DIY tyre inflator made out of old Lemonade bottle (for tubeless) – how?!!!!

I read on here a while back about several people who’d made crude versions of CO2 cannisters, out of lemonade bottles and using floor pumps, to inflate tyres (radidly) when doing tubeless

anyone done this and got instructions on how to do it?!

thanks-advance

and yes, I know it’s on the dodgy side!!!!

Dodgy? Sounds like genius! I don’t run tubeless (yet?) but have wondered about using a spare from the car for a similar effect. A mate has a bleed kit that uses pressure from a car spare to push fluid through.
Pop bottle, UST valve fastened/glued into the lid for pressure vessel. Then the tricky bit, hose from vessel to bike wheel…

I just use a track pump, I don’t quite understand all the excitement.

Got it, two track pump heads and a track pump hose, fasten to bike wheel, then onto pop bottle. Dunno if volume of pop bottle would be enough though.

glass bottle, petrol, er..

You could use lighter fluid like the 4x4ists do in iceland, squirt some inside the tyre, light and hey-ho the tyre is popped onto the rim and inflated instantly…

Or buy a compressor.

No one up for the engineering challenge then (I mean scrapyard challenge didn’t solve real problems, still fun though?)
🙂

I like the idea of igniting lighter fluid in my wheels. 😀

I use a spare rim & tire with innertube inflated to about 80psi (or maximum stated on the side of the tire). Transfer hose made from a floor pump hose with a head on each end. Seat the tubeless tire on the rim & add sealant, soap it up as per instructions on the pack, hook up the transfer hose and then connect it to the previously inflated spare tire. A bit of hissing and popping and you should have a tubeless tire inflated to about 40psi. Inflate or deflate as necessary!

Have thought about a lemonade bottle with the same system, they can take up to about 100psi. A tire volume is around 4 litres so a 2 litre lemonade bottle at 100psi should be able to inflate the tire to about 30psi. That should be enough to seat the bead on the rim, then top it up with a foot pump.

This works fine with a rim strip, but if you are running ust rims, using this method it can be a bit tricky. To make it easier though, I have found that if I inflate the tire with a tube first (to seat the bead), then pop off one bead and take the tube out, proceed as before with the sealant and air transfer and it goes on a lot easier. Seems to strech the tire into shape ready for tubeless.

Hope this helps!

car powered electric compressor does it nicely without all that malarky

I copped out and bought a CO2 inflator when the track pump wasn’t getting them sealed first time, even with the cores removed. But it can#’t be that hard can it?:

Drill 4mm hole in cap of empty lemonade bottle, unscrew cap, insert old presta valve chopped off an old innertube, you might want a dab of superglue or something to seal it to the cap. Reinstall cap, inflate, use as directed above.

If we drank pop that’s what I’d have done.

I use a mini-pump.
It’s great.

i managed to get Conti UST’s to inflate with a mini pump

cant egt high rollers to inflate even going like the clappers with a track pump!

How much pressure can a car tire take? I imagine 80psi in one of those should be enough, but will it end in disaster?

Has anybody else here actually made one? I suspect the OP might have been referring to me, as I do have a lemonade bottle compressor (made it back in the days when Stans simply gave DIY instructions – there were no rimstrips back then, hence it was harder to get sealed).

Valve attached to the bottom. Valve with core removed attached to the lid. Tube ziptied onto coreless valve. Plumbing valve. Track pump chuck. Gaffer tape reinforcement. Pump to 100psi. Jobs a goodun.

BANG!

aracer – looks shonky but functional! That answers the questions I’d been thinking. The separate valves on the bottle and then the plumbing valve, and it all makes sense.
Whatever people say about being easy with minipumps etc, getting tyres to inflate tubeless seems to depend totally on the tyre and rim combination. The tighter the initial fit the better. In my experience Bontrager are easy, Maxxis aren’t.

looks shonky but functional!

I’ve never felt the need to show off an immaculate home-made compressor!

I find new tyres work fine with a track pump – old tyres often need this. It also helps to remove the valve core when using this, as the air gets in quicker (not something you can do with a track pump).

those pop bottles are rated up to a pretty high pressure, so should be fine, though when they DO go they are gonna pop in a BIG way.

ill stick with tubes myself, dont see what all the fuss is about, and never heard of anyone NOT complaining about how tubeless is a pain in the back bottom.

