Friday, May 27, 2011

Gluing a Tubular

I had planned on dropping of my wheel and having the shop and having them glue on a new tire for me. Unfortunately I couldn't get it there until Thursday night. Normally not a big deal but it's a holiday weekend AND I needed to pick it up on Tuesday. They said they could do it but I shouldn't ride it until Thursday.
Well I took that as my cue that I should do this myself. Typically I live near a bike shop that can do this stuff for me but there will come a time I would need to be able to do this myself.

So here are the steps I'm following:

Pre-Stretch tire on the wheel, for 24 hours. Some say more is better. Some say not at all.
Gluing the Wheel. 1st coat 24 hours dry time, 2nd coat 12 hours min dry time, 3rd coat about 20-30 minutes before mounting the tire? (Mount the tire when this 3rd coat's glue, pulls strands when you touch and pull away).

Gluing the tire: With tire filled enough to give it shape. 1st coat 24 hours. 2nd coat 24 hours. Mount tire to wheel, when 3rd coat of wheel glue is "stranding".

I also watched a bunch of the how to videos on this website.

The first layer of glue is on the tire and wheel. I'm hopeful all of this will go well because I have to say, I'm starting to like the whole tubular thing. I don't think it's as difficult as everyone makes it out to be, but maybe I should wait a few more months before making that statement.

Edit: Here are the video's that I found to be the best.
Removing Glue from wheel.
Video #1 All the steps in one video
Video #2 part 1 of 4. More discussion going on in these videos.
Video #3 Part 2 of 4
Video #4 part 3 of 4
Video #5 part 4 of 4
Video #2

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