Tubed tire on a tubeless rim.. without a tube??

B Burdine97

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Good afternoon all,
I recently had bought some tubed tires to have installed on my mag wheels, which say on them "Suitable for tubeless tires". I brought these tires, tubes and my wheels to the local motorcycle shop to have them mounted and balanced. The guy who mounted and balanced my tires said that the tubes where not needed. I was in a rush and was unable to talk to the guy, but I thought that if someone wanted to run tubed tires on tubeless wheels, that they require a tube to be put in place. He was obviously able to seat the bead.
I guess my real question is, can a tubed tire seat a bead on a tubeless wheel and be ran safely?
Thanks!
 
I agree with you guys I would just think the guys who did my tires would atleast know that a tubed tire would need a tube..
Kinda mad they didn't already know.
Thanks guys!
 
A bit of a history lesson. When tires were first made, they were made to carry the weight by using canvas or some other strong casing material. These tires could not hold air vey well. They made tubes to hold the air. This applied to all tires.
When bikes started out tires were made about the same way. But not only could the tires lose air, the spokes nipples in the holes leaked air.
After a while they figured out how to make tires that could hold air. They called these tubeless tires. After a while all tires were made tubeless but they kept printing tubeless on tires.
It took a few years for bike wheels and tires to catch up. Now days almost all bike tires can be run with or without a tube. They do this because when you buy a tire the manufacturer doesn't know what kind of wheels you have on your bike. They make tires this way to most likely avoid law suits from people using tube tires with out tubes and getting hurt.
Even if your tires say tube tires on them this is probably a holdover from years gone by and they leave the printing on there so people can run old timey looking tires.
Leo
 
throught tire history tires that require tubes will leak air if used tubeless. period
you can however run tubes in tubeless Rims with no problem at all cars and bikes alike ! there is no problem getting the tires to bead
if installed correctly with a wet lube....
......
some times and I have ran into this myself, when putting a tube in a tubeless rim the hole for the valve stem of the tube to come through has very sharp edges and it will cut the tube.... they make a valve stem protector just for that and most tire shops carry them or did 20 years ago
..... on a bike I would Rather have tubes than tubeless.....anyway
taking a rat tail file to the inside edge of the valve core hole in the rims to round off that sharp edge would also cure the problem
..... that's what I would do but if you follow My advice you do it all on your own as these people are going to scream bloody murder at me for even mentioning it ! LOL its a jerry rig.... buy the proper tires for the rims or proper rims for the tire ! but seeings as you have what ya do make the best of it and then be sure to balance them ! (tube type tires like to be out of balance bad !)

......
Bob..........
 
Good afternoon all,
I recently had bought some tubed tires to have installed on my mag wheels, which say on them "Suitable for tubeless tires". I brought these tires, tubes and my wheels to the local motorcycle shop to have them mounted and balanced. The guy who mounted and balanced my tires said that the tubes where not needed. I was in a rush and was unable to talk to the guy, but I thought that if someone wanted to run tubed tires on tubeless wheels, that they require a tube to be put in place. He was obviously able to seat the bead.
I guess my real question is, can a tubed tire seat a bead on a tubeless wheel and be ran safely?
Thanks!

Hi B Burdine,
FWIW, it's really difficult to buy "tube only" tires these days.
Unless your tires say "Tube only" on their sidewalls they'll be OK running tubeless.
AFAIK the only difference between tube & tubeless tires is that tube tires don't have a final coat of anti-leak rubber
on their insides so they just might not hold air for as long so you'd best make a tire pressure check part of your routine.
BTW all the tires I've bought these last 20 years have said "Tube/tubeless" on them.
 
Loosing a bit of air is no big deal. I just didn't know if the bead will seat well with a tubed tire on a tubeless wheel. My biggest fear is just a sudden shift of the bead while riding causing all tire pressure to be lost in an instance, then causing some sort of accident.
The tire I am talking about is the shinko 240 classic. I got it off of JP cycles, it states its a tube type tire on the website, and the side of the tire says "Tube tire". Dont know if this changes anything..
 
Don't you love when you walk into a business, offer to pay for service and then they don't do what you ask.
 
No kidding WER. And let's hope that if he returns to have them fix it that they do the right thing and fix it for no charge.
 
