Do ebikes get more flats ?

[Gordon71]

Oh, we're good!! It was looking a little dicey early on, but when the storm hooked a right and was lining up on Tampa, we were clear. Then it took another right, moving further south.

Lawn maintenance said it was no big deal. An inch of rain, and a little wind. Very lucky! Heart goes out to those south of Tampa....

That's good. Now the concern is how far do the insurance companies spread the pain so they don't suffer any.

 

[justforfun]

And none caused by Office Depot, hmmmm.

Good 1

 

[AHicks]

That's good. Now the concern is how far do the insurance companies spread the pain so they don't suffer any.

Florida insurance was a serious mess BEFORE the hurricane. Elected officials don't want to have anything to do with it. I think it's a pretty safe bet there's going to be a federal "get out of jail free" involved...

Worse, they're saying better than half don't have any flood insurance. Talk about rolling the dice....

 

[Tars Tarkas]

Not sure where the alleged hatred is regarding Presta valves. I have never had a bike, car, truck, tractor, lawnmower, wheelbarrow, garden cart, or anything else with Presta valves, so there's that, but they certainly wouldn't be a deal breaker if I wanted to buy a new bike and it came with Prestas. As others have noted, most pumps work with Presta and Schrader valves nowadays. Coming up with any extra adapters or tools to deal with Prestas would be trivial. Still, if it were an easy choice to go with one or the other I'd probably prefer Schraders on a new bike, Honestly though, I kind of doubt the subject would even come up and I'd be fine with whatever I got.

TT

 

[rtp]

Not sure where the alleged hatred is regarding Presta valves. I have never had a bike, car, truck, tractor, lawnmower, wheelbarrow, garden cart, or anything else with Presta valves, so there's that, but they certainly wouldn't be a deal breaker if I wanted to buy a new bike and it came with Prestas. As others have noted, most pumps work with Presta and Schrader valves nowadays. Coming up with any extra adapters or tools to deal with Prestas would be trivial. Still, if it were an easy choice to go with one or the other I'd probably prefer Schraders on a new bike, Honestly though, I kind of doubt the subject would even come up and I'd be fine with whatever I got.

TT

Eh. After working on cars since I was a kid, including paid stints for that work, I never came across Presta valves until jumping into eBikes. Meanwhile over time, I've now got a lion's share of sockets, wrenches etc. that are now metric vs my old SAE tools. Things move on. I think my collection of bikes and wheelsets are split down the middle between Shrader (came with bikes) and the built by hand sets, with more quality rims coming drilled for Presta, so while it was annoying to have to replace my favorite digital combo inflator/gauge, it just wasn't the big of a deal. As others have said, most bike pumps today can handle both valve types. Schrader valves are slightly less 'fiddly' getting a good seal to get air in, but not enough to really worry about it, IMO. I definitely wouldn't drill out a new set of rims for my next wheel build over it.

Ironically, suspension bits are still Schrader - so much for 'standardization'

 

[PedalUma]

The main reason for Presta is wheel strength. Smaller hole = Stronger rim. @rtp, I got rid of my wood working tools and my chainsaw. I also got rid of SAE and went all in on bike tools. I wouldn't want a long skinny presta on suspension. It is not needed for rim strength. A stubby schrader is better for that high pressure application.

 

[6zfshdb]

Silly question here but do e bikes get more flats then regular bikes? Ive been riding every day to work on the same roadways and paths for over 25 years. The last two years ive been riding my aventon pace daily instead of my regular pedal bike. I get flats now 1-2 times a month. Its different items in the tire such as nails tacks screws thorns glass etc. for 25 years i probably got 5-6 flats going to and from work total. Ive gotten that the last 2 months alone. Is there something that makes this more common on an electric such as weight or speed or anything? Or is it just a string of bad luck? Its gotten so frequent ive purchased 2 tubes. I just pull out the flat one and replace with the spare and patch it so its ready to swap again next time . Not so much a big deal just curious if its more common on an e bike. .

I use my ebikes on the same trails I used to ride my conventional bikes. I do get more ebike flats but I log many more miles. I estimate the number of flats per mile to be about the same for both bike types. It might be a different story for roadies though.

 

[Jason Knight]

I estimate the number of flats per mile to be about the same for both bike types.

I agree it should be about the same per mile for the same style tire, but that's another subject people ignore.

