Still learning new stuff over age 70. I was helping my grandson replace his 24” mountain bike innertube and discovered he has a really long valve stem and none of my tubes will fit it. I’ve just never seen this before and found different types of valves for long stems so I’m not sure what tube to order. None of the replacement tubes at Walmart have long stems so I have to order it.

So, what should I be looking for?

Measuring the length of the old valve stem would be my approach.

Thanks, that's what we did and ordered one from Amazon, but I was confused by the type of valve. I've always only known the Schrader valve and then they through a couple more at me and I don't know if all air fill hoses work on all the types. Anyway, I bought one with a Schrader valve and hope it fits.

Hopefully your grandson's tube was a Schrader as well since "Presta" valves are smaller diameter and a rim with a hole drilled for Presta valves will usually not accept a larger Schrader valve. Some pumps have dual heads that accept both S and P valves but some only fit one of the two. Also if you have tubes with valves that are too short that you want to use you can get screw on extenders for both types. Schrader at any auto supply store and Presta at your bike shop.

Obviously the valve only needs to extend beyond the rim's inner surface enough to attach a pump chuck. Any longer is no problem though. As many new bikes are coming with "deeper" rims more and more tubes are being made with longer valve stems. Andy

If Presta and Schrader are the two common valve types for bicycles. You might want to double check what your grandson's is.

You don't want to drill out a presta rim to fit a Schrader. You might need to get another tube on the way or your grandson will be stuck in the house when you might want some time for yourself.

I ‘m afraid of that. I’ve never seen "Presta" valves, but the one thing that’s suspicious to me is that my grandson said that he was trying to fill the tire and couldn’t get any air in it so my daughter bought him a new tube which was too short. I know the air pump was for a Schrader valve and I was unaware that there were different types so I didn’t look at the original tube to see why it wouldn’t fill.

I wonder if he was using the wrong pump and the air was just coming out instead and he thought it had a hole in it. I did examine the tire for any holes or stickers and couldn’t see anything obvious to cause a flat. My daughter said she thought the tube seam had split, but I didn’t see anything like that. I don’t live near them so I was just going to fix it at home and take a trip back out there.

Anyway the new tube hasn't arrived yet so I'll guess I'll find out

Presta vs Schrader

Schrader adapter to use Presta fill valve.


Remember, you need to open a Presta valve by unscrewing the tip.

All right, Thank you so much! I sent this photo to my daughter and she said it was a Schrader so I'm in the clear, Thanks again.

If it is a Schrader, remove the valve core and check it, especially if the tube had slime in it. We have replaced quite a few cores later for being "clogged" as they were not fillable.

Good advice as the sealant is stupid. It sees the valve as a big hole to clog in We see clogged valves with old sealant filled tubes regularly. Andy

I just received the new tube and got it pumped up. It is just a regular Schrader Valve that's long.

So now I'm going to check out the extension so the other tube my daughter bought can be used as a spare. My grandson lives in a really nice place with paved bike paths everywhere so I don't know how he got a flat so soon after receiving it for Christmas.

Nowadays it is not easy to shop for inner tubes for the oldfashioned bike from 1970s, with 'normal' rims. Shops seem to carry only long presta valve tubes of the two kinds, for deep and mid deep rims, but even the shorter one sticks out like a sore thumb on my bike with those old shallow rims.

Are there deep rims for Schrader type valves?

I haven't seen any. Someone could drill it out to fit a Schrader, but then you'd be stuck using long Schrader's forever or using a Presta valve saver. I've had mixed luck doing that as they seemed to wear a hole near the valve. YMMV.

And finding long Schrader valves is problematic, as you found out.

Most definitely, especially in the 700 tire type rims

I thought Schrader valve is a dinosaur surviving today only on those run-of-the-mill family bicycles and basically is on the way to extinction, I mean on the bicycle scene, automobiles (still?) use it and probably will use it in the future too.

The Schwalbe schrader valve inner tubes that I buy are labeled AV for "auto valve". My valve stems are 40mm long. I like them because they make it easy to fit a hand pump chuck over them with my semi deep section rims. Hostel Shoppe in Stevens Point, Wisconsin has them.

I've never heard of that and I just pulled the box out of the trash that had the correct tube from Amazon and there is not one word of English on the box so I have know ideal what it says. I've bought a lot of tubes in the last 10 years for neighborhood kids and never came across this before.

People that don't cycle much or kids that haven't been told and don't have an floor pump tend to ride their bikes with tires that are almost flat.

Not on purpose, but they just don't realize that bike tires and tubes are thin and will need to be topped off frequently.

On a road bike with 25 mm wide tires, I'm topping off every two or three days. It'd be almost flat if I waited three or four weeks.

I bought my last short valve Schrader tubes from Decathlon, and I was quite pleased to find them because most of my bikes have shallow rims, and with a 20" wheel a long valve looks clunky.

Of course, Schrader and Presta are not the only choices, I was in my local DIY store here in Poland the other day and they still offer tubes with Dunlop/Woods valves, which is handy as I cannot for the life of me find a Schrader-sized pump-to-valve connector tube and it is so easy to misplace all your convertors when you need one.