Daft tyre question

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Dec66

A gentlemanly pootler, these days
Location
West Wickham
For a trip round the Pas de Calais and a bit of Flanders, 80 miles a day for four days... Spare tyre, or no spare tyre?

I'm doing my packing now and wondering if I should take a spare in case some calamity in the middle of nowhere shreds one of my tyres. I suspect the answer is "no", which would be nice...
 
OP
OP
Dec66

Dec66

A gentlemanly pootler, these days
Location
West Wickham
Spare tube maybe - but if you have a tyre failure there's plenty of cycle shops locally.
Yep, three spare tubes with CO2 inflators, cartridges and backup pump.

I'll leave the tyre behind :okay:
 

Pale Rider

Legendary Member
No need for a spare tyre assuming the bike has one of the popular sizes of wheel.

Mate of mine takes a spare tyre when he uses his Brompton on longer rides.
 

tyred

Legendary Member
Location
Ireland
I did once have a sidewall split for no apparent reason. It was only a few day tour but I couldn't a bike shop despite being in a well populated area of the north of Ireland.

An old crisp packet as a boot lasted for 80 miles. I then bought a roll of packing tape in a newsagent and re-inforced the trye. That did me for another 120 miles until I got home and access to my stash of spare tyres.

A little inventiveness will get you a long way. I'd say no to a spare tyre.
 
OP
OP
Dec66

Dec66

A gentlemanly pootler, these days
Location
West Wickham
Turns out my mate had some spare boots, so I have those in my wallet.

I did go to my local Halfords yesterday to get some, but their expert mechanic had never heard of them. Until a few minutes later, when (presumably having looked on t'interweb) he came back to me as the greatest expert in tyre boots, ever... To tell me they had none.
 
Regarding tyre Boots, I cut the top and bottom off of toothpaste tubes then cut them length wise, easy peezzy. Regarding carrying a spare tyre, I have cycled thousands of miles the length of Africa, and through South East Asia across Europe carrying a spare tyre, never used it. one day happily was cycling around the Gower, when Bang! sods law kicks in and tyre exploded big time and no spare, but saved by the toothpaste tube boot.
 

hoopdriver

Guru
Location
East Sussex
Most definitely check your tyres before you leave! The only time I have ever been caught out like that was when I had been riding around for ages on sturdy bombproof tyres and pretty much forgot all about them - until one afternoon when I was far from home and I had a flat and found that I'd worn a good sized hole right through them. And I had no boot handy with which to repair it. One of life's lessons learned the hard way.
 

andrew_s

Legendary Member
Location
Gloucester
I take a spare tyre occasionally, where I either expect resupply to be difficult (Tibet), or where I expect tyre wear rate to be higher than normal (cycle camping in the Alps).

I did use it once, but that was when I was trying to find the way into Nice airport and rode over something nasty because I was concentrating on road signs. "Something nasty" put a 2.5" cut in the front tyre (plus cut the rim tape and put a gouge in the rim), and put a 1.5" cut in the rear tyre. The spare tyre went on the front, and I cut a section out of the dead front tyre to boot the rear tyre.
Having the spare made the difference between riding home from Heathrow, and trying to find somewhere to get new tyres at about 10pm on a Saturday.
 

hoopdriver

Guru
Location
East Sussex
I took a spare with me on a very long expedition into some very remote parts of Australia. I never needed it, but the potentially catastrophic consequences of being stranded in the middle of a hot and lonely desert made it worthwhile carrying one. The odds for or against needing a spare should not be the only criteria; the consequences of being stuck without one should be taken into consideration too.
 
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