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How to Repair a Cut Bicycle Tire for $1

06.08.2015 by Scott Jangro // 4 Comments

Flats happen.

And we’re all prepared for a flat with a spare tube, patch kit, CO2 cartridges or pump. Right?

But have you ever seen a tire split or get cut enough so that it doesn’t hold the tube? At 100 psi, a tire will push its way out of even a small cut in the tire and will burst. And if you’ve already used your spare tube (because your tire is cut and you just had a blowout) you’ll quickly blow the second one while inflating it.

I know. Because I’ve done it.

Here’s an important tip: when you get a flat, try your best to determine the cause. If you can, find the hole in the tube, and match it up with the tire. At least inspect the tire very well for something sharp (glass, wire, metal) poking through the tire. Slide your hand through the entire inside of the tire to feel for something sharp. Something caused the flat, and if you can’t figure it out, be very suspicious.

Types of Flats

There are many different types of flats:

  • Puncture: glass shard or metal wire
  • Pinch-flat: hitting a pot hole or rock. Sometimes called a snake-bite because the tube has two holes close together.
  • Tire damage: split tire or cut sidewall
  • Blowout from heat: Too much braking on a carbon rim can melt your tube or even the tire. (Or worse, warp your rim – ouch!)
  • Damaged valve: most likely caused when inflating, not riding.

Tire damage is the worst kind to get because we usually don’t carry spare tires around with us as they’re pretty bulky. Though you can get a folding tire into your pocket for longer rides.

How to temporarily patch up a cut or split tire

If you do get a split in your tire, there’s an easy fix that should get you home. Just take a dollar bill, fold it up, and insert it into the tire to cover up the cut. Get it in place between the tube and the tire and inflate.

If you don’t have a bill, a Gu wrapper, or some piece of strong flexible plastic will do the trick.

I always carry a dollar bill around in my saddle bag for this purpose.

This technique is called a “boot”. It is obviously not a permanent fix, but it’ll more than get you home or even to the end of your century ride.

Here’s a cut sidewall. You can see it between the two s’s in “Pressure”. And here’s the bill in place. (This is after we got home, we’re taking it apart at this point.)

Fold up the bill so that it fits into the full width of the tire. The tube will hold it in place.

Here’s the cut sidewall, fully inflated, kept intact with the five dollar bill.

Many things can go wrong with a bike when you’re out on the road, and most of them can be handled with just a little preparation, ingenuity, and out-of-the-box thinking.

Because there’s nothing like a two-hour round trip for your spouse to sour him or her to your favorite pastime.

We’ll cover more of these MacGuyver techniques in future posts.

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Categories // tires

The Unprepared Cyclist

04.19.2015 by Ray Niekamp // 7 Comments

What a day! Sunny, a nice breeze, and 84 degrees (29C). There was nothing to keep me off my bike, even at the expense of foregoing yard work, and putting off a chore I promised to do for my wife.

I wasn’t going to go too long — maybe 20-23 miles — something that would keep me out about an hour and half. I could tell I haven’t been riding as much as I should, but over the years, I’ve built a good base, so getting back into a rhythm wasn’t difficult.

A fellow from my cycling club caught up to me and passed me like I was standing still. But then I caught a group of unfamiliar riders, and went by them. I felt strong pushing up some small hills, and had fun reaching 35 mph going down a sweeping bend on an empty road in a new housing development.

About 13 miles in though, something wasn’t right. I had just gone through a 90-degree turn on a busy road, and was heading up another small hill, but my rear wheel felt unstable. Uh-oh — a flat!

I wasn’t comfortable changing it in the shoulder of a 65 mph highway, so I walked the bike about a quarter mile to a pulloff, and set about changing the tube. It turned out that the smallest possible shard of glass had punctured the tire and the tube. I picked it out of the tire, checked for any other debris inside the tread, yanked out the punctured tube, and got out a new one.

Some time ago, I stopped bringing my small pump on rides, deciding to stick with CO2 cartridges. I had some recently-purchased cartridges in my seat bag, but when I went to attach the inflator chuck to one, I made an unwelcome discovery. The cartridge was one of those unthreaded ones. I needed the threaded kind.

So there I was, at the side of the road, the bike upside down with the chain hanging forlornly, and doing the only thing I could think to do: Call my wife.

She was there in less than 10 minutes, and we headed home. I inflated the tube in a matter of minutes and got the tire back on the bike, but by then, it was too late. My cycling window for the day had closed.

I’ll be stopping by the bike store for a few new, threaded cartridges. And I think I’ll start carrying the mini-pump again. Sometimes, it’s not a bad thing to be a belt and suspenders kind of guy.

And you wonder why I still call this blog Bike Noob.

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Categories // tires Tags // flat tire, pump

Garage Flats

03.19.2014 by Ray Niekamp // 1 Comment

Boy, I was excited to get out for a rare weekday afternoon ride! I hadn’t been on the bike in several days, and my body was craving for some fresh air and exercise. 

I grabbed the bike and guided it between the garage wall and my car, out to the driveway where I was going to top off the tires with air. But something didn’t quite feel right.

I looked down at the rear tire. It was flat.

That was really odd, because the last time I had been out for a ride, everything was fine. I had no inkling that the tire had been punctured, or even that it was lower at the end of the ride than it was at the start. But there it was.

I took the wheel off the bike, and took it and my flat-fixing gear into the kitchen.

Finding the leak was a problem.  I finally had to submerge the tube in the kitchen sink to discover the telltale trail of bubbles that indicated a tiny hole in the tube.

I patched the tube and got it back on the bike. My afternoon ride had to be cut short — to around only 12 miles. Better than nothing, I suppose.

But if it hadn’t been for the “garage flat,” I could have gotten in something closer to a full hour.

I’m pretty sure the garage didn’t cause the flat. Something punched the tiny hole in the tube out there — on the road. But it was in the chilly air in the garage that the tire deflated, so the garage gets the blame.

I’m hoping that now that spring is just about here, garage flats will disappear until the cold weather returns.

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