Tired of Tires and Trying(!) Tubeless

Welcome to the laziest Uncle Dave instalment ever.  We’re going to take two actual technical questions, and then answer them poorly.  Hope you enjoy!

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Hey Uncle Dave –

Should I run tubeless? As far as I can tell, running tubeless gives you an almost imperceptibly better feel in the corners as well as flat protection from small holes, at the minimal expense of being a pain in the neck to install, the added maintenance of refreshing your sealant periodically, the mild discomfort of burping a tire when things go bad, a sudden loss of stability paired with an odd sound in g-outs, and the virtual guarantee that, if you refill your sealant, you will break something on the next ride that will require a full tire and tape removal, which can only be done outside because you’re going to get slimed.

I’m torn.
Please help.

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Dear Torn:

Let us take a minute to ponder how crappy tubeless technology is.  So many other vehicles use tubeless tires.  Do any of them require messy sealant?   An air pressure top up with every use?  Somewhat commonplace roadside disasters?  Competing standards?  This seems like a tremendously odd great leap forward in technology.  Watch this video and think about what we have to deal with.

I’ve been running a steady mix of tubeless and tubed over the last couple of years. Every time I hop on a tubeless set-up I think “Man. This is so nice. These wheels feel so light and awesome.” I will admit though, once or twice, I’ve received a bike, thought these thoughts, and then discovered that said wheels were hiding a tube when I eventually cracked them open. I’ve also held off on swapping out a really crappy rear tire because the tubeless set-up was great and I didn’t want to mess with it.

For what it’s worth, I don’t run tubeless on any of my personal bikes. My reasons are thus:

• I hate pumping up my tires each ride
• Dealing with sealant kind of sucks
• On the terrain I ride, with the proper tube and installation, I never flat
• I don’t run my air pressure super low
• I’ve been lucky enough to have a steady stream of test bikes lately, so my personal bikes haven’t seen a lot of mileage and it hardly seems worth the effort

I can see both sides of this argument. Depending on how and what you ride, Neither decision is wrong. I’d say give it a shot and see what you think. Or don’t.

Sorry,
Dave

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Dear Uncle Dave,

With the great technological leaps in tyres, rims and tubeless systems, why have we not improved the way we get the beads of tyres over rims? Any thoughts, ideas or tips on this for an amateur mechanic with bleeding knuckles and snapped tyre levers?

Cheers
Busted Up Knuckles

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Dear Buck:

It’s interesting that you feel this way.  I haven’t mounted up many tires with full DH casings lately, so I was under the impression that there had been an improvement over the last few years.

I don’t go to bike shops very often.  I can really only think of 4-5 instances in the last 10 years where I’ve had to go in to a shop.  I pride myself on being self-reliant with bicycle repairs.  Or, I just ignore the jobs I’m not interested in/incapable of doing myself.

I remember working a new bike build a few years ago and I could not get the tire to seat.  I worked and worked and worked it until it felt like my fingernails were going to come off.  It was a shameful moment, when I finally gave in and decided to walk in to the bike shop and ask them to mount it for me.  It didn’t take them very long.

What I’m saying is you might be asking the wrong guy.  But here’re a few tips anyhow.

• I’ve used soapy water to get difficult beads to seat.  Might be an option to get a nasty bead over a rim.  You’ll probably need some grippy gloves though, if you head in this direction. (Uncle Dick’s Bead Slip {no relation to uncle Dave} works really well also -Ed.)
• If you’re running a tube, inflate the tube to get it to seat properly.  Once it’s nicely tucked up into your tire, deflate it, almost completely.  You’d be surprised how even a tiny bit of air can make things a lot harder
• Once you have the tire nearly seated and are struggling with the last little bit, make the effort to push the bead that is already into the groove on your rim.  This little bit of slack can make all the difference

I’m sure the comments will have something to say about this.

Sorry,
Dave

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Ryders Thorn anitiFOG eyewear. " src="/media/original_images/ryders_antifog_1600_CW22Uok.jpgw1600" alt="ryders_antifog_1600" data-recalc-dims="1" />

Torn – your submission was this week’s letter of note. Or something. Regardless, you win a Ryders Thorn anitiFOG eyewear. 

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