If you go from a normal road tire to a fat tire bike for example, you're going to be at higher risk of puncture just because you've got a bigger contact patch to hoover up debris with. The odds of getting a flat should be a factor of how much surface contact there is. Thus the wider the tier contact area, the higher the odds of hitting something. The longer distances you ride, the higher the odds of hitting something.

It's actually why I'm a little surprised I've not had any problems in the 14 months or so I've been riding my Aventure -- Jinx, jinx!!! -- whilst having to do a tube replacement on the front and patch on the rear of my 3 speed cruiser.

The need for that replacement was weird, the valve stem separated from the tire at the hub when I tried to unscrew the cap. Like... it just fell off?

 

[mschwett]

I agree it should be about the same per mile for the same style tire, but that's another subject people ignore.

If you go from a normal road tire to a fat tire bike for example, you're going to be at higher risk of puncture just because you've got a bigger contact patch to hoover up debris with. The odds of getting a flat should be a factor of how much surface contact there is. Thus the wider the tier contact area, the higher the odds of hitting something. The longer distances you ride, the higher the odds of hitting something.

that’s not the whole story - while there is a linear relationship between contact patch width and odds of contacting an object on the ground, the likelihood of a flat depends on the amount of force between the sharp object and the tire. force per unit area of tire goes down as the tire gets wider, just as it goes up as the bike/rider get heavier.

for an object which is sharp / strong enough to cause a flat on any bike tire, this doesn’t matter, but for an object barely able to penetrate a tire, the reduced load per square inch of the fat tire will help.

 

[m@Robertson]

that’s not the whole story - while there is a linear relationship between contact patch width and odds of contacting an object on the ground, the likelihood of a flat depends on the amount of force between the sharp object and the tire. force per unit area of tire goes down as the tire gets wider, just as it goes up as the bike/rider get heavier.

for an object which is sharp / strong enough to cause a flat on any bike tire, this doesn’t matter, but for an object barely able to penetrate a tire, the reduced load per square inch of the fat tire will help.

Exactly this. You have a much smaller chance of rolling over something sharp on a 700x25C tire, but that tire is rock hard being inflated to 100-110 psi. Its also very thin and likely has almost zero tread articulation. A piece of glass will slice deeply right into it. A fat tire running at 12 psi on the other hand - and lets say you are running a 30 tpi tire casing as I try to do on my commuter tires - that tire has a shot at conforming over a sharp object. Even if the tread is cut, it may not get all the way thru thanks to the thicker 'armor' of the hugely-more-substantial tire casing.

To further muddy the weaters: I have found that front tire flats are effectively nonexistent on fat tire'd urban commuters. Likely because of the points made above (not even a cut, though). the back tire is a different story. Before I seem to have cracked the code with a modern uber-sealant, I had not infrequent flats in the back... sometimes sealed by my Sealant 1.0 (Slime) and sometimes too much for it to handle. But either way... we're talking nails, more nails and bits of steel. How did I miss them with the front and not the back? Simple: I didn't. The front is protected as described above. It rolls over, say, a nail and for lack of a better term just gives it a bear hug and keeps rolling. But... it also doesn't let go instantly. That nail is held onto for a fraction of a second, which means it goes airborne. Straight into the back tire.

So, on occasion while I was still riding fat tires I would hear the occasional hissHissHiss which would be my signal to jump off the bike, grab the needlenoses in the bag on my handlebars, pull the nail, then jump back on and ride, letting the sealant do the rest. Over the last year my puncture frequency simply went away. Now that I am running 'flatless' skinnier tires I haven't had any sort of incident since January 2021 at least, which is when the Bullitt became my daily driver. I crossed 2300 miles on it over the weekend.

 

[mschwett]

Exactly this. You have a much smaller chance of rolling over something sharp on a 700x25C tire, but that tire is rock hard being inflated to 100-110 psi. Its also very thin and likely has almost zero tread articulation. A piece of glass will slice deeply right into it. A fat tire running at 12 psi on the other hand - and lets say you are running a 30 tpi tire casing as I try to do on my commuter tires - that tire has a shot at conforming over a sharp object. Even if the tread is cut, it may not get all the way thru thanks to the thicker 'armor' of the hugely-more-substantial tire casing.

