Catrike -Fixing A Flat Tire

Most of us aren't expert flat fixers, so Mel provides this tutorial on changing those tight-as-a-drum 406-sized tire on recumbent trikes. He also covers "Shortcuts", "Things that DON'T work" and "puncture resistant tires"
Recommended products :
Schwalbe Easy Fit -tire soap
Park Tools Steel Core Tire Levers -size small or large
Schwalbe Tire Levers
Kool Stop Bead Jack
Schwalbe Tubes and Tires
Fumpa USB rechargeable bike pump
Topeak Road Morph bike-mount pump
Pedro's Floor Pump
GÜP Instant Flat Fix
This is part of the RPDX Catrike Maintenance and Safety video series. See the rest of the series at recumbentpdx.com/maintenance

[@Olyphoto7]

That was fantastic. Now we just need to figure out when to come back to Portland.

[@RecumbentPDX]

Thank you! Look forward to seeing you and Jennifer in the shop!

[@BakaWoodworker]

FANTASTIC video Mel...as always. This one is especially top notch and informative.

[@RecumbentPDX]

Thank You!

[@sylvain65]

Thanks Mel, very informative

[@RecumbentPDX]

Thank you!

[@stoutdog56]

Thank you! Great information and several things I had previously not known.

[@RecumbentPDX]

You are so welcome!

[@casualcarl8460]

Great video Mel. Jam packed with great advice. Thank you.

[@RecumbentPDX]

thank you!

[@markdaarud7764]

I use the tyre glide. It has made tire repairs easier.

[@RecumbentPDX]

Looks like a nice product. Have you used it on the 406 tires? I'd be curious if it moves the bead or gets bogged down by the resistance.

[@markdaarud7764]

I have a Catrike 700 and I use it on the 700c and 406 wheels. It can Bogg down but it gives a good pushing leverage. I don’t use the tire levers anymore.

[@jamesmchugo9422]

Good information. About the Fix A Flat goop. Nasty stuff! Granted this was years ago, but I blew a tire on a Sunday and found my patch kit had gone bad. (Sub note, replace those kits annually they dry out even if never used.) My options were walk about 12 miles home buy a can of Fix A Flat it was the only thing the only gas station that was open had. It worked, mostly. But limping in an a soft tire was better than walking 12 miles. The next day however, nasty. The fix a flat goop had leaked out of tube and tire it was all over the frame the rim, my clothes. I ended throwing away the clothes tube and tire, had to use solvents to clean the frame rim and gears. Hind sight, I’d have been better off to walk. I’ll never use tire goop of any kind ever again. About the tire irons, I’ve always used 3 when dealing with a tight tire. 1 holds the tire so it can’t walk up on you. Then I can use the other 2 to work tire over the rim. I’m not describing it very well, but it works pretty well.

[@RecumbentPDX]

"Goop". That sums it up.

[@mitchellstrauss5117]

nice tutorial Mel...

[@RecumbentPDX]

Thank you 😁

[@SFCRambo60]

What dealers need to tell Trike Riders is to get rid of the slick rear drive tire, I found out the hard way on my Catrike Dumont. I had to get off the trail and do something and when I went to get back on the trail, all I did was spin my rear tire and had to get back out of the Trike and move it back onto the trail. I went straight to a bike shop and bought a more aggressive tire and I'm much happier than having a slick tire. By the way, I looked up that one tire inflator, $ 250.00 you got to be kidding me. I can but 2 or 3 inflators and have money left over for something else. One other thing, I wish you had put better information on the list of items so it makes it easier to look up. I'm interested in that one hand pump for Catrike that pumps up to 250psi. Thank you

[@RecumbentPDX]

Thanks for the comment. We're a local shop in Portland Oregon. Anything in our videos can be purchased in our shop. Nothing in our shop can be purchased on the internet because we don't sell on the internet. So, we make it easy to buy in our shop. Regarding the "$250.00", I'm not kidding you. Many of our customer can't operate a standard pump (hemiparetic stroke, Parkinsons, MS, ALS, Ataxia) and this pump restores their confidence to ride independently. Do we sell a lot of them? No, we don't because there are often perfectly-adequate less expensive alternatives. But, we do sell them when appropriate (and they're a lot less than $250).

[@davestephens8033]

Rear wheel. What do you do with the trike to take the rear wheel off? Nobody ever shows an easy way to do this if you get a rear wheel flat. I had to flip the trike upside down, because its a huge pain if the wheel drops out of the trike and you got a dirty chain to deal with and a struggle to remove the tube and put another one on, and you got the chain falling off front and rear sprockets to boot. I had a rear flat once and it was a panic attack, I think it took me almost an hour to gain access to the tube and patch it or swap it out. I don't ride with other people and I have bad vision which makes any flat a terrifying experience. Because of that I buy the Schwalbe Marathon flat proof tires and replace them before they get much wear. The two front wheels are super easy to change or patch the tube. Then pumping the tire back up is a chore, the small pumps are useless, I use a medium length one that has a foot brace you can stand on so you pump against the ground instead of two handed. I would like to see a real world trike video of a person all alone get a rear flat and efficiently and cleanly change the tube without the chain getting all crimped up and in the wrong sprockets. So far I've not had a flat in years, but worry about it every ride I go on. I'm not sure my Catrike Road will fit in our Honda CRV, and at my age 74, being 6 miles from home all alone dealing with the trike upside down, because nobody rides around with a bike stand to make it easy, as most uselessly show us videos ;-) Anyway, riding season is over, rains are back, getting cold again. Summers are just too short here in S. Washington.

[@RecumbentPDX]

On our website, I've got a video - under the service tab - on removing rear wheels. We've spoken with TerraCycle about building a "jack" to drop the rear triangle on, but haven't settled on a good design

[@davestephens8033]

@@RecumbentPDX Thats not what I am talking about. I'm talking about being 12 miles from home and you get a rear wheel flat. You don't have a stand for your trike out in the wild on the side of the road with cars rushing by, so dropping the wheel off the bike becomes a panic attack scenario. I had to flip the trike upside down, which is not good because now your shifters and the cables are being crunched with the trike upside down. All the rear tire flat repair videos only show the trike sitting on a professional trike stand, not in a real world scenario. Thats a video I want to see, not a shop video with a professional mechanic making everything look super easy. When I had a rear tire flat, it took probably 45 minutes of swearing and I don't think I actually removed the rear wheel, I had to get the tire off the wheel and patch the tube because removing the wheel, even upside down was just too difficult. Lets see a video shot on a busy highway, with a half blind old man like me and a procedure that a child could easily do. There are no videos like that.

[@RecumbentPDX]

@@davestephens8033 we've spoken with T-Cycle about making a frame-attached built on kickstand, but haven't gotten beyond talks. We have a customer who just props the trike up on his helmet. It gets it three inches of the ground which is the perfect height for dropping out a rear wheel

[@33India6]

Ya, I agree. I am 84 and am terrified of flats. Prior to getting my 559, I had a Fuji Sagres on which I put 5000 miles a year and ran Continentals, and one flat in 30,000 miles. In my new 559 I had half a dozen flats in a short order of time, a good percentage due to Presta valve issues. I don’t see any reason for not having Schrader valves on those rims, tires.