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Alex Asigno
Alex Asigno

By Alex Asigno •

Punctures And Repairs

It's the breakdown we all dread but it's as inevitable as the rain that always follows hours of cleaning and polishing! Thankfully, these days we don't see so many of those front wheel, high speed blow outs of yesteryear but anything that inflates is liable to be punctured and the problem of sudden deflation is still with us. Tubed tyres are straightforward. As long as the tyre itself is not badly damaged it can usually be repaired and all you do then is replace the tube (do not repair a tube - it is never worth it!). Remember repairing the tyre is just as important as replacing the tube. Imagine the water and muck that can be forced through the hole and start acting between the tube and the tyre itself and you'll get part of the reason. When repairing tubeless tyres there are certain requirements. Most experts will always use a 'mushroom' repair to completely fill the hole and very few are happy to simply apply a patch to the inside. The reason they will give you comes from the danger of a patch getting 'lifted' by water forced through the unfilled hole on the body of the tyre. NB Some punctures simply cannot be repaired. Side wall punctures and those where structural damage to the tyre has occurred are two examples. Radial Tyres It may seem a bit excessive but if you get a puncture in a radial the advice will almost always be to 'write off' the tyre. Radial tyres are built with a continuous belt around them below the rubber. If the belt is damaged the tyre could distort under extreme use (as you get with a modern Superbike) and the puncture could re-develop with disastrous consequences. Chris and Peter will simply refuse to repair a tyre if there is the slightest danger of this occurring. Foreign Objects If you find a nail or screw sticking out of your tyre the advice is: leave it there! Take off the wheel and get down to the tyre shop (or call a mobile fitter). You never know, the tyre may be capable of being saved. Puncture Proofing
There are substances on the market that you put into your tyres and just forget about punctures altogether. Some of these products are wonderful, some are not. The best thing to do is get expert advice before adding anything that can effect your tyres in any way at all.
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