Face it, flats happen when mountain biking. These Texas trails are covered in thorns, sharp rock, cacti and plenty else that will go straight through your tire and puncture the tube.
Today I have a quick tip on a way to prevent most of these flat tires and keep you riding. Watch this video first, and then answer the following question.
Can your tire do this?
The product that seals the tire is Stans No Tubes which you can check out at www.notubes.com. Their kits fill your tires with puncture filling sealant. As the tire rotates it automatically fills any new holes or punctures with liquid which immediately seals and stops the loss of air. The installation process takes a while if done manually, but take your bike to a local shop and they will be happy to install it for you. It is one of my most highly recommended upgrades to make and will definitely decrease the amount of flats you have.
An additional benefit of using this product is that you can fill your tires with a lower tire pressure. For trails with plenty of climbing or loose conditions like sand and gravel this is great. The lower tire pressure gives your tire more surface area to grip onto the soil and rock giving you more traction.
A Stan’s No Tubes kit is available at most local bicycle shops for a cost of roughly $60-$70.
Here is a video showing you how to install the Stan’s No Tubes kit.
Here is a step by step guide to installing the Stan’s No Tubes kit. http://www.notubes.com/detailed_kit_instruction.aspx
Do you use a tubeless tire system? What are your thoughts on it?
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{ 4 comments… read them below or add one }
Other than cost and the difficulties Vanjr mentioned, are there any other downsides to tubeless?
Great question. Sometimes it can require a specific rim or tires, but for the most part any rim or tire can be adapted to a tubeless system. I suppose a potential downside is that your tire could do what is called a “burp” on you and you would end up losing a lot of your air. But a burp happens pretty seldom and is honestly a lot better than getting a hole in a tube. The tire and rim will usually seal up again pretty quickly after a burp.
I really can’t say that cost is a big detractor because you will definitely save the amount invested when you don’t have to buy new tubes all the time.
I tried this for my cyclocross bike and simply could not get it to work. Could not get my LBS to do it either-problems-either I could not get my tire on the rim or if I ever did, I could not get it to seal. I now others use it and maybe its better for larger tires, but I really tried and could not do it.
I have only ever tried and used the kits made for mountain bikes. However, they have come out with kits specific to both road bikes and cyclocross. Here is a link to the cyclocross product, http://www.notubes.com/Cyclocross-Kit-P100.aspx. I have had several people tell me that they had to use an air compressor to get tighter fitting tires to seal, perhaps that would also help. I hope you are able to get it working!