Tyre repairs

G'day Keith

I haven't tried it but I believe some punters have success with a ratchet tie-down strap around the circumference in the middle of the tread. Adequately soap up the beads for both lubrication and helping with the seal, then squeeze the beads out against the rim by compressing the centre of the tyre with the ratchet strap.

Apparently it works ?????????

As for the old pressure can explosion trick ......... looks a tad dodgy to me.

If all else fails, why not carry a spare inner tube?

G'day Keith,
A tightened tiedown strap around the circumference of the tyre certainly can help seat the bead.
A receiver tank that you can pressurize with your pump will give you a needed boost of air to seat the bead. Also remove the tyre valve to allow a high volume of air to get into the tyre quickly then once the bead has seated disconnect the pump & replace the valve then reinflate the tyre.

Cheers
Stu

Keith,

I never had any success using straps on 265.75R16 tyres onto 8" rims. The tread flexes too much and doesn't spread the sidewalls enough. Ended up buying an air cannon, bead fitted in seconds. But they're a bit heavy for off road/travelling.

If tyre has just rolled off the rim, then it can be fitted with plenty of lube, and constant flow of air, or dump the air out of a small tank, as mentioned above. Mick O has some "instructional" videos of using gas to pop the bead, not fraught with danger, but no doubt practice required.

Get a tubeless repair kit, if you haven't already. I've used them in situ, at 8 o'clock at night, and even repaired a staked grader tyre, requiring 4 or 5 strings. Got mine from ARB.

Bob.

I've done a LOT of tyre's over the years & I've never had a lot of luck with straps either, it does work occasionally (rarely).

I don't have an air cannon, though I'd love one, what I do to reseat the bead is to make sure that the rim is clean & dry, apply a moderate amount of tyre wax ( soap slurry will do) to the large flat area of the inner rim, as well as the tyre beads.

I will then try to knock the inner bead on using a rubber (dead blow) hammer, then with unrestricted air flow into the tyre using a open valve stem fitting, gently push the rim center until the outer bead seats (pops).

Remove the air fitting refit the valve & re-inflate to the correct pressure.

If this doesn't work then a very small amount of accelerant & a flame has been known to work...

Hi
Re straps they work well on bias tyres as the tread will compress in, this will result in the sidewall spreading out to help inflate.

On steel radial tyres the steel will not compress in, it will only buckle down and not spread the sidewalls.

All latest radials are now steel tread reinforced.

Cheers
Charlie

Here are a few videos from my travels. There is the usual disclaimer about risk attached.

Reseating a tyre using Butane Gas


Vimeo videos

Youtube Channel

Thanks everyone - some enlightening information.
Think I will try to source appropriate tubes or stick with the splits.
Thanks again.

Keith,
The good news is that flat tyres are a lot less common on tubeless. You will no longer have flats from tube fatigue or splits or dirt or stickers on the rubbish tubes they supply these days.

If you get a flat tyre in the bush, the first thing to do is to hook up the compressor, reinflate the tyre and find the source (a spray bottle with soapy water can help). Then the first line repair is to use a plug. Plugs take a little practice and can fail if you don't do them properly or of the hole is too big or there is dirt, stone or wood still in there. You must remove every skerrick of material in the hole, then define the direction of the hole with the pointer, so you can push the plug in the right direction. I use rubber glue to lube the plugs. Insertion is pretty simple - load the plug onto the tool, plenty of glue in the hole and over the plug - push it in the hole until it the tip of the tool is inside the tyre, slight rotation and pull the tool out. Most sidewall stakes and simple tread punctures repair easily with this. I never have had success with stones penetrating the tread. Reinflate to road pressure, spray the area with the spray bottle, check for leaks - if still leaking put in a 2nd or 3rd plug. If that doesn't work, I'd patch it from the inside.

To apply a patch you need to break both beads, but only lever the outside bead off the rim. (If you remove the tyre totally, you are more likely to distort the beads). A bit of soapy lube helps lever it off with little or no distortion to the bead. Also pay attention to the other side of the tyre - make sure the opposite side of the outside bead drops into the "well" of the rim. Access the inside of the tyre and roughen up around the hole with a round wheel on a drill (or coarse sandpaper or a tool).Glue a patch on in the usual manner. I find it hard to insert mushroom plugs, so still use patches. Lube the bead and edge of rim when levering the tyre back on, so it goes a bit easier.

Buy yourself a decent pump - those 150L/min pumps pump brilliantly and will only set you back around $150-200. They pull 45 amps, so you'll need them well installed or run off clips on the battery. Lube around both beads, run the pump and hold the tyre vertically in a way that assists the beads to seal. A fat tyre on a skinny rim will always reinflate - a skinny tyre on a fat rim will be a dog to reinflate. (So a 265 tyre is easy on a 7" rim and hard on an 8" rim).

Extra tricks - I've never seen a strap or rope work on a radial tyre - it's something I used on crossply tyres 30 years ago. A 16" bike tube can help around a bead, so I used to carry one, but rarely needed it so no longer bother. I personally have never needed to and wouldn't use the butane party trick out in the middle of the desert.

If the good pump was unsuccessful, I use my spare tyre (or any other tyre) as an air tank - inflate it to 65-80psi and run a simple pressure hose between the tyres - the valve cores will need to be removed for this to work and the tyre chucks have to work without valve cores present.