New ones are fine and seem to go up with a track pump, but how do I inflate a tyre that’s already been used, has a slightly distorted bead and just takes a while lot of effort to inflate enough to seat.

I guess i’m after a good recommendation for a suitable compressor or track pump. I have a cheap go outdoors track pump but it just doesn’t seem to put out enough air in a single stroke to do the job. Are more expensive ones better in this respect, or should I just resign myself to an hour of hard (futile) effort each time?

I don’t want to go down the co2 route as it just seems wasteful and too expensive.

Do a search on here for ‘ghetto tubeless’….

without an airline, if it goes up first time then go and buy a lottery ticket as your lucks in 🙂

If it’s bent / out of sorts fit it to a wheel with a normal tube, pump to the remommended max, leave it a few days, then try again.

Cheers 69er, there’s a thread from yesterday that seemed to conclude that I should buy a compressor. I do quite a bit of diy so maybe not such a bad idea.

our mechanic put a 26″ tube round the seated tyre and blew it up with a hand pump 😯

I’ve never had a problem with schwalbe and maxxis on stan’s rims (once I’d figured out to seal the holes in the rims on my Arches!) but you can save a few minutes pumping by getting an old lemonade bottle, some tubing like windscreen squirter tubing, and a couple of old presta valves, and putting the de-cored valves in the bottle cap and connecting it all to a track pump. Pump the lemonade bottle to 80psi with a kink in the tube, release the kink and hey presto tyre pops onto rim first time. There are some pics of similar setups on here if you search. I take no responsibility for you blowing your ears/eyes out if the lemonade bottle bursts 😈

I’m thinking a ‘ghetto compressor’ has got to be a bit of fun.

assuming you have one of these (or similar)

and a car already then,
get 2 of these

one of these

then take the spare tyre from the car and remove the valve core, connect one of the pump fittings and the other end to the y piece. connect the pump to the y piece and connect the last pump fitting between the y piece and the tubeless tyre to be inflated, having spliced one of these
into the pipe

Now, close the camel back valve, pump the car tyre to 65psi, then open the camelback valve and……wooosh! sEAT THE TUBELESS TYRE (hopefully!)

the bits will cost about 30 quid, I think, if you hunt around.

I’ve not tried it yet though…so can’t guarantee anything!

edit:
same principle as the pop bottle…just a bigger volume and a bit more robust.

Oldish tyres can be hard work from time to time, depends on the state of them. I’ve always managed to get them up with a track pump, narrowly missing a cardiac arrest on 1 or 2 occasions. Valve core out is helpful if you get the missus to hold the pump adapter on whilst you give it plenty. The method of inflating with a tube to seat the tyre mentioned above, then deflate and carefully take one side off, is another good one.

Ghetto compressor sounds like a good wee project – worth a try if you’re using a lot of non-UST tyres.

Well following bigjim’s suggestion I used a second bike tyre. I removed the valve core and put it in one end of a length of washer hose then attached the other end on to the coreless valve stem and inflated to 60psi. Once inflated used some mole grips to kink the hose.

Removed the valve core on the tyre to be inflated and attached the other end of the hose. So now I have 2 tyres attached to each other via washer hose with only the mole grips preventing equalisation of pressure.

Removed the grips and seconds later I have 2 inflated, and most importantly seated tyres. Removed washer house and both tyres inflated no problems using the track pump.

Thanks all for your help.

our mechanic put a 26″ tube round the seated tyre and blew it up with a hand pump

Awesome tip – thanks. Just set up 2 wheels tubeless today and that tip worked a treat. Both went up straight away with a track pump.

our mechanic put a 26″ tube round the seated tyre and blew it up with a hand pump

roofrack straps around the circumference of tyre do same job aswell- they hold the bead down so it seals better.

Don’t forget the washing up liquid solution around the bead to help the tyre bead slip into position… makes a big difference for me…

I just bought a compressor….

@ neninja

I can’t picture this…
do you just stretch the tube over the top of the tyre and leave it there as a ‘constraint’ on the central part of the deflated tyre whilst you pump it up?
ta.

ah. Scruff just answered this for me. going to try it tonight!
potentially the best tip ever – will report back.

I got round to making my ‘ghetto compressor’ eventually, so I thought I’d post a photo of it in use tonight.

1m of syphon tubing, a T-piece, a schreader valve from an old tube, an in-line valve, and 2 topeak pump chucks. drill the valve out of one pump chuck (so it allows the car spare to empty), remove valve core from car spare, assemble as shown, pump to 40psi (takes a while!) open inline valve and …..fizz, fizzz, pop! tubless tyre is seated. fizz, fizz, slosh, slosh, fizz…slosh and …seal 😀 cost me about 15 quid for the bits I think, but works great and should last for a long while. I’m pleased with it.

Inflate tyre first with a tube in (leaving it inflated for a while can help btw). Then unmount the tyre from one side only, leaving it beaded on the other. Remove tube, fit valve, refit tyre, inflate. Half the job is already done and the other half is made easier by having been recently pushed into shape.