Would you use a repaired tube?

[screenman]

Does anyone remember mending tubs? Picking off the sticky glue, trying to find the puncture, razor blade to cut open the thread, then patching and sewing it up again. What a pain.You had to repair them as they were so damn expensive.

Plenty of memories, Normally on cross tubs the night before a race.

 

[screenman]

New tube on the road (and usually a CO2 to inflate) - mend at home with good old patches and glue - I've found that the self-adhesive patches are very variable, with presumably a shelf life for the glue?

I don't tend to count how many patches but I guess at 4 or 5 I'd probably bin the tube.

Tip: When I mend punctures I clamp the repaired/patched section of the tube between two small bits of plywood in the jaws of a vice - tightened up and left for a couple of hours to really push the patch onto the tube.

Rob

I do the same vice thingy bit.

 

[Vantage]

Depend on if you use cycling for transport, I do not.

Semantics. Whether the bike is used for transport or not, it still has to go somewhere or it's furniture. Throwing away a perfectly good tube is still stupid.

 

[screenman]

Semantics. Whether the bike is used for transport or not, it still has to go somewhere or it's furniture. Throwing away a perfectly good tube is still stupid.

Your opinion, personally I would rather fit new and use the old one for something else. Both the tubes I have scrapped in the last 10 years or so have been put to other uses. At what age do tubes start to deteriorate?

 

[I like Skol]

Swap for new tube at roadside, patch at home and swap back again. That way I have confidence that my spare is always good, and I get maximum patchiness out of the one in use.

WRONG! Swap for a pre-repaired tube at the roadside then fix the punctured one later. There is no limit to the number of patches that can be safely applied to a tube. The end of life is reached when a catastrophic event occurs, the patches start to perish, the tube starts to perish or the valve stem begins to separate from the tube.

 

[screenman]

WRONG! Swap for a pre-repaired tube at the roadside then fix the punctured one later. There is no limit to the number of patches that can be safely applied to a tube. The end of life is reached when a catastrophic event occurs, the patches start to perish, the tube starts to perish or the valve stem begins to separate from the tube.

So you are dropping down at hill at 45mph and your years old multipatched tube decides to have a catastrophic failure.

 

[youngoldbloke]

Does anyone remember mending tubs? Picking off the sticky glue, trying to find the puncture, razor blade to cut open the thread, then patching and sewing it up again. What a pain.You had to repair them as they were so damn expensive.

Yes I remember. Cleaning off the glue residue with an evil solvent (the paint 'thinners' that my dad 'acquired' from work). Good sewing training for a teenage boy. As for using repaired tubes - why ever not?

 

[Vantage]

Done properly a patch can be just as strong if not stronger than the original tube.
Anything can fail if old enough but that isn't what the op asked about.
A thorn can also cause a 45mph downhill blast into a hospital/morgue trip. Why not just stay safe and keep below 20?

 

[I like Skol]

So you are dropping down at hill at 45mph and your years old multipatched tube decides to have a catastrophic failure.

By catastrophic I mean an encounter with a Stanley knife blade or ripping out a sidewall on a jagged rock (both are things that have happened to me). The tyre holds the pressure and the inner tube only has to be airtight. Inner tubes don't have catastrophic failures unless the tyre does. I am more fussy about tyre condition!
Poorly executed puncture repairs are another matter all together! You and I both know that there are some people who shouldn't be trying to patch inner tubes.

 

[screenman]

Done properly a patch can be just as strong if not stronger than the original tube.
Anything can fail if old enough but that isn't what the op asked about.
A thorn can also cause a 45mph downhill blast into a hospital/morgue trip. Why not just stay safe and keep below 20?

I agree a patch can be strong, but from my experience tubes deteriorate over time, which is why I change mine yearly and seldom have a visit from a certain fairy.

 

[mickle]

Do you people still get punctures?

 

[screenman]

Do you people still get punctures?

Only those with lots of patches.

 

[I like Skol]

I agree a patch can be strong, but from my experience tubes deteriorate over time, which is why I change mine yearly and seldom have a visit from a certain fairy.

I think we have duelled over this exact same point in the past! I hypothesize that existing puncture repairs do not increase the likely hood of further punctures but accept that a person who fixes punctured inner tubes is likely to run tyres that have more wear so might get more punctures as a result!
I myself will happily run my tyres until they are almost thread bare. I may experience slightly more punctures as a result but seeing as how an inner tube swap at the roadside is so quick and easy and the effort required to patch an inner tube is so miniscule (and costs pennies) I don't have a problem with this strategy.
I used to use Morrison's own feather edge puncture kits at £1 each but they seem to have stopped these so I now pop into Wilko's for their equivalent.

 

[screenman]

I think some people get pleasure out of saving as much money as possible, that it seems is not in my character makeup.

 

[I like Skol]

I think some people get pleasure out of saving as much money as possible, that it seems is not in my character makeup.

I don't know if that was aimed at me, but if so it is very wide of the mark! I use Morrison's/ Wilko repair kits because I haven't found anything better, regardless of price. I run my tyres for as long as they are serviceable, once they are worn out or start to get regular punctures then it is replacement time. I don't waste money but also don't have a problem with spending it. I recently replaced a set of almost new and hardly worn tyres because they were getting punctures about every 100 miles. This was unacceptable so I spent the cash to replace them (I got the expensive folding version too!).
Only a fool would spend money for nothing!