Flat Tyre, No Puncture?????
 

Evening all. In October I left my bike at my buddys house for one night, when I came to it the next morning the back tyre was flat. Filled it up and no problem what so ever.

Its had a service (inflation) mid december. Been out today, come home and just put bike away and again back tyre is flat. It may be a puncture but wouldnt my front wheel hit a nail/glass first and so be flat too?

Very odd indeed, any suggestions??

Cheers

Take the valve core out - check it out, then replace it. Pump the tyre up tp normal pressure then put some spit over the valve end and check its not leaking.

You can easily skip over a nail with your front wheel with it just falling right for your rear.

It's actually harder to puncture your tyres than you think.

Also, the front is a lot lighter meaning it could ride over something that the extra weight and pressure of the rear would force into the carcas.

Just one of those things. If the valve is ok , it's time to check your tube.

My BMW would sometimes let the air out between bead of tyre and the rim. For some odd reason it was more likely to do it on a cold night ?? In the end I fitted a a tube, which fixed it.

I think Tommy has got 'tubed' tyres on his bike, I would change the valve core and keep an eye on it, if anymore problems. don't mess around...............change the tube, you just know it will go flat again 'miles from home'! my tubeless tyres often let air if the bike is not used regularly, old aluminium rims on cars suffer a fair bit of leakage from where the Ali has pitted and no longer forms a perfect seal.

thanks everyone, useful info. gonna go grab a foot pump tomorrow morning from wilcos and have a gander at the valve.

just glad it happened when i was at home and not sat on top of the peaks, still snowy up there!

Tyre slime
 

Has anyone out there used this stuff [see title] I never have and just wondered what is the general consensus . I can see the obvious advantage avoiding being stranded with a puncture but what are the negatives if any.

Years ago I used in a Bonneville a green liquid called 'OKO', you put in before you had a puncture, don't think you can buy it now but there is a similar product called 'gloop'. Well. the 'OKO' worked fine for me after I removed a nail from the rear tyre. I have only ever known 1 person have success with 'finelec', the foam you squirt in after you've got the flat.

The classic scenario for car tire punctures is that the front tire pops the screw or nail upright and the rear tire gets punctured. Since screws and nails and other debris tend to get washed downhill, they collect along the road edges (depending on which way the road is crowned, but typically mainly on the right in right-hand-drive countries). Thus, the most common puncture is the right rear tire.

I assume the same is true of motorcycles, but I'm prepared to be wrong about this. I've had one front and one rear puncture in the last 70,000 miles, but my rear now has a slow leak which I'll have to address pretty quick. Just another data point.

Mark

(from Sierra de la Ventana, Argentina, where the rain has been relentless)

Gloop and Slim
 

I ve seen these products in different bike shops, but not sure what sort of mess you can expect when changing a tyre , dont want to ruin my rim if you know what I mean. I think Ted Simon used the stuff on his second RTW trip

Slime, gloop, ultraseal, etc etc...

I use it, even in tubes... Works well ! Never had a puncture since I started using it.

Can't say if its the sealant or just luck but I wouldnt hesitate to use it.

Only downside is, you have to clean the tube A LOT before a patch will stick to it after it's been "glooped" and a tyre yard probably wont plug a tyre which has been treated.

I think it's more that they dont want to as it's more work and they don't understand it.

Gloopy
 

Thanks Ted gonna give a try. But Im not going to go looking for punctures to test it. I guess the puncture will find me when it good and ready. Cheers.

Well I stand corrected, it is a puncture. Bikes all blocked up as me and the tire make tracks to local mechanics to get the beading broken.

its been a 'fun' afternoon :rofl:

Last summer I had about 18 flat tyres on a journey. Most of these not punctures but just tyres that went flat while riding (including 7 times on one wheel on the Road of Bones). Each time we removed tube, test inflated in water, changed valve and reassembled having found nothing. It stayed up for between 2 to 6 hours riding (all on dirt) and quickly went down again.

I put a spare tube in at one point but the same happened a few times again!

We never solved the mystery.

We broke the beads very easily by using the side stand of the other bike.
In fact we got very efficient at it all!!

Wow Tony thats really bizzare??:confused2:

All sorted now, the bloke had a machine that dd the job. He then fixed the puncture for me so alls well that ends well as my granddad used to say :thumbup1:

That Slime/OKO/Gloop is good stuff, and doesn't damage the wheels.

I first used some back in the late 70's on me old Escort MKI GT1300. it had a nail in the tyre. I took the valve core out, filled with OKO (as it was then) and refitted the valve. I spun the wheel - took the nail out & pumped it up. SIMPLES. Lasted until I sold the car a few months later (a few 1000 miles).

I'd use it in my tyres if I was off on a trip - use to do all me bikes, but can't be arsed now. Its also claimed to help balance the wheels too?

So IMHO - 9/10 good stuff !

I hope I'm not next in line. My rear dropped from normal ripio pressure (about 20) to near zero very abruptly the other day, just as it started to rain. I pumped it up to 35, rode for a while, checked it again: still 35. I finished out my day, forgot to check it because my clutch cable snapped in the hotel parking lot (in the rain). Checked again in the morning after changing my clutch cable: 5 lbs down. Pumped it up. Rode for two more days without losing a single molecule of air.

I'd like to assume it's the valve core, since not only can I check for leakage easily but I'm carrying some spares. What I don't want is to ride the next umpteen thousand miles subject to this little nagging voice which says, "Don't forget that your tire could go flat at any moment, hurling you under that truck you're passing." I like concrete answers, not mysteries.

