Re: First flat in a looooong time

Wolfgang Strobl <news51@mystrobl.de> wrote:

Am Wed, 26 Mar 2025 22:01:05 -0400 schrieb Joy Beeson
<jbeeson@invalid.net.invalid>:
 

 
Tuesday, 25 March 2025
 
On Saturday, I came out of Aldi to find my front tire flat.
 
On Monday, I walked to the Trailhouse and handed the wheel
to the mechanic with instructions to put in a new tube and
find out what had happened to the old one.

 
Many years ago, when commuting each work day by bike, I got a flat now
an then, too. Most often, I just patched the tube and continued my
commute. My record was something like a bit more than seven minutes,
from removing the tire to pumping up.  Ideal conditions, sunny morning,
a a clean place to do the repair, a somewhat soft tire that I could
remove with my bare hands, an easily found small puncture and, last but
not least, a fresh repair kit from TipTop. On other occasions, I just
mounted a new tube and patched at home, later.  Nowadays, when doing
long tours throughout the region, I still carry a tube, but haven't had
a need for it, so far.  Perhaps I have better chances to avoid punctures
because I avoid so called "bicycle infrastructure", but perhaps the
tubeless tires plus sealant are just working.

I’d put that more down to tubeless which at least on Gravel bikes just
work, until it doesn’t at least but they are fairly rare event and even
then don’t tend to leave one stranded just with a squishy tyre that will
not seal! And requires topping up every few miles.

 

 
He showed me a crack at the base of the valve stem.   The
tube had died of old age!

 
As Andrew said,  perhaps not enough pressure.  That was my first
reaction, too.
 

Roger Merriman