Originally Posted by
Rdmonster69
Hello fellow bikers !!
I had a weird issue last fall with my rear tire developing a bubble where the tread apparently separated from the casing of the tire. The tire in question was (and is) a tubeless Bontrager R3 Hard Case Lite 700x32. Tires have not been over inflated and I typically run them at about 70 PSI. The rear did it at 300 miles or so.
Fast forward to Monday. I get to the turnaround of a 40 mile ride and notice a pretty prominent bubble on the front tire (same brand/type of tire). There were exactly 647 miles on the tire. The bike is locked in my car and it can get hot in there but I usually check pressure before rides and haven't seen anything amiss.
Even more odd and graphically shown in the pics is the wet spots that appear on these tires. In these pics they have not been through any water at all. My garage floor was bone dry when I carried the tire out for the pics. The got spots on them from day one. I have no clue what it is...like If the sealant is weeping through the rubber or something. It has never looked like anything other than clear water like is shown in the pic.
Either way my Dpmane is now running on Conti GP5k which are kick ass tires. Just wondering if Bontrager has made a bad batch of tires or what ? Has anyone ever seen anything similar ?
FWIW I never had a flat or any issue with the tires until the tread started bubbling up.
The wet spots are the fluid from sealant. It may be trying to seal a puncture or it may be just seeping out of the rubber.
The bubble is likely due to a delamination of the tread perhaps caused by the sealant leaking under the rubber tread. I’ve seen this long ago with mountain bike tires where the fluid caused an almost complete delamination of the tread. It could be a quality control issue with the way the tread was applied where the tread didn’t bond properly to the casing. You likely wouldn’t see the issue with just air (or when running a tube) but the fluid can fill the pocket and raise the tread.
Given the low mileage, you might go back to the retailer and see if it is a warrantee issue. Not sure it that will work but it’s worth a shot. Even if you have to just replace the tire, you should replace it. There is no fix for this problem.