Mark

(from Villa Gesell Argentina, where all the college students have kindly vanished until next summer)

Slime works well until you get something stuck in the tyre. I had a flat in France about 2005-ish. It was my first overnight trip with the Bonneville and pillion so I'd stripped the toolkit down to the minimum. The Slime sealed each hole until the nail found the seam in the tube. Then it made a V-cut which was too big. I was was lucky it was France, centre of town on a weekday, a scooter place had us moving again in an hour. The last bike puncture I had fixed in the UK took three days :thumbdown:. Needless to say I now carry levers, tubes and a G-clamp. The sidestand trick works well BTW.

The best prevention for punctures IMHO is a proper mudguard. Add a cut out section of oil bottle or conveyor rubber to extend your "fashion" mudguards and the front wheel will cease setting the rear up for punctures. Keeps crud off the exhaust and engine too.

Andy

You will of had a puncture. The trick is to really over inflate the tube (until it's like a tractor tyre lol). At low pressures, you cant always find the hole and bubbles. Over inflating the tube then squeezing it as you hold in under water will show you the tiny bubbles. If a hole is that small, the properties of the butyl will close it up until you put it under the strain and pressure of the bikes weight.

Another common mistake is not holding it under water long enough to really look properly.

Ted, if the weight of the bike causes a pinhole leak to open up, why would I not lose any air at all in two days riding, then wake up this morning to find a perfectly flat tire?

I guess I´m in for some detective work after all. Sigh.

Mark

(Just a day´s ride from the famous Javier of Dakar Motors, Buenos Aires)

Hmmmm ! I cant answer that one.

Ask Javier for a new tube and be done with it..

Make sure you tell him Ted says hi and say that I promised you a discount ;)

I wish I was sitting back in Dakar motos right now. Listening to the parilla crackle with a cold beer in my hand ! ahhhhhhhhhhhhh happy days !

I recently went through this in Mexico a few weeks ago. Took my front tire apart 7 times in one day, along with two trips to the vulcanizadora, only to roll into my final destination with a flat tire, go figure. Add to that i was using a super heavy duty tube. These things are near impossible to work with! Never again, my knuckles are still scarred! Roadside repairs can be tough, especially trying to find the bloody leak in the first place. Even inflating a tube on the roadside to twice it's size is only a fraction of the PSI it will receive inside the tire, but it does give the hole an opportunity to open up. A patch that i applied around a month ago finally failed on me while entering Mexico City last week, right across from a vulcanizadora. I should of bought a lottery ticket. Mark, go buy new tubes and put your mind at ease. Some mysteries are not worth solving IMHO.

@dave
yeah I tried but tyre is pretty big so had problems, plus im a skinny lad so all i did was bounce of whe I jumped on the tire. looking at the machine the bloke used i would be inclined to use a spade next time, so even though i didnt repair the puncture for myslef which would have been useful, i know what to try next time, plus i can get my back tire off easy.

If the wheel rim is dented (even slightly) it can cause a slow puncture, on cast wheels with tubless tyres.

I was less than 20 miles from Dakar Motors when my tire (which held air perfectly for 200+ miles of riding) went flat at a gasolinera. I pumped it up. It was flat within minutes. I pumped it up, but suddenly my little pump couldn't keep up with the air leaking out. I took off the wheel and took it to a tire place, since that seemed easier than doing it myself by the roadside. By the time I got it back on the bike and messed around with unrelated stuff it was long since dark. I got lost. Found a hotel, which was full. Gathered from various people that the next nearest hotel was likely a llllooooonnnnngggg way away. Got lost again. Rode various toll roads in the dark until I started to develop the suspicion I was headed back the way I came. Found a hotel, after following faulty (but very specific) instructions from three or four different people. Finally flagged down a pizza delivery guy, who gave flawless directions to a quaint little four star place. It costs a mint, but I've got a place to sleep and from which to resume my journey to Dakar Motors tomorrow.

Motto of the story? Well, there must be many. For one, I no longer give a shit about solving any mysteries. There was a half cm gash in my tube, of unknown origin. Who cares why it leaked only occasionally for a solid week, then gave out completely? Wny am I carrying a spare tube if I'm too lazy to use it even on bright, sunny, warm afternoons?

Something about penny wise and pound foolish. I'm for bed.

Mark

(from somewhere within a half-hour's blind wandering in the dark from Dakar Motors, Buenos Aires)

I had a tyre that displayed similar symptoms.It would hold air for weeks and then it would deflate slowly for a few times,then remain inflated followed by a spate of deflation .
It was caused by an extremely small pebble,stuck in the inside of the tyre .Sometimes the tube would seal ,sometimes not .
I suspect that it depended on the position of the wheel when the vehicle was parked.

My old Trumpet has a DR650 rear end (which I fitted) and the tyre was old & hard - so I decided to replace it! After a good hour or more in the garage I gave up and got my tyre fitter mate to do it for me. I'd use a large vice, a chissel & lump hammer and a lot of f**k, sh*t & b****s!
He has a mobile tyre business & arrived in his van.
It took him a good 10 mins - and he had to keep running his on-board compressor to eventually get the tyre free from the rim!
He said it was one of the most stubbon he had come against - and the tyre date code said it was 1989 !!!! So may well have been on for 20yrs! The tyre bead had welded itself to the alloy rim....

Id of just cut the tyre off by then :)

Ted, the wire bead part was stuck to the rim - so I couldn't get at it to cut it off without damaging the rim!!!!