Changing a tire without tools

I found the following forum on ADVrider and I figured....what the hell, let's try it.

I bought a harbour freight bead breaker and 8 straps and with my irons.

Well, I put my road attacks on last night using straps. And (drum roll please)...the results were pretty good. I still had to use my irons, but the force needed was very minimal. It wasn't anywhere near as hard as before.

Anyway, if you are interested, research the following forum and take it from me that this method works.

Mount a Motorcycle Tire Without Using Tools - ADVrider

Also, if you have any questions, get a hold of me or post a message on this forum and I'll share more of my experience. All in all, it took a couple of hours.

 

looks like way too much effort!!!!

Spend $50 buy the premium tire irons .and get some dish washing detergent and away you go....its really not that hard to do...

 

LOL I like that!!! I wanna do that!

 

You can REMOVE a tire without tire irons or tools. Easy.
To put a tire on you need tire irons NOT a screw driver! But what makes putting on a tire difficult for some people is this: Here is the secret......

You have to start the last side of the tire onto the rim starting on the side opposite the valve stem. VERY IMPORTANT. It give the tire a bit of room to shift towards the valve stem.
While you are trying to get the tire on the tire must be down in the center of the wheel. Do not have the bead of the tire sitting up on outside edge of the rim. THAT IS THE SECRET.
As far as a bead breaker .NOT NEEDED. Just lay the wheel with tire on a blanket on the ground and put your foot down (with boot) onto
the tire and it will break away from the rim. NOT a problem.

I cannot believe how many motorcyclist that pay a shop $70.00 or more to mount a tire.
I have been changing my own tires since I was 16 years old and working in a HONDA shop.
I am 60 now and just mounted a 240mm rear tire. and the front tire too.
I did have to go to a CAR tire shop to get the 240 seated on the rim. Takes a lot of air pressure.

 

"Just lay the wheel with tire on a blanket on the ground and put your foot down (with boot) onto
the tire and it will break away from the rim. NOT a problem."

Whoof, you must be a big fellah. That ain't gonna happen with tires I've removed. I've had to work at it with a bead breaker. Kind of hard on brake rotors too innit?

 

There is a trick to it.
You do not use the toe of your foot, you step on the tire with the side of your boot or heel and keep the shoe or boot right near the edge of the rim of the wheel as close as possible. the foot MUST be close to the wheel. If your foot is on the outside edge of the tire you will not get there. the tire will just flex. brake rotor is in the middle and the pressure is being applied on the outside edge.
You may have to tilt the wheel up just a few inches on the opposite side.

 

One of my buddies also breaks his bead with a long 2x4. There's no real trick to it...just plain old leverage. I live in a townhouse with a small one car garage and so the need for smaller more compact tools is a necessity. I come from a dirt-bike background and I agree there are many similarities, but I had never changed a sport bike tire before.

The only tricky thing was balancing my rear tire. Because of the single sided swing arm, you have to buy or make an adaptor to throw it on the balancer. I haven't balanced the rear yet, but went for a 60 mile ride anyway (I had to go to a hockey game). I didn't notice any difference. I did, however, balance to front tire. The last thing that I wanted was feedback coming up to the handlebars at high way speeds....that could get interesting.

 

One note about balancing the tires, you could avoid that altogether with this product calleld Dynabeads. I've been hearing rave reviews about them and when I try my 1st tire change i'm gonna give those a whirl

 

I use a Marc Parnes balancer which has a neat VFR adapter. I use a HF rig to change tires...which works ok.

 

Insider tip: I used an empty 50gal oil drum the oil drums rim / edge I lined with an inner tube to keep from scuffing the cycle wheel/rim's, the drum was used to set the rim on in order to lever / change all my cycle tires when I owned a shop, the oil drum is the perfect height for lever work instead of kneeling on the ground. Dawn dish washing detergent and "long" levers, also a couple scrap peaces of rubber sheet cut into 3x3 squares works to keep the levers from scratching the rims. "winks"