Right at the bottom of a 2 mile screaming fast descent (40mph is screaming fast for me) I get to a traffic light and make a slow U-turn to wait for my wife…as I do so the front wheel skids out and I nearly go down. I put that down to jello legs. As she comes down I make another U-turn to come alongside her…front wheel skids out again. WTF???
Turns out the front tire was at about 50 psi and quickly deflating. I got it off and discovered the valve was busted, one touch and the pin disappeared inside the tube and the thing fully deflated. If that had happened on the descent I think I’d be typing this from the afterlife.
I think I must have damaged it when I was inflating the tires with my floorpump before the ride.
Out of curiosity…does this happen often? and what is the standard lifespan of tires and tubes? I have about 1200 miles on these and I did notice a small hole in the tire too.
Yeah, flats happen, get over it --condider yourself lucky, and I suppose you’ve never mountain biked then because flats happen much more often.
Sometimes if you pull the pump head off the tire valve too quickly you can damage the valve core (plunger in the middle). 1200 miles on a tube pretty long, not unheard of, but very long.
Damn, I wish I only flatted once every 1200 miles. It is actually pretty easy to damage a tube with a pump. FWIW, I’ve had a bunch of flats while riding above 40, both on the front and back just not at the same time. It ain’t fun, but usually you can stop safely.
Flat tires are like a curse. Once you’ve had one they will happen again and again, with greater frequency and intensity. Eventually, if you aren’t careful, they will happen even before you get on your bike.
Lucky for you, I have a cure. Just mail me a check or or money order and I’ll send you my award winning book entitled “Fix a flat a minute.” It spent six weeks on the NY Times Best seller list and the movie is coming out next year.
I had two flats within 2 miles from my house Saturday. On my mountain bike. Ride down the driveway, and can tell the rears low on air, turn around and pump it up. Head back out, make it a half a mile and it’s totally flat. Since I’m close to home, I walk it back. I had a tiny wire like piece stuck in the tire casing that caused 2 flats a few weeks ago before I figured it out. So fearing more of the same, I put on a different tire, and a new tube and head back out. About 3 miles from home, on a 40 MPH downhill in the Cuyahoga river valley, I can tell its going flat again. I get stopped, have the tire and tube off the rim, checking things out, and the second car that drives by is an F150. Guy stops and asks if I need a ride. Very pleasant suprise. I accept, get home, switch shoes and helmet and enjoy a nire ride on the road instead of the MTB ride I had planned.
First flat was a bad tube, torn at the stem. 2nd took a while to figure out. Rim strip was not mounted quite right. Didn’t completely cover one of the spoke holes, just looking I couldn’t see it, but if I touched the rim strip, I could tell it was lose enough for the tube to expand into the hole and cut.
I flatted again yesterday. Reliez Valley Road 33mph almost lost it, and the tire is toast too and I’m having the wheel checkedas well.
Note to construction contractors…if you are going to use those big f*#@king steel plates to cover trenches in the road, the least you can do is try to get them flush with the road surface. Just dropping them and leaving an inch of steel sticking up in the air is not safe for cyclists especially if you do it on fast downhill twisting roads.
I rode nearly 5000k on one set of tubes. Seriously. I had 1 flat over 5000k. Since then, I have had many flats, including one ride where I had three flats on the same stretch of road (bastard kids putting out nails I think).
*Note to construction contractors…if you are going to use those big f#@king steel plates to cover trenches in the road, the least you can do is try to get them flush with the road surface. Just dropping them and leaving an inch of steel sticking up in the air is not safe for cyclists especially if you do it on fast downhill twisting roads. **
I ***hate ***those effing things…man, good thing you didn’t do more serious damage to anything including yourself. Not much room to bail anywhere either on Reliez Valley—fun road but nowhere really to go if you get into trouble—or come across something suddenly and unexpectedly.
Last year I got three flats during one ride. I only had two spares. After the second flat and before I put in the final spare I ran my finger over everything and thought I got whatever was giving me a flat. I was wrong. I did not find the cause until later that night after I rode my bike with a flat front tire down some nasty hills to get home - I was 10 miles out. You have not experienced life and death until you have ridden a bike with a flat front tire down a hill.
I have gotten many flats. Sometimes I can change them quickly, other times not. On a road bike it is less frequent than on a MTB. Thank goodness for CO2 cartridges.
My suggestion which I don’t follow - if you have a really really important race coming up, and you have a lot of miles on your tires, then buy new tires, tubes (if clincher) and tape and replace everything. And change it yourself so that you figure out what it is that you’re doing.
--condider yourself lucky, and I suppose you’ve never mountain biked then because flats happen much more often.