it, but you don't need to be particular about it.

Did you get the smaller bottle with the little hose for the valve stem? If so, get the tire remounted and the bead reseated, then let the air out, remove the valve core, attach the hose to the stem and then attach the bottle to the hose and inject. Replace the core, reinflate, give it a spin and you should be good to go.

Robert A

I got an 8oz ($20) bottle with a little hose for injecting the liquid. At the LBS, the tech showed me how to remove the valve core, and so the tire currently has no air, though it was fully inflated till then. How much liquid do I put in for a 25c GP5000TL?

Also, please explain the above in red? The tire was seated till the air got let out. Do I need to do anything with reseating the tire now?

WhyFi

Ah, sorry - you would only have to unseat the bead if you have to soak up/remove the old sealant. If you're just adding more, no, there's no reason to do any of that. Just let the air out, remove the core, inject, replace the core and air up.

For a 25mm tire, I'd probably put in 1.5oz.

u235

I am dedicated tubeless on 3 different wheelsets. I've stuck tubes in. Pesky gash that would seal and reseal at random and a bacon slab didn't help and also a tape failure. You can mess with a tape failure forever on the side of the road and think you have it fixed... I have a combination that the tire unseats off the bead on its own if it were to get down close to 0 (opposite problem the OP has). If I ever had an issue with that combination, I'd never get that fixed roadside. I don't know if the OP has things right but a tube is still something that can come up.

Robert A

Okay, done. I have no idea how much sealant went in, but I know I added some. Tire inflated right up, but with CO2 only, not track pump.

It's nice knowing I can service this stuff.

bruce19

The only time I had an issue with tubeless it was exactly this. It was at the start of a ride. I was riding with a buddy who is a former LBS owner. I was perplexed but he went right to it. And, we went on our way.

WhyFi

One of the things that I've done with that smaller bottle is to use a Sharpie to make marks roughly quartering the bottle so that I can use those as ~2oz graduations. It can sometimes be hard to see the level, because of all of the bubbles when you shake it, but it helps.

Also, when that bottle gets low, don't buy a new one - keep it and use it for dosing, and buy the bigger refill bottles; they're much cheaper per oz, but don't have the application tube and dip stick.

The dip stick, btw, is convenient to check sealant levels and viscosity in the future. Just make sure that you check your levels when the bike is hanging - if you deflate the tires, remove the cores and rotate the valve stem to the bottom, sealant is likely to push up, out of the stem and all over your floor... Not that I'd make a mistake like that.