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Tube mountain bike tire won't seat properly in rim. Help needed.

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Speeder500

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Discussion starter · #1 ·
This tire is a large 26 3.00" knobby duro razorback wired tire, which I use a tube.

I can't get it to seat 100% in the rim. It gets about 85% in when filling up to 70PSI to try to get it to seat.

Both sides at the same location don't seat in properly.

You can see in the pictures of how it doesn't seat on the rim lip. The tires have a grove on the side that is supposed to sit on that.

Tires say max 40 PSI so now sure how much higher I can go to try and seat them.

Any tips or ideas on what I can try? Thanks.

EDIT: Just wanted to point out that I checked my worn out 26 x 2.6 same tire on another identical rim and that tire wasn't seated properly either and I never noticed.
I am wondering if it is even possible to now get this tire to seat 100% properly.

Can I just live with it like this?

Tire half seated and half not seated
L]

Tire not seated here


Tire seated correctly here
 
#2 ·
I assume you are using plenty of soapy water? I mount automotive tires as part of my occupation and can tell you there are much better lubricants available than soapy water. I have had tire not bead correctly and have rotated the tire then reinflated. I have also semi inflated the tire and physically man handled the tire on the bead. Some tire will seat on the bead if ridden @ an elevated pressure.
 
Discussion starter · #6 ·
J.B. Weld said:
Soap, high pressure (I'd stop at 50 or so) and tire pliers should do the trick.
Click to expand...
If I put on ear muffs and wear safety goggles. Is there anything unsafe about going as high as 100 PSI to see if I can pop it onto the rim? The rim is the toughest downhill rims you can buy, the MTX 39.

Will a wire bead tire really stretch anyway? These tires are really tough tires, they weigh 3.5 lbs each and have really reinforced side walls. They use moto cross technology in them, that is what Duro told me.

Will the Park tools tire pliers really work with such a wide 3" tire?

This guy in the video needed 75 PSI for his tire to seat. But he is using tubeless

I filled my tire at 60 PSI and going to leave it sit overnight to see if it does anything.

 
#7 ·
Speeder500 said:
If I put on ear muffs and wear safety goggles. Is there anything unsafe about going as high as 100 PSI to see if I can pop it onto the rim? The rim is the toughest downhill rims you can buy, the MTX 39.

Will the Park tools tire pliers really work with such a wide 3" tire?
Click to expand...
Too much pressure can sometimes break the casing and permanently deform the tire. I haven't worked in a shop for awhile so I can't recall if the pliers would fit that tire but they might, that tool is definitely the ticket for seating stubborn tires IME though.
 
#8 ·
I've had both warped-casing tires and ones that no matter how much soapy water and PSI was used, would not go on straight. I did not try heating the tire with a heat gun (be careful) or blow-dryer, while cooling the rim, but there's another possible method to do it.
 
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#9 ·
For years I've used a solution of dawn dish soap and water. Lube the rim and tire just before pumping it up. A compressor helps. And like others have said, wear ear plugs (muffs) and eye protection.
 
#10 ·
The tire pliers will fit tires that wide, but you'll need two hands to clamp them...so, you'll need a helper.

Over-pressurizing the tire is not a good idea from a couple of standpoints: one is the tire itself not being able to take the pressure, as mentioned, but also the rim. Pressure is an exponential function; I've watched someone literally bow a rim inward at the seam from inflating the tire too much (120psi in a 2" wide tire).

It was quite loud.
 
Discussion starter · #12 ·
Thanks for the tips everyone. I actually finally got it! And thankfully so because I stocked up on 9 of these tires.

This is what I did, I was trying a lot of things. But what seemed to work was simply inflating that tire to probably between 80-100PSI. My gauge on my compressor only goes to 60 and then stops at the 0 mark which is about 80. So I have no idea how much air I put in. Could have been over 100PSI.

I just put my safety goggles on and my ear muffs, and hoped for the best here.

I also used vaseline to lube the sides as the soapy water just seemed to dry up fast. Not sure how much that helped.

