I don’t know about you but the very idea of dealing with a puncture when I’m on the road fills me with dread. When I was running tubeless tyres it wasn’t quite so bad – plug the hole – pump with CO2 cartridges and get to a garage. But now I have tubes…. well I’ve been petrified of how I’ll deal with a flat.
Before I rode out to Russia I took a six month City and Guilds motorcycle maintenance course here in London. We spent two hours dealing with tyres and tubes – on beautiful clean, new bikes – what a breeze! The tyres had been on and off the rims so many times you hardly had to use the leavers.
Fortunately at the Horizons Unlimited meet up in Derby earlier this year I was lucky enough to see Grant Johnson run a tyre changing demo… I was blown away (see what I did there) by the aspects that I simply didn’t know and actually, once you have the know-how, how easy it can be… why on earth was I ever worried?
The good news is that Horizons have produced a DVD which is basically Grant doing his demo – in detail and with notes. I can’t recommend it enough – if you’re frightened of dealing with a flat, or even if you just want to brush up on your skills before hitting the road, this DVD is for you.
It’s available to buy from the Horizons Unlimited Store (you need to scroll down some to find it) for $24.99 US or from people like Traveldri-plus here in the UK (I’m afraid I couldn’t find a direct link so just give Les a call).
Here’s the trailer:
