Flat Tire Woes – FTW!
I knew I was in a bit of trouble when I looked at the rear tire of my PX before I left the house. It wasn’t really flat but you could see it had very little air. I mustered all my courage to bring the PX all the way to gas station, basically riding on the handlebars, just outside or village. Once there filled it up with air (it was at 6 psi when I got there hehe) and went my merry way to the office.
I had a meeting setup later that evening so I left a bit early. Got to the basement parking, saw the scoot then BAM saw the PX basically resting on the rear rim. The tire was gone (or tube, to the nitpickers). Again I wondered if I could cheat my way out of it and run it to the gas station for air, but upon further inspection the tire was totally out of air, you could actually squeeze the tire and see the rim edges, it was kaput.
It’s been a while since I’ve changed a PX tire and I welcomed the challenge with open arms and a sweaty chest. I had no qualms doing it, I had the tools, I had the tire, I had my fantastic block of wood which acts as my jack. From the get go I was doing things wrong. As I was removing the spare tire from it’s place I realized, around 2 bolts too late, that I was removing the nuts. Instead of removing the nuts holding the tire to the mount I was removing the nuts that held the rims together. And sure enough, the rim went POP and split as I removed the final nut from the mounting bolt. So there was my spare tire on the ground with split on one side and the inner tube peeking out like entrails from long dead roadkill.
Argh. After giving myself a few seconds of WTF moment, it was clear what I had to do, remove the air from the tube slip the nuts back into the rim bolt and fix the darned mess I had created. This while my rear tire remains firmly planted on the rear rim of my PX. I could actually hear my PX say “What?” as I was doing all this.
The rest of the ordeal was pretty much straightforward, the block of wood worked it’s wonder, my ratchet again proved it’s darned expensive worth and bad tire off – semi good tire on. While all of this was happening I had a very curious maintenance guy looking over my shoulder and being rather amused at this sweaty man’s ordeal. I could have used the help bud!
None the worst for wear, it was done in good time. It was just a matter of getting started and instinct basically took over. It’s like riding a bike, or it’s like sex, though I don’t remember sex being this dirty and greasy………oh wait.
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