DIY Airless Bicycle Tire

core77.com

23 points·fortran77··6 comments

good for him for making something cool looking, but dang this is sketchy.

modern tubeless systems are so nice that i never worry about getting a flat on my bikes, and unlike this thing, I also never worry about them coming off of the rim, even at high speed through corners/over roots and rocks.

they stop holding air as well after a few months and i squirt some more sealant in and it's fine again. for any bike that sees real use it's hard to beat.

I had tubeless with my last bike. Maybe it was just my setup but I pretty consistently had flat tires when the temp dropped below zero (which, admittedly, is a weird time to be on your bike).

I think the rim just contracted too much to maintain the seal.

The sealant viscosity is likely too low at those temps to effectively seal punctures.

I suspect one could fill an inner tube with a soft silicon used for mold making, I wonder how it would compare?

Quick approximations: cross section of 20cm², cylinder length of 2m (probably about right for 26″ mountain bike wheels), that’s about 4L; the stuff is generally somewhat denser than water, assume something like 1.25kg/L and this tube of yours is now 5kg. Much heavier than is desirable (especially for rotating weight: gyroscope effects will make it harder to handle), without stopping to consider its shock-absorption and road-holding properties.

Interesting! Thank you!

Reply on news.ycombinator.com