Originally Posted by
uoficowboy
Was about to start a thread - but I'm hijacking this one instead! Can you patch a tube where the valve seems to have broken away from the tube a bit? My valve (a presta) looks like it had about a quarter sized chunk of rubber on it. That was then attached somehow to the rest of my tube. That attachment failed overnight, leaving me with one completely flat tube. What do you all think? Patchable?
On a side note - it's an XLC tube and has maybe 100 miles on it. I think I may be avoiding that brand in the future.
from above
Originally Posted by
FBinNY
Unfortunately, most of my flats are cased by poor bonding or corrosion where the valve is joined to the tube, and so both unnecessary and unrepairable.
i have been lucky in this respect
but have also heard many people report this same failure
sadly most of the brand names printed on the tube boxes
are al printed at the same giant factories that make identical tubes for multiple companies
so while you might find another brand of tube that is less prone to this sort of breakage
it might only be a matter of time before they change suppliers and use the same tubes as your xlcs
the other failure than can occur at the valve
is when the stem is worked back and forth by rough handling
during pumping
and the edge of the valve tears out of the rubber
but this can mostly be avoided by careful pumping
and avoiding using mini pumps except in emergencies
and using the little nut on presta valve stems