I took the plunge! (new unicycle)

This was going to be a post about how I ditched my cheapo 20" for a new 24" Nimbus II and how they compared for learning for this hopelessly slow learner.

However, after receiving my uni last night and doing only a small amount of riding, it is too soon to report much except that the ride is much smoother.:slight_smile:

The problem is, this morning I discovered that the tube has a 12-inch gash in it! :astonished: Yes, let me repeat that: :astonished:

I have no idea how this happened and I know it can be replaced, but it is raining all day today and there is rain in the forecast all week.

Aargh!

Glad to hear you are still committed. Keep it up!

This week I’ve done my first free mounts on my 20". If I can do it so can you.

Sorry that my post was kind of low on content. I can actually give some information about the difference between learning on a 20 and a 24.

First, mounting was much harder. It’s bigger! I got so used to just stepping right onto the 20 with any support and now I have to really work at mounting using a fence and a block. It does get easier every time, though.

Next, I had to go back to a lot of dependence on the support until I got used to it. I think I’m almost back to my 20" comfort level now.

Last, you go faster . Duh, that’s why I got it! Not a whole lot, but you do go faster. It becomes most noticeable when you UPD. :wink:

One more thing, I was also considering the Torker LX, but decided on the Nimbus for a variety of reasons. I don’t regret the decision at all. My friend and I compared his Torker to my Nimbus side-by-side and we decided the Nimbus was better in every way!

Here is a picture of the tire disaster.

bad tire.JPG

Thanks! I was almost at the point of giving up. And congrats on your free mounts!

I hope to have more news later in the week.

Sorry about that tube… Ouch!

The good news is when you jump back on your 20 it will most likely be much easier to ride than it was before.

Keep it up! Keep practicing! Even if it’s only for 10 min. (this usually turns into 30 min.) The payoff is sooo worth it.

Id say for your next tube put more pressure in it if it was kinda low or less if it was extremely high. And be really careful not to slice it on the rim or any tools you use to put the tire on.

I’m not sherlock

But I’ll play detective anyway. Dahm Watson !, look at that tire ! It looks like someone slashed it with a knife. Except they missed the tube ? :thinking: A level of almost surgical precision lacking in vandals. I would say it was a cheap tire with a weak or damaged side wall, and or over inflated. Strange how the wall would rip without the tube popping. I wish I had a new tube for every time I heard a gunshot pow at the gas station while some gauge less biker was using the eye ball method to adjust their tire. Yours would be the first time I have seen the tire rip while leaving the tube inflated. :thinking:

You need to take a better look at the picture.

Yeah the tire definitely isn’t split, if you take a second to look at the picture you can see that the tire is unseated and what you are actually looking at is the split tube inside. They even said it was the tube which was split, they never mentioned the tire.

Correct. The tire is fine. Something happened to the tube. The picture shows it exactly how I found it, with the tire off the rim. :thinking:

And I’m 99.99% sure that nobody broke into a locked garage and a locked car and messed up a unicycle tube leaving the rest of the unicycle, car and garage untouched.

I think I had it inflated to about 45psi.

I know when i got my II for the first time, i pumped the tire to 60psi, since the tire said it could handle it. Rode down a hill, got a small bounce and BOOM! gunshot explosion!! The neighbors came out to see what had happened. I just pointed to the tire and shrugged. It didn’t quite look like that, but it was very similar. Now I keep my II at around 30psi +/- 5. Seems to work well at that range.

Interesting. Good thing I wasn’t riding it when it blew. I’ll try less air in the next one. 30? 35?

Maybe I’ll go now and see if the bike store has one.

I’d go with 30, i’m a bit heavy set (240ish) and 30PSI sits just fine with me. I can ride off curbs and hop a bit with that pressure. Once you start really doing tricks, i’d say drop the PSI down to about 25 or even 20 for a bit more bounce.

And yes, I was riding and it made a nice bit of air pressure smoke when it blew too. Was kinda cool.

Make sure there is nothing on the inside of the tire that could cut the tire. I’ve gotten several flats w/ fresh tubes because I ddn’t check the inside of the tire carefully enough. Never bigger than 1/2 an inch though. May have been at least partly do to a defective tube.

I bought a second hand 29 and a couple of days after buying it we were all checking it out over lunch at work riding round hopping and all was well. When I went to the back of the car later in the day the tyre had blown off the rim exactly like yours. Tyre fine, tube had a huge split in it. No idea why it should happen.

Just a quick thought. Was it very hot the day the tire blew? If it was really hot in the car, the air in the tire would have expanded and if the tire was near it’s limit, it might have been enough to cause it to blow.

Nope. It was actually quite cool. Upper 50’s, maybe a little warmer in the car. Let’s say 60.

I took off the tire and felt all around inside it and the rim and couldn’t find anything sharp or unusual. Unicycle.com said they’re sending me another tube. Now if the rain will only stop I can change my :frowning: to a :slight_smile: .