I also put the tire in the dryer but it cools down really fast so not sure how much that helped.

But what did it was just filling it up with PSI, waiting a bit, filling some more and finally I looked and the tire was seated correctly.

I don't know if filling it as high as I did which could have been more than 100 PSI is safe or not, but I am using the toughest and heaviest downhill rims on the market, and also the strongest knobby downhill tires on the market. These tires and rims should be able to handle much higher PSI compared to a typical rim or tire.

Rim weighs 760 grams, and tires weigh about 3.5 lbs each. As heavy as you can get.

Either way I had no choice because I was set on getting these tires mounted correctly.

Is there a possibility that I damaged my rim? Should I retrue it?
 
#13 ·
If it looks to run true still then it's probably fine.

Anywhere near 100psi seems crazy. I think the problem is that soapy water is relied upon by so many however it's simply insufficient and dries up too quickly. I've slipped a little bit of motor oil onto the bead once to help bead a tubeless tyre, it beaded up extremely easily, yet soapy water was achieving nothing.

I believe the auto tyre industry uses dedicated tyre lube, yet for some reason we MTBers persist using soapy water.
 
Discussion starter · #14 ·
Is Vaseline a decent way to lube the tire instead of oil or soapy water?

Will Vaseline work almost as good as oil? You see I don't want to make a mess of oil and have it potentially unglue my rim tape. Vaseline seems like a better idea.

Whith my tire finally mounted and seated corrently now and spun on the fork, I don't see any hops anymore so I assume it is all good. Not sure about the side to side true.
 
#16 ·
J.B. Weld said:
I'd never use oil or crazy pressures to seat a tire because both those methods could damage or destroy it.
Click to expand...
Oil would destroy what exactly? The wheel maybe from corrosion, I don't know enough about the chemistry and what oil could do to alu or brass etc however it's run through engines so I can only assume that it's designed to be friendly to it. The tyre? Well it only has to last the life of the tread and so far it has for me, and they come off still looking perfect. Keeping in mind that I'm talking about a tiny little bit applied using my finger along the bead.

Interesting tool, I didn't know it existed. That makes sense for the OPs situation, however I'm not sure it'd be much use trying to get a tyre to "slip" into place for tubeless inflation.
 
Discussion starter · #17 ·
J.B. Weld said:
I'd never use oil or crazy pressures to seat a tire because both those methods could damage or destroy it.

View attachment 1111477
Click to expand...
I don't really get how this tool would work, I mean wouldn't it push one side of the tire in and cause it to fall off the lip of the rim.

If this was certain to work I'd buy it, but I can't see it actually working.
 
#18 ·
Speeder500 said:
I don't really get how this tool would work, I mean wouldn't it push one side of the tire in and cause it to fall off the lip of the rim.

If this was certain to work I'd buy it, but I can't see it actually working.
Click to expand...
You grab the tire with it and pull the low spot up, you can't make it fall off the rim. As mentioned I haven't used it with a 3.0 but if you're handy with a welder you could make a custom pair out of bigger channel locks. Check out your lbs.

I can't count how many times I've used that tool, probably at least a dozen times a day for years. Believe me it works.
 
Discussion starter · #20 ·
Just need your advice again. The tire has sat in the rim fine even at the 18 PSI I use them at. I assume since I was able to get them mounted and seated properly that the rim and tire are fine and not out of spec.

My question is, should I really consider that tool? Or should I just fill the tire up to 100 PSI again. These are the most heavy duty downhill rims you can buy so I assume 100 PSI should be no big deal, the tire is also the most heavy wire bead duty tire you can buy also. I also got the last one on fine with no issues at 100PSI, so the rim and tire seem to take it.

What would you guys do? Just fill it up again to 100 PSI, or buy the $50 dollar tool?

I worry the tool will not work as these tires are so stiff weighing in at 3.5 lbs. If I knew the tool would work 100% I would consider paying the $50 dollars.
 
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J.B. Weld
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