TLR tyres are so tight ....help please

[gbs]

I have two newish wheelsets with TLR Pirelli 32mm tyres; one, Zero Racing, the other Cinturato. Between them I have ridden about 7,5000k without p*******ing in the last 18 months or so, Today I thought i would refresh my repair skills but found I could not take the tyres off the wheels. I accept that, at 83 years, I have lost some strength but I suspect that design has outstripped praticality. Tips, please. To clarify both wheelsets have tubes

 

[ktmbiker58]

Tubeless ready tyres tend to be tight on the rims as they need to seal sufficiently well to be inflated so it is often very difficult to push the bead away from the rim once they have been inflated and the bead seated, also some rims seem to have a very shallow well in the centre which makes it hard work to get the bead off the rim. It is just a matter of strength and good quality tyre levers!

 

[Ian H]

Tubes will make fitting tubeless tyres a lot more difficult. The thicker beads mean they don't drop into the well of the rim so easily.

 

[HLaB]

Set them up tubeless then you can use tyre levers with no tube to pinch. Failing that keep working round, even with my week fingers Ive never had a tyre which after a few rotations failed to go over the rim.

 

[Sharky]

I've been successful with some tight fitting tyres ...

Using three slender alloys tyre levers.
Working opposite to the valve, insert the first tyre lever, but not yet attempting to lever off.

Then insert the second tyre lever, no more than 1.5 ins apart, then insert the third, again, no more than 1.5 ins apart.

Then using hand and forearm, lever all three levers at the same time and hopefully the tyre comes off.

May work for you
Good luck

 

[Punkawallah]

Always good practice to keep up your ‘on the road’ repair skills. There is a proprietary tyre lever that claims to make removal easier - Tyre Glide or similar. I have no experience of it.
From the sound of it, if you want to use that tyre/wheel combination, it looks like you’ll just have to ‘hit the gym’ :-)