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CHEAP Air compressor for seading tubeless converting tyres
Hey guys I live on the northern beaches and sick of hassling my mate to swing by his work and use his air compressor... So has anyone found any good cheap ones that work for going tubeless.. and yes sometimes non tubeless ready tyres so a floor pump is out of question....
thanks for any advice
Cheers Dan
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I bought an adaptor from LBS for $5, simply go to the servo and use the air hose.
+1 adaptor and servo
I have a Supercheap Auto compressor that cost about $190 it does the job perfectly
I bought a compressor for exactly the reason you did. Barely used it.
Now I use a valve adaptor and the pump at a service station.
When I travel, I use a CO2 cartridge to seat the bead. Specializeds new MTB pump apparently has enough air per stroke to seat tubeless beads.
The most difficult time to seat a tyre is when it is new. After that a foot pump normally works.
I use a 4x4 compressor...$89 of ebay, and an old car battery and its works a treat.
I bought the adapter for valve and easy as!!
I seated 2 tyres last week in minutes, and then re-seated 1 again after a bad 'burping' incident!!!
http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/NEW-OUTBAC-12v-4x4-Po...
And you get to take it away with you, kids footy's, poo toys, etc...
i find modern servo compressors next to useles as they cant deliver that quick initial blast needed to seat most tyre/ rim combos.
Heres a tip. Go to your local fire safety shoppe/inspection depot and ask if they have any out of date empty extinguishers they are about to throw out. Big ones are handy as you get 2 or 3 goes before needing to pump up again but the little ones work too
Remove the gauge and replace with a shraeder valve. Pump up to about 60 psi (servo compressor is handy for the first charge)
Good idea to paint it so you know it's no longer a fire extinguisher.
Back to your wheels. Remove the core (most tubeless valve stems lets you screw the valve off the top) your ex extinguisher hose sits neat on the open stem and a quick blast will bead your tyre. Thumb over the open valve and a quick bit of switcheroo work will let you get the valve back in place with plenty of air still holding the tyre firm.
A little top up with the floor pump to get your desired pressure and Robert is you mothers brother.
Cost? The cost of a Schroeder valve. Or if you want to go even cheaper you can pull the hose off an old pump and the extinguisher hose will sit on the pump outlet. Takes s bit of rooting around as you need to hold the extinguisher trigger open while pumping it up but should cost you nothing
Bonus is its portable so you can have it at your camp site at races for those unexpected burbages
thanks for the reply guys ... yes I tryed the servo but didnt have any luck as all the pumps i found doont have a constant flow of air they did the pumping in spurts and couldnt seat the tyre .... I go have a look at bunnings and super cheap see what i can find
I got mine for $99 from supercheap auto plus about 30 bucks for hoses and a car adapter and bought a Stans presta shraeder adapter for a couple of dollars.
If your tyre has a ust bead I find now that with a bit of care positioning the bead I can get away with the floor pump. But if using normal folding bead rubber then a compressor is a must. Servo pumps are just too difficult especially these new electronic control ones.
.. the new Kratos tyre beaded up OK with the floor pump. The Crossmark LUST that I swapped from front to rear wouldn't bead up with the floor pump, but was OK with a burst of CO2. While Stan's don't recommend that, from what I've read it may be OK if you do it with the valve at the top so it doesn't blast the pool of sealant. We will see...
CO2 all the way for me, they've never failed to seat a tyre (UST or not) for me yet. Given I only see a few tyres a year it costs less than $10 in gas bulbs and is a hell of a lot more compact. Of course if I had a gob off man shed it would be a different story
This topic comes up a lot, and usually the advice is to use soapy water to help seal.
Hey DTM just buy one!
My better half was so happy when I bought my compressor a few months back as she has had to live with me behaving like a nutter every time I do the tyre thing for years now.
I like to change my tyres to suit the terrain and I always have a number of wheels in the garage so it is a frequent activity. Each time it starts with a whole lot of optimism that this timeI'll whack a tyre on a rim and the pump will cause it to seal immediately. Sometimes this does occur. Sometimes.
More often than not I then waste a few gas canisters before proclaiming to the better half I need to visit the local servo. So off I go with wheel, tyre, adaptor to suit the servo pump and the mandatory 1L of sealant. Most service stations have those pumps where you input the pressure you want and they deliver the air in short bursts. You watch your tyre inflate and get all excited then they take a rest to go again and any good they just did rushes back out. They are useless! You need a continuous burst of air not little puffs. I have left many litres of sealant on service station driveways proving this theory.
Then there's the mate who knows everything and says it's easy so you take it to said genius who always appears mortified when it doesn't work this time... But it always works for them apparently! Then there's bike industry old guy who says you need patience and explains how you need to leave the wheel on one side for a day to let the sealant do its thing on that bead then rotate to the other side for a day then get out your soap & water and massage it. Who has that much friggin time and patience? I just want to pump my friggin tyre up!
You do make life a lot easier if you run tubeless tyres and have rim tape and rubber rim strips on your wheel but if you choose not to use the rim strips or go for the weight savings of a non-tubeless tyre than I promise the whole experience is challenging.
About 3 months back I saw a sale advertised at Supercheap Auto for a decent unit for $250 from memory. It is a Black Ridge BRC180 which has a 40L tank and delivers air at 180L/min. Apparently that is a decent sized unit. I needed to spend another $40 on a nozzle plus rubber hose from a track pump and voila! I couldn't work out how to attach the photo of it but you can pm me if you want.
No more stress in our house at tyre replacement time
CO2 can sometimes cause the sealant to become bally and not have its proper effect of sealing a leak. I haven't had issues with this but it is known to happen. Some people inflate with CO2 to seat tyre without sealant then let out and place sealant in and refill with air.
The idea with the old fire extinguisher is absolute genius.
+1 for Rob's comment on soapy water, it really helps.
And I have both a cheap compressor (around 100 clams from Bunnings) and one of these:
http://www.lezyne.com/products/floor-pumps/high-volume#!classic-dirt-floor-drive
The floor pump has worked for me every time, where the compressor did not.
OH i was just looking at one for $89 at bunnings i thought it looked good ... dosnt it have the power?
Don't muck around. Spend the money and buy a compressor. Long after the price is forgotten, the ease of replacing tyres, no wastage of sealant and time saved remains.
I tried the foot pump method and all I got was a good upper body workout! So I decided "bugger this" and went to Bunnings and bought a Ryobi Compressor ($199) + air inflator with gauge ($17) + Boston liquid sealant (don't use white plumbers tape, this is easier) + presta shraeder adapter ($3) if you need one (I did). Sorted.
Don't buy the cheapy $89 ones from Bunnings. The floor manager in the tools section at Bunnings said the Spear & Jackson Project compressors keep coming back with sheared/snapped parts. That's why he recommended the Ryobi. He's had 9 Spear & Jacksons come back in the last 12 months and no Ryobi's and he states he sells same quantity of both brands 50/50. I guess you get what you pay for within reason.
I do like the fire extinguisher option though.
Search ghetto compressor on the singletrackworld forum or Google. Similar idea to the fire extinguisher but using a fizzy drink bottle which is rather more convenient to get hold of.
Here's the thread. Awesome!
http://singletrackworld.com/forum/topic/ghetto-t...
That's gold !!!! Just read that thread wow will have to give that a shot looks way easy and effective !!! Wow
why do you need a compressor?
maybe put the money towards a decent set of rims or tubeless specific tyres?
have never needed anything other than a track pump.
Do you have tubeless tyres on a MTB Caution??
Some of them can be a bugger to seat and you need a high volume of air to seat them. It is best done with a compressor. There are always other ways of doing it but the compressor really is the best way of doing it!
yep spending almost 2.5 k on a XC bike I only ride about a 1/4 of the time came with non tubeless specific rims and I not rich enough to buy the next model up ..... Maybe one time for now though its stans conversion kits!!
yes I be careful cheers , I will try the cheapo way out if it dosnt work off to bunnings for a compressor!!
Man I didn't know people had so much issues to consider spending $200 on a compressor.
The servo pump and soapy water worked fine for me. Used flat tyre mode, and a couple of bead pops latter it was on. Initially I set the pressure too low (like 30psi) but found I needed around 45-50psi for the bead to seat properly all the way around. At home I then put in 50ml of Stans through the valve for puncture protection and job all done.
Has worked for Ignitor UST and Crossmark UST tyres on Mavic 819 UST and Crosslink UST rims.
Edit: Mind you, I did wear safety glasses and hid around the side in case the wheel went all nuclear and exploded in my face.
mavic tyres on no-tubes flow rims. dont even use soap, they just go straight up.
as i said before, spend the money on decent rims and get results.
You can still experience problems with "decent" components even if you spend further. Your tubeless experience is generally a question of the combinations used and their manufacturing tolerances. Judging from the above it can even affect a designed for the purpose full UST setup.
Most of those interested in these discussions however are dealing with tubeless conversions for such reasons as low cost, low weight, and wider tyre choice against what may be considered a marginal benefit. What's the harm in trying it out first at little or no cost? It's up to them, and what better use is there for a forum than for people to ask for and be given helpful advice? There's people sharing how they've bodged fully ghetto conversions such as making their own sealant and splitting BMX tubes for rim strips.
C02 Canisters are cheap and easy to use, and you can use them out on the track or if you are away from home......
If you buy them on Ebay you can then for around $1-2 each..... alot cheaper than a compressor.
Saying that a Proper tubeless ready Rim and Tyre combos can be inflated with most track pumps.....
@ rob thanks for that link to the ghetto compressor wow is amazing how well it works cost me whole of about $5 to build and works a treat 3 of my mates have built one and all rating it also .... I've done 4 tyres now with it all on non tubeless specific rims with stans rim strips but used gu and tubeless ready tyres .... Anyway no more bugging my mate to come around to his factory to use his compressor stoked !!
I would put up a photo but can't work out how .... Basically looks exactly same as one in robs link above
For those who only have a floor pump, I've done alright using the emergency off-road tubeless tyre seating trick of running a strap or small rope around the outside of the tyre. As you tighten it up, the center of the tyre flexes inwards and that forces the beads out. I use this method to seat both beads (with a floor pump), then let the tyre down, pop one side, put the sealant in and re-seat the bead. The floor pump doesn't seem to have much problem seating the one bead.