zonatandem

Had a blowout on our Zona tandem this weekend.
Pffffft! . . . and instantaneously had the front rim to the pavement. Either sharp stone/glass or some other debris caused the mishap.
About a quarter inch cut into the tire and coming thru in the casing. Searched my fix-it stuff and used a Band Aid to line the inside of the cut-up tire. Put in our spare tube, pumped it up and we were on the way!
Band Aid? Why not . . . beats having to reach into the wallet and using a folded 5 dollar bill!
Pedal on!
Rudy and Kay/zonatandem

reburns

Did you apply some Neosporin first?

gracehowler

Cheap!
R&J

zonatandem

Saved the Neosporin for road rash, not tire 'rash'!
Rode 20 miles this morning and tire held up great.

jnbrown

I prefer a $1 bill over $5, but I think used a $10 once.

zonatandem

jmbrown:

Agree on the $1 bill, but did not have one of them in the wallet! With inflation, it costs more than that to buy a tire boot. So the BandAid did the trick!
Rudy/zonatandem

Alcanbrad

I make my own boots by cutting a short length (~ 1.25 inches/3 cm) of an old tire and cutting the bead off of each side. I tuck a couple in the saddlebag or trunk. They are naturally curved so they fit nicely in the tire over the hole and they are free. (Though it is kind of cool when you pull that dollar bill out and it has 4 holes worn through it).

prathmann

Used a $10 once and forgot about it until I eventually got another flat. By then it had disintegrated into about 30 pieces. Gathered them all up and when I got home I put down a wide piece of Scotch tape on the kitchen table and worked on the jigsaw puzzle of putting the bill back together again. The store clerk looked at me a bit funny but agreed that it did still meet the standards of legal currency.

jimmuller 

Better on the tire than on you.

zonatandem

Have also used a candy wrapper, old piece of tire, piece of Tyvek . . . anything that'll bridge the gap/cut in the tire.
Necessity is the mother of invention!

jimmuller 

Ooh, Tyvek! The ubiquitous house covering.

I once used part of the box holding a spare tube. Worked very nicely, let me get to work and back home again.

chris ss

I keep pieces of a milk jug or soda bottle cut to size in the seat pack - light, tough, curved, thin, free.

CliffordK

I put about 1000 miles on half a Park Boot (the full boot made the tire thump).... then a week ago the boot cut through my tube
So, I've now covered the Park Boot with electrical tape.. and we'll see if it does any better. But, I'll probably remove the tire for the summer and keep it as a winter tire... so it may be another year before I'll know if it is still working.

79pmooney

Who cares what the bill is. They are completely reuseable. I have never had one turned down that got me home. But I don't keep riding on those bills! (I often use more than one bill for large cuts, one lengthwise and one or more crosswise, even going under the bead if the cut is big enough. I like to have 5 bills at least in my wallet. If I leave home with just say a $1 and a $20, I'll stop for an espresso going out and pay for it with the $20.

For permanent tire boots, I glue in dacron sailcloth with contractor grade contact cement. Unless the cut is so large I cannot stop the bulge, these repairs last the life of the tire and go hundreds of miles in any case.

Ben

rlp

I usually keep one of my two spare tubes in the box for just this reason.

Wilfred Laurier

Last time I had a cut in my tire I used a strip of adhesive backed Velcro that I forgot in my handlebar bag after some project I was doing. The tire was very worn by that point but had it not been I would have had no problem continuing riding on that tire.

jfarwell

We used the dollar bill trick once, 85 miles into a rainy 100 miler on the Bon Ton Roulet in New York state. Quickly extracted the bill from the tire at the end and exchanged it for a cold beer form the cooler.

Also once used dental floss to sew up a slash (back at home) put some duct tape on the inside and put the tire back on the rim. Really dislike throwing out a tire before its time.