I am convinced that those who use tire tubes, just enjoy getting flats and fixing them...

[MTVR]

Vehicle tires are tubeless and get flats all the time.

What kind of "vehicle" are you talking about? Skateboards? Airplanes? Be more specific.

I see bicyclists swapping out tires everywhere.

Again, I have no idea what you're trying to communicate- are you seeing cyclists swapping road tires for off-road tires? What does that have to do with anything that we're discussing here?

 

[MTVR]

The last [tubeless] tire I quantified had been rided about 3,000 miles of New Mexico dirt over about 6 months. It had 350 sealed thorns (vast majority goat heads)...

Yup...

 

[MTVR]

Because it works just fine as it it is had has for decades and I don't have to do anything, I get where I am going just fine

By your "logic", our expedition vehicles should all be covered wagons, pulled by livestock.

 

[MTVR]

You're right, one solution surely must fit all. Riding daily in Portland, OR, must be exactly like riding daily in the desert of western Colorado, eastern Utah, what with single digit humidity and triple digit summer and subzero winters. It's 10% relative humidity here at our house right now.

View attachment 584817

Both Stan's and Orange stop being fluid in a couple of months for me. I remove the tire and peel off sheets of dried sealant from inside the tire carcass a couple of times a year. Sometimes I'm not perfect and let them go longer than I should and inevitably they pick up a cactus needle (you have those in Portland, right?) or goat head and the sealant doesn't flow anymore.

Torn sidewalls? I dunno, a few maybe. Tires are too expensive to replace more than a couple of times a year. This tire is about a 6 month old Maxxis Ardent that split a couple of weeks ago enough to no longer be air tight despite being plenty of tread left. The rubber dries out and the threads start to expose. Stan's makes this worse so I usually use Orange Seal, which seems to be less harsh on tires. Got a new tire ready to go, just waiting on sealant to arrive so it's been running a tube for a couple of weeks.

View attachment 584816

It's just the nature of the beast.

Another, this on a set of wheels that have been just sitting in the garage for a year or so. The rubber on these is all brittle and cracking, they aren't useful anymore.

View attachment 584820


This is my super light Gunnar, the sidewall wax has already dried and threads starting to expose on a tire I put on this spring. It's even still got the new tire vent spews hairs on it.

View attachment 584819

Conti's are some of the worst about doing this but they all dry out fast and the sealant weeps through the threads and seals for a while until they leak air. I carry a tube in case they start leaking on the trail. The tire casing eventually splits and I can use a piece of duct tape then. I get an extra couple of months using tubes at the end of their useful life. It's rarely that the treads are worn, the carcass just wears out fast here.

View attachment 584827

Did your tire sealant come from Chernobyl? My tires wear out without falling apart like that.

Oh, and more pics of your Gunnar please. That's very cool.

I would love to have a steel bike made from an 853 tubeset (or something comparable), even.if it was not custom-built like your bike. I looked an the Niner SIR 9 and stuff like that, but ended up with something decidedly more blue collar- a 2020 Kona Unit.

 

[CampStewart]

By your "logic", our expedition vehicles should all be covered wagons, pulled by livestock.

No, by your "logic" everyone who doesn't follow your advice and think the same as you is wrong even if we are not having any issues with our current system. Covered wagons pulled by livestock didn't even have pneumatic tires during their heyday. I wouldn't argue that tubeless are not superior to tubes in most instances but I would not make a provocative statement as you did for your thread title or waste so much energy trying to defend it.

 

[MTVR]

Because it works just fine as it it is had has for decades and I don't have to do anything, I get where I am going just fine

People in covered wagons said the same thing...

 

[Regcabguy]

What kind of "vehicle" are you talking about? Skateboards? Airplanes? Be more specific.



Again, I have no idea what you're trying to communicate- are you seeing cyclists swapping road tires for off-road tires? What does that have to do with anything that we're discussing here?

By vehicles I mean engine driven cars,trucks with tubeless tires.
I misspoke on the bicycle tires.
Do Baja racers use a product such as Stan's in their racing tires? Not trying to be sarcastic,just curious.

 

[CampStewart]

People in covered wagons said the same thing...

Why did you reply to me twice, days apart with the covered wagon line, are you on drugs or something?

 

[MTVR]

By vehicles I mean engine driven cars,trucks with tubeless tires.
I misspoke on the bicycle tires.
Do Baja racers use a product such as Stan's in their racing tires? Not trying to be sarcastic,just curious.

Fair enough...

Passenger cars and light trucks don't use liquid sealant in their tubeless tires, so any puncture results in a flat.

I don't if Baja racers use Stans in their tires, but I do know that that the BF Goodrich Baja T/A is a racing tire (not street legal) that costs up to about $750 each, and is typically used on specially-designed beadlock racing wheels (also not street legal).

 

[calicamper]

Pull your valve core once every few months, position the stem at 6:00, and check the sealant level with a dipstick. If it's low, add more. Not checking your sealant level once every few months is not a tubeless system failure, that's an owner not doing mainenance failure.

If you tear a tire sidewall out, you're gonna need more than a tube to get you going again. How many tire sidewalls have you torn out? I never have.

And if you prang a rim while recreating some kind of Nitro Circus stunt on your expedition bicycle, keep in mind that the tire was BETWEEN the rim and whatever you hit, so the tire is probably done too, in which case a tube alone isn't going to do anything to get you going again. If you prang a rim to the point that your tubeless system won't seal and you somehow DIDN'T destroy the tire in the process, just pound it flat with a rock and go again. I personally have never pranged a rim that bad, even with custom-built flyweight cross-country race wheels, so I really don't worry about it.

If you're gonna carry a spare anything, just carry a spare tire, folded up in your bike bag.

A couple thats why I carry material plus a tube to cover a torn spot. Even used a dollar bill once in a pinch. Got me 15 miles home.

 

[robert]

I don't enjoy getting flats or fixing them but I do it when I have to and continue on my ride. It's not that hard if you grew up doing it and now that I'm older and a lot more busted up it's not like I can ride or race like I used to anyways.