Killing All the Flies

So, just curious. Has anyone figured out where these post titles come from?

I got home last night and decided to put the Nate's on both the front and rear of the bike and to see if I could figure out why the one tire has so much of a hop in it. I knew it wasn't the wheel itself. There's a tiny bit out of true, but the Nate tires have always been wonky - as if they are out of round fairly seriously.

I installed them, soaped up the bead to help the tires move on the rim a bit easier and then pumped them up to 40 PSI (Not fun with a low volume floor pump - who knew it would take 15 minutes to pump those big tires up to that pressure) and then let them sit overnight. Came out to the garage this AM and let out air to ~19 PSI. No problem.

Went back into the house, got my coffee, played with the dogs, oggled the wife, then headed out the door.

Front was flat. Argh... So I pumped it up and headed out the door, figuring I just didn't get the nut tightened all the way down or something. Nope. About half way to the bus I had to pump it up again. Then when I got almost to the bus stop I had to get off and walk because it was so flat I couldn't steer at all. Quite the workout, though, moving all that dead rubber.

My bus ride in was spent swapping out the tube and getting it all pumped back up. Good fun, that. Bus driver was cool about things. As were the other passengers. I am becoming such a pro at changing tubes that the actual changing process takes no more than two minutes. The pumping, though, that takes a bit longer. My small hand pump takes about three million strokes to get the tire to a ridable pressure. Not a desirable pressure. Just ridable.

I figure what happened with the tube was that the soapy water dried, causing the tube to stick to the tire's casing and when I aired it down either a small bit of rubber pulled away from the tube - a natural flaw in the tube itself - or that one of the myriad patches loosened its grip after being stretched and then aired down. I'll have to take a look at it tonight and see what's what.

Oh - for your viewing pleasure I present the traffic I had to deal with last night: