Ok, that's it.

[mimitabby]

how much air are you putting into the tires?

My DH put 120 lbs of air into the tires for my hybrid and I got flats 2 days in a row. the second day I noticed that the poor tube had been trying to squeeze through the spokes holes.
THen I asked him how much air he was putting in. I think max for those tires was 70lbs.
that solved that problem.

[Grog]

I support the rim hypothesis.

My sweetie had lots of flats and I got sick of waiting on the side of the road. I grabbed the wheel, pulled off the tire and inspected the rim. The tape was all over the place, not protecting the tube at all. I rearranged the tape temporarily and then he got new rim-covers (sort of a latex band, instead of simple tape...).

[Meg McKilty]

No, no, no. We checked it all.

The tire, the tubing, no tire wall pinching the tubing, one flat was near the valve, the other simply blew (and my ears ached for several minutes),a nd no this one refuses to stay inflated for more than about an hour. I can only imagine how long I was riding on a flat yesterday.

The tires can hold 87-120 psi. We usually put about 100 in, but we put 90 in it just to see. Seemed stable until later in the ride.

Now, I haven't gotten to the water and bucket thing- lazy American?

[Grog]

Another silly thing I can think of:

a bad batch of tubes.

Or just plain bad luck.

[Wahine]

I bought a batch of bad tubes once. I buy tubes by the box. I was getting 1 or 2 flats per week. Switched to different tubes, no problem. Not true, I still get a lot of flats. But I attribute it to back luck and a lot of hours on the bike.

[CyclaSutra]

I had six flats in one spring until I got my rim tape re-taped... one shop just re-installed the same old tape. First a hit-the-rock blowout of the tire off the rim and then... Two more flats. So I went to a different shop and whined until they put new rim tape on AND THEN put ELECTRICAL TAPE over the rim tape. Double protection against those nasty spoke holes. Few hundred/about a thousand miles, no more flats. I now strap duct tape on all my seat posts for emergency cover-the-spoke-hole incidents.

Sometimes it's just bad luck, sometimes it's figuring out a pesky mystery. Good luck!!!

[Starfish]

I just had 4 flats in 4 rides, and I could NOT find the problem. Finally, however, I did. It was inside the tire, but barely visible...one little thread or wire of the tire was not perfectly flush with the tire...it just barely poked up, and only when I flexed the tire a certain way.

After I found that spot, I thought that surely booting it would do...but no. Another flat. Got a new tire today.

[makbike]

Have you closely inspected the inside of the tire to make sure there is not a tiny piece of glass or metal present? I once found a metal wire sticking through just enough to reach the tube, hence my repeated flats.

Hope you undercover the reason soon!

[SouthernBelle]

Hi all,

We've used different brands of tubes from different shops, the holes have been in differing spots. I haven't looked at the last tube. We used one of my old tires that's still ridable just to use a different tire.

A couple of things have come to mind since I talked to Meg.

1. She may need new rim tape. This is an older Bianchi probably never been replaced.

2. When we were futzing around with the defective tire, it had an ear-splitting blowout right after we aired it up. Could a blowout of that nature have damaged the rim.

3. OK, more than a couple, this bike had larger tires, I think they were 700x28, we are trying to work with 23s or my old one is a 25. It seemed to clinch on OK, but could it be that these rims are too wide for that tire.

random thoughts,