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Old 03-29-24, 09:20 AM
  #26  
cyccommute 
Mad bike riding scientist
 
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Join Date: Nov 2004
Location: Denver, CO
Posts: 27,466

Bikes: Some silver ones, a red one, a black and orange one, and a few titanium ones

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I have tried the RideNow tubes in the last 6 months and haven’t been impressed. I’ve punctured 2 tubes after installing them in an older tire that was using a butyl tube without issues. Upon very close inspection of the tire, I found extremely short (and difficult to find) burrs in the tire that punctured the much thinner polyurethane. I repaired both with stick on patches provided by RideNow and neither would hold air for more than about an hour. I removed the patches and reinstalled them thinking that I had done something wrong but the reapplied patch didn’t hold either. I flatted 4 times in rapid succession with these tubes. A change in tire helped although the old tire was not worn out.

I did get one of the Tubolito patch kits which worked better but are far more involved than butyl tube patches. They have to cure under clamping for at least 30 minutes which means that they are not suitable for on-road repair. I’ve also flatted a few times since then on extremely small punctures. I’m not sure how these are going to work when goathead season really gets going.

One other caveat I learned the hard way: get tubes that closely match the size of your tire. I put a 23-28mm TPU tube in a 35mm tire and the tube flatted on the interior edge because the tube stretched too far. TPU is not stretchy at all. It will not expand to fill the space if you use a too small tube on a too wide tire.
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Plan Epsilon Around Lake Michigan in the era of Covid
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Dinosaurs in Colorado A mountain bike guide to the Purgatory Canyon dinosaur trackway
Solo Without Pie. The search for pie in the Midwest.
Picking the Scablands. Washington and Oregon, 2005. Pie and spiders on the Columbia River!



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