StrongEagle

Riddle me this, my bike riding friends. I was riding in Brazos Bend State Park today (Needville, Texas). Made about 11 miles and then I got a flat front tire. I had to push my bike back to the car... fortunately, only a little bit more than a mile.

I checked the tube when I got home, looking for the leak, expecting to find a puncture somewhere. Instead, the video shows what I found. There should be a link below to look at the video. The tube looks like swiss cheese. It would make a good aquarium aerator.

I can't figure this out. I cannot find a single place in the tire where a puncture might have occurred. I don't think I rode on the flat... I mean... rolling resistance goes up big time... especially when riding on gravel/dirt surface, which I was doing. And... no alcohol or doobies.

So... I dunno... Previously, I had to replace the rear tube twice because the spoke protector strip had a rough edge... but I've put hundreds of miles on the front tire without issue.

So... how come I have so many leaks in my tube? I'm thinking of buying Continental Gatorskins for my next tires.

Here is the URL to the video:

Apparently I cannot post a URL until I get more posts... and I don't know how to post a video here. Please PM me with an email address and I'll send the URL of the video.

Thank you for any thoughts or advice.

WizardOfBoz

Upload to google pics or imgur. Then share link: imgur dot com slash fawr324dsdfu

StrongEagle

ht tps: slash slash 1drv .ms/v/s!Ai1qoBekoDRPhcJe0OpVFGhoQoCzcw?e=W7E1D4

Trying with a couple of spaces in the URL... this is to my onedrive account.

trailangel

When you get a puncture and roll the bike on the flat tire, the tube moves around and continues to get more holes from whatever is stuck in the tire.....which might fall out in the process.

StrongEagle

Thanks for your comments. As I noted, I cannot find a single puncture wound in the tire... and for that matter, I couldn't even find junk in the tire.

At this moment, I'm dealing with the idea that it is my spoke protecting strip that did it... it's a hard plastic strip, and it caused me 3 flats in my rear tire until I realized what was doing it, and replaced with a rubber strip.

But... I've never had an issue with the front tire, over hundreds of miles of riding.

davidad

Think one of the gators got to it?

cyccommute 

Video assist. This isn’t just a case of getting a flat and having the tube squirm around in the tire. That would put a bunch of holes in one place. This looks more like the kind of damage from running through miles of goatheads. I’ve had more than 60 punctures in a tube (I stopped counting at 60) that would look like this but there would be dozens of goatheads spikes in the tire. Goatheads sometimes pull out but just as often break off.

What does the tire look like StrongEagle?

StrongEagle

The tire looks absolutely clean, in fact, I can't find a puncture hole anywhere on the inside of the tire. I am beginning to think that I am the victim of hard plastic rim tape. Twice before, on my rear tire, I had puncture failures where the hole was on the inside of the tube. It finally dawned on me that the rim tape was carving through the tube, and I replaced it with a rubber one... no more issues. Too bad I can't post pics.

I did not have that problem on the front wheel and I rode hundreds of miles with the same sort of rim tape. However, my ride yesterday was all off road, as it were, improved, hard dirt and pea gravel walking paths. And it had rained a couple of days earlier so there was definitely a lor more rolling resistance while peddling... I basically had to drop down a gear or two to push through the stuff.

So.. my theory is that my tire and tube flexed a lot more on this dirt/gravel path than on pavement, and that I again suffered the rim tape cutting through the tube... in at least one place to get the flat, and then since I had to push the bike down this path for another mile, maybe I got more cuts as a result of a completely flat tire.

Definitely going to add a rubber rim tape before I put a new tube in, and I am considering a Continental Gatorskin since I am riding "off road" fairly frequently on 700 x 38C tires.

Thanks for your response. Cheers.

BoraxKid

Which side of the tube are the punctures on? Are they on the inner side of the tube that faces the rim, or the outside of the tube that faces the tire? If the punctures are all on the same side of the tube, facing the rim, then that would support the idea that your rim tape has degraded and caused a flat.

If the punctures are all on the outside of the tube, then that would be a counter-factual to your rim tape hypothesis, and would lend support to idea that you ran over something gnarly, it pierced your tire & tube, and then fell out of the tire. You might not find evidence of a tire puncture if the tread compound is sufficiently soft, as it can sort of close-up around the thin "wound" from a goathead thorn or similar device after it falls out. I've had cases in the past where I only found the tiny piece of glass left in my tire tread by removing the tire from the rim and aggressively flexing the tread between my fingers as I looked over the entire circumference of the tire.

StrongEagle

I think you've hit the nail on the head. I've gone over the tire with a microscope and have found what appears to be a single, thorn/pin/tack created tiny hole... just large enough to make me suspect that whatever went through it (and then came back out) was sufficient to puncture the tube.

As for the tube... it's impossible to find that single hole on the outside of the tube with all the thousands of bubbles emanating from the tube, but heavy scrubbing and scruffing is present on the inside of the tube... so... either I got additional cuts from the rim tape or possibly pinch punctures from the completely flat tire being pushed over bumpy ground. In any event, I've added a new rim tape, rubber, with very soft edges.

Too bad I can't post a couple of photos. In any event, many thanks for your comments.