Bike pumps suffice for Moto tires?
 

Hi all,

Just wondering if I can just buy a cheap bike pump for middle of nowhere punctures? I purchased two tubes so I'll go the way of swapping the tubes on route and then repairing the puncture at nearest town professionally. I've been shown a few electrical pumps which hook up to the battery but they look kinda flimsy and I'd rather have something reliable even if it means a bit of work! Here in south America the options are limited but I can find basic pumps in most malls.

Cheers!

rtw

I carry a small compressor so I can change pressure with road condition. What about bomb cylinders? Tiny and reliable. Just carry about 6. That is plenty

A bicycle pump will do a motorcycle tyre. It will take a long time though. Often you need to put air into a tube quite quickly to find a puncture and you can't do with with a hand pump.

Cheap electric pumps are flimsy but they do seem to work well as long as you're very careful with them.

You can use small bicycle pumps but they are hard work - particularly on rear tyres and on a hot day. I must have half a dozen of them that I've bought over the years - they all work but just slowly.

Small electric pumps are the easy route if you're on a bike that'll power them but I have two bikes that won't - one with no battery and one that's 6v so the manual pumps are the only option. I've also had an electric pump sucumb to being shaken around so it didn't work when I needed it so these days I chuck one of the manual pumps in as well!

What I've tended to do with the hand pumps is just put enough air to get going and finish it off at a garage (or later on pump a bit more in when I've recovered from the first attempt).

For a hand pump, you want one with the largest diameter barrel you can get. One meant for fat tired mountain bikes, not skinny road tires. You only need to go to 40 psi or so on a motorcycle, so you want high volume, not high pressure. It really does make a big difference.

I find it much easier to use the pumps with the valve head on a hose, not part of the barrel of the pump.

If you want a manual pump, at least get a foot-powered one. To inflate a motorcycle tube to 30psi takes a lot of effort, and it goes easier on your leg than your arm.

Mountain morph pump will do the job. Reliable, small and high psi.

http://www.topeak.com/products/pumps/mountainmorph

Meant to say, you can order from wiggle.co.uk. I think they deliver worldwide. Alternatively, try chainreactioncycles.com

Great responses all! Many thanks!

Also, is there a gadget for checking PSI? Do those who use simple bike pumps just guesstimate and then check them later?

Time-tested advice, for what it's worth: carry two pumps, not one. Rely on the electric one, since it's fast and easy--when you've got a flat, usually just before dark, in driving rain, or on a busy highway where stopping means risking your life, the last thing you're going to want to do is hang around hand-pumping.

But carry a mountain bike pump as backup. Advice given above is good: a large barrel, a hose for connecting to the valve. I'd add that a cheap one is wasted money and will let you down, so buy quality. Ziptie it to your frame so that you won't be tempted to lend it out or remove it at inopportune times. Sooner or later your electric pump will die.

Note that sooner or later your hand pump will also die, particularly if left out in the weather year after year. Don't neglect this simple fact.

Little CO2 cartridges are fine as long as you carry enough of them. They're good for popping a bead back into place if you ever go tubeless. You'll be surprised at how many cartridges it takes to inflate a big back tire, and how much they cost. You'll then need to find new cartridges each time you get a flat. On a long trip you might get a lot of flats. You can do the math, but I'll say that it takes two to inflate my tubeless mountain bike tires, and my motorbike tires are a lot larger than that.

Hope that's helpful.

Mark

Absolutely in agreement. If you take an electric one take a good quality bicycle one as well. Only, remember you've taken it. I've tended to bury mine in the bottom of a pannier and last time I needed it it I couldn't find it. I ended up convincing myself I'd left it behind and only found it when I got home and unpacked.

All of this is for tubed tyres. Good luck trying to sort out a tubeless puncture with a bicycle pump

Or you could get a quality electric pump. I've got a 'cycle pump' cost £70. I've used it in anger all over the world for 8 years and its never let me down. It's had some seriously hard times too.. 15 punctures in Tanzania in one day. It was almost almost running.

However, one day it might fail so I carry three c02 cartridges just in case.

I might get a bicycle pump though. More reliable and the same weight as a few cartridges..

Tire tubes can be easily patched yourself. I like touratech's patch kit. Grant's video is a great tutorial.

We have a small compressor which is brilliant. Just needs a smack now n then;)

Well, it's been a few years, but the last HU meeting I went to in North Carolina, Grant demonstrated a CO2 deal that used much bigger, paintball cartridges. I believe one of those suckers would do a tire. You'll have to ask him who made it.

Bike pumps suffice for Moto tires?
 

Co2 cartridges? All this is news to me! I currently live in Chile though I'm originally from the UK. Are they widely available? I wish I'd considered all of this before I'd left but was too busy focusing on what bike to aim to buy and what stove, etc :)

Ps 14 punctures in a day!? I think after the fourth id have phoned my dad in tears to come and pick me up :D

Pps

I bought a couple of tire irons out here. They are around 7 inches long and pretty sturdy feeling. My bike is a stock Honda Tornado XR250. Do you guys think two will be enough?