They are closed on sundays so tomorrow I am going to run down there. They are super nice, I would figure that they would fix it free of charge.
Talked to one of the guys for quite some time about his nighthawk cafe racer build.. Told him xs650's are much better, haha.
 
B.Burdine while it wasn't a motorcycle tire I'll relate a recent experience. I needed to move a piece of wide (14 ft) equipment. I knew the tires were questionable so called a local shop to purchase a wheel and tire. Didn't ask the cost I wasn't bargain shopping. I need a wheel and tire for a haybine ready to move equipment tomorrow. No problem you can pick it after 3. Cool easy peasy. Got the tire and truck was loaded to leave at 6. Sure nuff one of the tires had the tread separating. While good enough to drag around a field, not good for highway travel. I wanted the new tire on the ditch side so we swapped them around and what do you know the rim won't work. The offset is wrong. This is on a Saturday about 2 pm. everything is closing. One of the guys knew a service station owner 18 miles away that owned him a favor. The call was made and arrangements to open the shop done. Both tires loaded and away he went I stayed to remount the one wheel since we had ended up with the equipment on blocks. 30 mins. , an hour, then 1 1/2 hr.s gone I begin to wonder. . . . .it is just 18 miles. He shows back up and says it wouldn't have taken so long but we had a devil of a time getting the tire to seat. Ahh well, it is mounted and I've got 3 hours daylight to get home, 30 miles of country backroads away. We made it without taking any mailboxes (several were close by inches) out or endangering any oncoming traffic. All good. The next day I went to get unhooked and that new tire was flitter flat.
Took it off and finally put my good eye on it. It was a tube tire. Not one but TWO shops had worked on this and NEITHER one caught that. Now maybe they thought "he didn't ask for a tube" or maybe they thought all tires are tubeless now and will work. Who knows?? I didn't go back and question why. I did say a word of thanks that no one was maimed or killed and nothing was torn up. I did take it to another shop and had a tube installed and it has bumped and jumped mole hills over 200 acres the last 3 weeks with nary a loss of pressure. I do know if something had happened if the offended party had a sharp lawyer the fact I ran a marked tube tire without a tube would/could have sunk me financially. To say nothing of the guilt I would have to live with. So long story short, when someone gives advice/guidance it ain't their life they are betting with. You asked for opinion and I offered mine. I wish you best with your decision whatever it is.
 
About the service not doing it the way you wanted........My brother-in-law needed new tires on his Suzuki V-Twin. I offered to change them for him with tire beads to balance. He bought the tire beads but took them to someone else. The guy that did the tires did not use the beads but stuck about 6 different wheel weights on his nice chrome spoked wheels. This was a BIG patch of UGLY. Anyways, he soon had multi- spoke breakage on the rear wheel, almost an accident too. Seems those Suzuki's are known for their spokes breaking. That's a job I'm glad I didn't do.

Scott
 
B. Burdine97:
I always check to make sure the bead is up against the rim lip..... on any tire I mount and every once in a while I'll get one that doesn't want to pop up properly..... usually braking loose the bead all the way around and squirting it all the way around with soapy water and then putting about 60PSI in it will get the bead to seat....
the only time I ever had a bead come off was a tubeless tire on my 305 honda dream it was a cheepo tire and thin I picked up a nail and the tire went down and then came off the rim before I could stop ..... the tire was the worst tire I have ever encountered for a bike
it made for a fun ride the rest of the way home ....a good 10 miles and that tire would not stay on the rim..... i stopped and put it back on with just my hands several times !
however that is Not normal ! " if the tire is the right size for the rim you have no worries of the bead coming off." running proper inflation
running Underinflation is a different story.
 
In case anyone cares about what is going on with the tire. I called the dealer that mounted and balanced my tire and asked them if a tube is needed or not. They said no and that there really isn't a such thing as a tube or tubeless tire anymore, that its determined by the type of rim whether or not a tube needs to be installed. I asked if I would be safe to ride as is (without a tube in the tire) and his response was "Most definitely".
This was some what reassuring but it wasn't good enough insurance for me. I emailed Shinko tire directly and here was there response.
 

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I will now be going down to the shop that did the tire, presenting the direct email from the tire manufacture, Shinko, and nicely ask if they will install a tube for me and re-balance the tire free of charge.
 
I like the Shinko response. Your service place SHOULD have had the same answer. I don't think much of that person at the service place, and the service place is tarnished till eternity.

Scott
 
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