Mounting tubeless gravel tires on hookless rims: OK, I give up.

[Onno]

Get a compressor! Mounting tires with a compressor is the easiest thing you will ever have done with a bike, and quiet ones start at about 200 dollars. I had a couple of blast pumps, and they worked, but always with lots of fuss, and one of them broke after a year.

[Mikej]

Originally Posted by dolface

Leave it on the rim and set it out in the sun for ~30 minutes to warm up/get hot. Then do the soapy water and try again?

This is the best advice if you don’t have a compressor.

[prototoast]

Originally Posted by dolface

Leave it on the rim and set it out in the sun for ~30 minutes to warm up/get hot. Then do the soapy water and try again?

Won't the tire expand more than the rim, making it looser and thus even harder to get seated?

[bshell]

[QUOTE=EB;3428885]Completely tire dependent. The tires and rims I use, I can easily seat with just a floor pump (hookless or not). Definitely not verging on impossible. If the tires won't seat with a floor pump, I swear off that brand and look for different tires. I do not have time in my life to devote to difficult tubeless combos.

I asked and you delivered. And missed the point even though you're also making it.

[Hilltopperny]

Wrap another layer of tubeless tape and that should alleviate your problem without going to extreme measures!

Sent from my Pixel 6a using Tapatalk

[dolface]

Originally Posted by prototoast

Won't the tire expand more than the rim, making it looser and thus even harder to get seated?

Maybe I misunderstood the issue? "but it's not fitting tight enough to the sides of the rim to seal enough to pump up the tire to get it to seal to the rim, no matter how fast or hard I pump"

[benb]

Also be very wary of manual bike pumps that charge unless you really need to be able to mount tires without power. Some of them cost as much as a compressor. For the $ the compressor has way more value.

[BumbleBeeDave]

I'll loo through all of this and try it again. But with my current commitments I can't give it another go till next week But fortunately I have another set of wheels already ready to go that I ca use this weekend.

BBD

[jpsawyer23]

Another thing to try that basically works for me every time is to seat the tire with a tire lever first before going at it with a pump. Basically with the tire mounted, run the tire lever between the bead of the tire and the rim pulling it to the outside of the rim bed. It's hard to describe, but you just wanna pretend you're almost taking the tire off. If the tape is slippery with sealant or soap, it helps to clean it off first. you won't be able to fully do both sides but I just do as much as I can on making sure it's seated around the valve. I've had very good luck with this.

[tellyho]

If the fit isn't tight enough, I always add more tape. I feel like most setups need to be tweaked somehow in this fashion.

Also, a compressor definitely makes getting the tire seated easier, BUT if you really can only do it with the compressor, a trailside fail will mean that your only fix will be a tube.

[HenryA]

Originally Posted by prototoast

Won't the tire expand more than the rim, making it looser and thus even harder to get seated?

The heat from the sun makes the tire softer, flexible and so, easier to get a seal at the bead.

[cequip]

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When I first started tubeless 7-8 years ago, it was a scene for a sitcom. All kinds of bad words. I could take 2 ounces of sealant and have it all over myself, all over the garage. It would take two long nights after work to get two tires on. Much practice sure has helped. I tried a few different devices similar to this, have used air compressor (too much air I thought) and this Airshot and lots of practice has turned two stubborn tires into a calm, clean half hour process with the Airshot maybe needed half the time. Good luck!

[NateFrentz]

+1 for the airshot... hate needing so many gadgets taking up space but this one is worth it

[eri]

So much good advice in this thread.

In my experience road tubeless is a lot more difficult to seat than modern mtb. When I first tried road tubeless I had to page in a bunch of skills from yesteryear.

On mtb I won’t use tires that I can’t seat with a hand pump but for road that just hasn’t yet been possible for me.

I have a high flowing air compressor with a regulator I trust and seating tubeless is pretty much instant.

For lube I do wipe the rim with a wet rag before seating a tire, I leave the tire inflated with sealant over night, then expect a few days of repressurizing and adding sealant until the tire holds air over night. The high pressure road tires are much more finicky than mtb tires.

[RoosterCogset]

Originally Posted by NateFrentz

+1 for the airshot... hate needing so many gadgets taking up space but this one is worth it

What is it about a compressor or airshot or the like that make seating possible. Is it the speed with which air goes into the tire? How do you control though how much pressure is going in -- for example if a rim is only rated to hold (like the Pinnacle hookless) a max of 65psi, how do you avoid damaging/blowing up a rim if the air is flooding in so fast and could otherwise inflate to eg. 100psi -- turning off the air flow quickly enough before that happens?