After years of good luck with tires and tubes, my luck has changed. This became apparent today, when, less than seven miles into Tom H's annual Covered Bridges ride today, a patched tube gaver out... and then, a few yards down the road, the sidewall of the tire gave way.
Yeah, but that's not all. The last two all-paces rides, on which I've taken the Monstercross bike, the Krakow Monster, I've gotten a flat. And I got a flat on that incredibly wet ride with Tom. And on examining the tires, I could never find the source of the problem, expect for the sidewall that blew out*.
Six flats in those four rides, because on two of them I had either a second flat or a useless tube.
Some of the problem I assign to buying these tubes on Amazon. They have a large number of good reviews because they're cheap. But if you look at the negative reviews, you'll see over and over that the tubes come with flaws, or fail in the tire, or are too large for the wheel and tire(!). I posted a review myself saying that they were cheap enough that if they came with one flawed tube out of the half-dozen, the price was low enough to put up with it... but the number of failures has multiplied. (My initial thought was, "They're just tubes. They're balloons; they'll just expand to fill the space; as long as they hold air, who cares?" But that conditional phrase, that "as long as..." is they key: they don't hold air.) I posted a review on Amazon with my thoughts, but I can't find it now (I could not find where Amazon allows you to see your own reviews, although I didn't look very hard).
I go through a lot of tubes, and it's good to get 'em in bulk. But I need a more reliable supply than this.
After the tire blew out today, Chris C, who was on the ride, lent me a tire, and I put it on. It was a used tire from the Trenton Bike Exchange. It probably would have lasted the ride... but I just didn't trust it. So I turned around and went back to the car.
I've bought new tires, and new tubes. I have a supply of tubes coming from a different source. Here's hoping I can change my luck.
*I'm sure that sidewall blowout was a fluke, as opposed to my belief that the tubes I've been getting were generally flawed. I've been running Vittoria tires for years on my bike and TEW's, and never had a problem, and I've never heard of a similar problem. The replacement tire I bought is a Vittoria. I pumped it up to its rated maximum - twice - and it's holding.
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