To further muddy the weaters: I have found that front tire flats are effectively nonexistent on fat tire'd urban commuters. Likely because of the points made above (not even a cut, though). the back tire is a different story. Before I seem to have cracked the code with a modern uber-sealant, I had not infrequent flats in the back... sometimes sealed by my Sealant 1.0 (Slime) and sometimes too much for it to handle. But either way... we're talking nails, more nails and bits of steel. How did I miss them with the front and not the back? Simple: I didn't. The front is protected as described above. It rolls over, say, a nail and for lack of a better term just gives it a bear hug and keeps rolling. But... it also doesn't let go instantly. That nail is held onto for a fraction of a second, which means it goes airborne. Straight into the back tire.

So, on occasion while I was still riding fat tires I would hear the occasional hissHissHiss which would be my signal to jump off the bike, grab the needlenoses in the bag on my handlebars, pull the nail, then jump back on and ride, letting the sealant do the rest. Over the last year my puncture frequency simply went away. Now that I am running 'flatless' skinnier tires I haven't had any sort of incident since January 2021 at least, which is when the Bullitt became my daily driver. I crossed 2300 miles on it over the weekend.

front flats seem exceedingly rare, which illustrates both aspects of the principle. less weight, more likely to avoid an object.

i don’t believe the tire width / thickness / flat resistance is a linear relationship though, some things are going through a tire no matter what, so step one is avoiding the thing, which a skinny tire does well.

i’ve switched to tubeless on both my road bikes, and have never had a ride-altering flat, thousands of miles. my commuter has had many flats, extremely irritating ones given the motor and drivetrain design. my non-e road bike had a cluster of flats before i went tubeless on it, but overall still at a much, much lower per mile rate than the commuter given that it was seeing 500 miles a month vs 100.

 

[Jason Knight]

for an object which is sharp / strong enough to cause a flat on any bike tire, this doesn’t matter, but for an object barely able to penetrate a tire, the reduced load per square inch of the fat tire will help.

Makes sense. Odds of hitting higher, chance of damage lower. Wonder if why -- for me -- 26x2.25 seemed to always get flats more often. Large enough to increase the odds, sufficient pressure to make hitting things go worse.

 

[m@Robertson]

i don’t believe the tire width / thickness / flat resistance is a linear relationship though, some things are going through a tire no matter what, so step one is avoiding the thing, which a skinny tire does well.

After having been a fat tire commuter for something like 6 years, and now doing it on relative skinnies (26x2.0 Schwalbe Marathon Plus. and M+Tour, and belted Super Moto X on the front) and somewhere in the ballpark of 6-8000 miles on the fatties, I think in the final analysis there's no conclusion to be drawn. Or more accurately, there's no difference.

Part of this is because it is 2022 and we have products on the market now that can seal holes up to 1/2" on the fly. We have electric pumps that can run off the bike battery so no pumping. and fast refills to replenish a slowly sealing leak are easy. We have tubeless sealants (plural) that can do the same big-hole magic tricks so tubeless is no longer limited to fixing thorn and small nail holes, but can be counted on for anything that doesn't physically destroy the tire casing.

 

[tomjasz]

Florida insurance was a serious mess BEFORE the hurricane. Elected officials don't want to have anything to do with it.

Floridians have the elected officials they voted in and deserve…
At what point in the changing climate do we suggest there are places where substantial rebuilding with designs not able to survive hurricanes wont be insured or subsidized?

 

[AHicks]

Floridians have the elected officials they voted in and deserve…
At what point in the changing climate do we suggest there are places where substantial rebuilding with designs not able to survive hurricanes wont be insured or subsidized?

Suggest you bring that up with the guy that's been living there in a mobile home for the last 30 years? Insurance was reasonable then, but due to runaway costs and crooked contractors sueing the insurance companies (and winning) he can't buy flood insurance (at any price) - or be able to afford to move. This guy may have been fine when his place was built, but in the 30 years since, development has gone nuts with housing density rules change allowing WAY higher density - without the necessary drainage infrastructure improvements. The engineers and developers responsible are NOT elected officials, and the commissioners responsible for overseeing all this are some of the greediest (what's in it for me?) types imaginable. THEY say everything will be fine - until it isn't. Then they retire.....

