by Raymond L. Marr

Created on: August 04, 2008

Changing a flat tire, the most simple and yet crucial part of beginning the journey to cycle commuting, it is simple and in doing it becomes easier to do time and again.

On more then one occasion, I have been out there pounding the pedals on a road I may not of followed previously, enjoying the scenery and the feeling of exhilaration that is par for the course when riding a bike. I am cruising along, got my flow going, pedaling is easy, cadence is high then suddenely woosh, a flat tire in the middle of a backroad, my flow is off, pulling off to the side of the road, now what?

Well you really have a couple of choices, you can either step off the bike and start walking back to the closest town or get off the bike and make the fix. It of course depends on you, and the awareness of how to make the fix, which is the objective of this article.

My first suggestion is to always carry an extra tube with you on the bike ride, because often that is the easiest fix, you carry an extra tube and pump and you are set. At the very least carrying a pump and a patching kit is the most basic necessity of anyone who is travelling at distance and even locally.

If you just decide on carrying a patch kit the process is relatively straightforward, in the patch kit there is usually, rubber patches, a buffering metal and some rubber cement depending on what type of patch kit it is. The better patch kits usually also contain what is called tire irons, which are basically plastic with something that looks like a hook on one side and the other part of it that looks like a crowbar usually rounded. Both sides have a purpose, one side is to help take the tire off the rim, because as you will see it is not as easy as you might of thought. The tire iron is as important as having a good patch kit. The other side of the iron is the hook in itself it helps the process depending on how tight the tire is to the rim. For now though we will just focus on the lesser side because most tires should come off easy enough when using that side of it. The changing of the flat also depends on whether it is on the front or the back.

Many of the bikes purchased today, have what is called quick release on the front and the back tire. The way you can tell is if you look at the back wheel or the front wheel on the left is what looks like an angled bolt that can move back and forth. The idea behind the quick release is to enable a quick change of a tire when taking the wheel off the bike. Once the wheel is off you can

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