“You could use lighter fluid like the 4x4ists do in iceland, squirt some inside the tyre, light and hey-ho the tyre is popped onto the rim and inflated instantly…”

You need to use liquified butane or propane lighter gas, not plain lighter fluid. Fluid will just burn and will not create a ‘rush’ of expanding gas, whereas the liquified gas will be changing from the liquified to gaseous state and then igniting it will create a sudden expansion of hot gas that will (possibly) pop the tyre on.

glenh – Member

BANG!

if anyone has access to some dry ice, there’s lots of fun to be had with a big pop bottle

*disclaimer – good lord no, I was kidding! not my fault if you kill the cat/blow your fingers off*

never heard of anyone NOT complaining about how tubeless is a pain in the back bottom.

Only if you use normal tyres and/or rims.

Proper tubeless rims and tyres (either ust or just tubeless bead) go up with zero problems.

this old plant sprayer works a treat

how does that work?

the handle on top is a pump to pressurise the bottle
ive removed the original spray nozzel and the pipe is a perfect fit on to a valve it works just like the pop bottle compressor above

but how do you stop the air coming out before it is up to pressure?

there is a tap half way down the pipe (green thing on pic)

I have been thinking about how to do a home made compressor for a few weeks now. Yesterday, I realised I had one already while spraying paint on a fence. Rob, you just confirmed it works!

My grandad used to have a brilliant setup for seating tyres onto rims (car tyres, but the principle’s identical) He had an old truck tyre on a wheel, which he’d pump up to a decent pressure. Then, he used a double ended tyre hose (ie, each end of the hose had a valve connector). One on truck tyre, one on new tyre, open valves, pop! Air escapes old tyre, runs into new tyre. The exact same thing would probably work with a car tyre- your spare maybe- though there’d be less volume.

Wot? No home chemists on here??

Set ya soda pop bottle up with a couple of spoons of Baking soda (sodium bicarbonate) in the bottom. Pour some vinegar into the bottle and slap the top on quick smart. Use a hose to connect to valve…

Instant CO2 at a good rate!! 😆

If I get bored I might even try this out one time. The good old track pump has worked every time for me so far!

genious!

I had considered using cheep cola and bi-carb with a second bottle packed with something to trap the inevitable entrained sticky mess, but never got arround to trying it.

I like the plant spray idea. I have one of those…
al.

I've seated truck tyres with acetylene.
About a four second blast from the welding torch, step back and poke it with a bit of burning paper on a long stick.
Works a treat.

Really, really don't go pumping car tyres up to silly pressures. If a car tyre lets go on you, it could easily kill you. I wouldn't be happy about 80psi in an MTB tyre either.

A dirt cheap compressor will do the job for £60. A CO2 cartridge will do it for a quid a pop. Not worth making up your own "ghetto" sytem of doing things unless you know it's rated for the pressure.

Most rims will give up before the tires will. Think it was Halo who used to rate their tires for 100psi claiming they wouldn't go higher in case someone running v-brakes wore the rim down.

Can't see a normal car powered compressor being much cop, the ones I've seen are painfully slow. Trackpump would be much more effective. You need a compressor with an air tank, so as above you are looking at £60 and up.

CO2 canisters are the easy and cheap option unless you are serial tyre swappers.

Think I used too much rocket lighter fuel.
Tyre went on fine – well it seems to look ok through the Hubble Telescope.

have you tried putting a strap/loop round tyre, forcing middle of tyre into rim well (by tightening loop) and encouraging sides towards rims then pumping like crazy

as children we made flame throwers out of really cheap(very thing easily compressed) gallon plastic containers, so could you fill one of them up, seal it to the tyre them jump onto it going for the big bang approach

I had lots of failed attempts getting my high rollers to seat with a track pump. Even with the strap round the tyre, it just wouldn't seat.
A mate suggested using a garden sprayer, as it had worked for him, and yeah it worked- only just though and with a bit of modification.
You have to get max flow out of it by removing the tube and filter from inside the bottle, loosely taping over the pressure blow-off valve and pumping it up to way past what is probably safe (safety glasses might be a good idea!)
I removed the spray head and pushed on the valve and tube off of my track pump on to the sprayer tube and pulled the trigger…. Not exactly explosive but constant pressure, something you cant get with a track pump – up she goes……thank ****!!

Why bother with a compressor when you've get a pop bottle, a bit like

who needs scaffold anyway