Noteworthy maybe, is the fact many of these places (half?) are second homes. That being the case, you get no vote locally, and unless you're primary residence is also located in Florida, you get no say in what's going on anywhere in the state, even though you pay twice the taxes a full time resident pays.

Fema, in the case where a house has been flooded and the damage exceeds half the value of the home, won't give you a dime unless the house is rebuilt on stilts (pilings). That can get REALLY expensive, and in many cases (most?) is not totally covered by insurance companies - assuming you have insurance.

Bottom line, your comments are grossly over simplified. There's way more to it than what you see on the surface...

 

[tomjasz]

Suggest you bring that up with the guy that's been living there in a mobile home for the last 30 years and can't buy flood insurance (at any price) - or be able to afford to move. This guy may have been fine when his place was built, but in the 30 years since, development has gone nuts with housing density rules change allowing WAY higher density - without the necessary drainage infrastructure improvements. The engineers and developers responsible are NOT elected officials, and the commissioners responsible for overseeing all this are some of the greediest (what's in it for me?) types imaginable. THEY say everything will be fine - until it isn't. Then they retire.....

Noteworthy maybe, is the fact many of these places (half?) are second homes. That being the case, you get no vote locally, and unless you're primary residence is also located in Florida, you get no say in what's going on anywhere in the state, even though you pay twice the taxes a full time resident pays.

Fema, in the case where a house has been flooded and the damage exceeds half the value of the home, won't give you a dime unless the house is rebuilt on stilts (pilings). That can get REALLY expensive, and in many cases (most?) is not totally covered by insurance companies - assuming you have insurance.

Bottom line, your comments are grossly over simplified. There's way more to it than what you see on the surface...

It’s really a shame, I’d be devastated. Absolutely. But with the changes in storm intensity and the frailty of modular and mobile homes how can living there be sustainable if we believe the prognosticators and there w8ll be more storms and more violent storms? BTW we lived in on St Armand’s Key after living on St. Croix. We left both as we saw the weather issues, and knew we’d eventually lose. We went through a hurricane in the USVI. Our house survived without issue but no water, phones, and power was brutal. God said let there be light and nature said “nuttinall be so”.

 

[AHicks]

It’s really a shame, I’d be devastated. Absolutely. But with the changes in storm intensity and the frailty of modular and mobile homes how can living there be sustainable if we believe the prognosticators and there w8ll be more storms and more violent storms? BTW we lived in on St Armand’s Key after living on St. Croix. We left both as we saw the weather issues, and knew we’d eventually lose. We went through a hurricane in the USVI. Our house survived without issue but no water, phones, and power was brutal. God said let there be light and nature said “nuttinall be so”.

We're way off topic, so just briefly, I get your point. There's a good reason we bought 10 miles inland on ground that's about 80' above sea level. I love Florida, but there's no way I would want to get involved or have anything to do with some of these places built in low lying areas. Clearly, not all people think that way though....

Florida's insurance companies are in the midst of a real mess. One couple bought a really nice place with a huge mortgage, THEN they found out the insurance was going to be more than the mortgage payments.....

Oh, one last point. The insurance companies are not 100% to blame for the mess. A much clearer focus can be had if you check out the number of lawsuits against them, by fat cat lawyers and crooked contractors. Contractors call you up for a "free" roof inspection looking for hail damage. They go up on the roof, mess up a couple of shingles, take a few pics, and you get a new roof for free. This is a HUGE problem down there....

 

[Gordon71]

Desantis called it a 500 year flood. What will he call it when it happens again in a few years? Truth is, unless we do better, many places will simply be uninhabitable in the future.

 

[scottsdalecommuter]

I paid a decent amount for Tannus Armous inserts (over $100 total for 2 tires if I recall to be installed by LBS) and have been very pleased with them. They add some weight and definitely add rolling resistance which chews up a bit of battery but have given peace of mind. Since my bike doesn't have front shocks, they also had a bit of dampening effect which was nice. Would I buy them again? Yes, probably for the peace of mind alone. Knock on wood: Ill probably get a flat on my ride home from work today, lol

 

[AHicks]

Desantis called it a 500 year flood. What will he call it when it happens again in a few years? Truth is, unless we do better, many places will simply be uninhabitable in the future.

Except people will still be living there, and paying property taxes.

The only answer I see is for the government to buy all that property, bulldoze it, and THEN declare it uninhabitable, as in no building permits available....