Re-inflating tyres post flight

[st599_uk]

Due to the difficulty with trains, engineering works, rail replacement buses and time off work constraints. a group of us are having to fly to Basel.

I'll be dropping the tyre pressure, just in case, but am wondering about re-inflating them. I normally ride with about 85 psi in the tyres. The little hand pump I have would struggle to get up to that. Basel itself is in the wrong direction and would add 90 mins to an already long ride on arrival.

Just wondering if there's a better portable pump, or if I can use the pump on a petrol station forecourt (I have the correct valves) to achieve 85 psi?

[Cyril Haearn]

Be very careful using a pump for car tyres, it might be very powerful, might burst your tyre in a moment
Some LBSs have airlines and even machines selling inner tubes

[roubaixtuesday]

I use (an earlier version of) one of these on tour. Excellent.

https://www.wiggle.co.uk/topeak-morph-mini-gauge-pump/

[Mick F]

I absolutely love my little Lezyne.
https://ride.lezyne.com/collections/han ... fdr-v204hp
Works like a miniature track pump and will get my tyres to 120psi.

https://www.wiggle.co.uk/lezyne-micro-f ... -abs-pump/

[HarryD]

My vote also goes for the Topeak Morph but the Road version with pressure gauge

[Marcus Aurelius]

I’d go for the Lezyne mini track pump thing. The one I have has a reversible valve fitting, so can do Schrader ( the ones you have ) and Presta valves. It’s easy to get well over 100 psi with one of those.

[thatsnotmyname]

I normally ride with about 85 psi in the tyres. The little hand pump I have would struggle to get up to that.

As others have said, I would avoid garage forecourt compressors. The only other thing to add is, if you ride at 85psi, why would you have a mini pump which cannot of re-inflate a tyre to that pressure?

[st599_uk]

I normally ride with about 85 psi in the tyres. The little hand pump I have would struggle to get up to that.

As others have said, I would avoid garage forecourt compressors. The only other thing to add is, if you ride at 85psi, why would you have a mini pump which cannot of re-inflate a tyre to that pressure?

It may be the speed at which I can pump it.

The larger higher capacity ones look good. Could they be attached to the bottle cage?

[thatsnotmyname]

I normally ride with about 85 psi in the tyres. The little hand pump I have would struggle to get up to that.

As others have said, I would avoid garage forecourt compressors. The only other thing to add is, if you ride at 85psi, why would you have a mini pump which cannot of re-inflate a tyre to that pressure?

It may be the speed at which I can pump it.

The larger higher capacity ones look good. Could they be attached to the bottle cage?

Depends on the pump. A Lezyne pressure drive would be ideal, will fit where you want it and will easily go over 100psi..

[simonhill]

I usually use garage air pumps when on tour. I pump to about 50 psi.

In 20 plus years doing this I have never had a problem, except once in the wrong way. In Thailand, it wouldn't put in any air. It just let it out and for some reason it wouldn't inflate, I think because there wasn't enough resistance. I found a motorcycle shop just up the road and pumped it up on their airline.

Has anyone had the postulated problem of using a garage airline? My multi, multi experience is no.

[willswitchengage]

Topeka Morph think is brilliant. There are other 'morph' style pumps but my Topeka has worked really well over the years and will get to over 100 psi without much excursion if that's what you fancy. Lightweight too.

When I used to work in a garage we blew up all kinds of stuff with the airline - even inflatable toys for the local kids as we were next to a river. A manual one is fairly easy to control.

Or just don't deflate your tyres. At worst case scenario and the hold isn't pressurised and the plane flies in a vacuum then there's an additional 1 bar pressure across the tyre carcass. Considering they'll be probably be at 7 or so bar already... it's in the noise. Never tried a test to failure but car tyres are 'blown' on at >double the normal rise pressure. I'm assuming risk of blowout is the reason they want you to deflate tyres, unless anybody knows otherwise.

[Navrig]

When we go for a cycling holiday I throw the track pump into the bike bag. It will fit within the rear triangle and doesn't take the bag over the allowance.

[rualexander]

Just leave your tyres inflated, unless someone official from the airline absolutely insists you have to deflate them.

[backnotes]

My first thought was CO2 canisters, and then soon after that I wondered if they may be banned on flights. Turns out it's not that simple https://forum.bikeradar.com/discussion/ ... -canisters and I am sure there will have been similar discussions on this forum. So that might work, or it might not!

Second thought is to email the bike shop closest to airport and either ask them nicely if you can use their track pump to top up, or buy a single CO2 canister, taking the CO2 adapter with you. OSM Cycle suggests that this shop https://veloalacarte.one/ is about 4km from the main entrance to the airport. So more like 30 mins round trip than 90 into centre of Basel and back.

My third thought was to idly wonder if there's a map marking public bike pump locations in Basel. Amazingly, it turns out there is. You can switch this map https://map.geo.bs.ch to English, and then if you go top left and select the "Transportation" theme, and then click on "Bicycle", and then expand that and click on "Bike Pumps" it claims to show locations of bike pumps with magenta icons. There's one shown at the corner where that closest Velo a la Carte bike shop is located, so maybe this means they have a public pump outside? The map even distinguishes between hand pumps, compressors and "unknown" bike pumps....

My final sad thought is that if Basel is anything like Cambridge, then when you get to the location of any of these public bike pumps, some charmer will have removed the head and / or the air hose and head, thereby rendering the pump completely useless.

PS If you are going on tour with a group, then at least one of you really will need to have a pump that can easily reach the required pressure anywhere, in the event of punctures in remote locations etc. And as above, it's not clear why you need to deflate the tyres to fly anyway!

[PDQ Mobile]

PS If you are going on tour with a group, then at least one of you really will need to have a pump that can easily reach the required pressure anywhere, in the event of punctures in remote locations etc. And as above, it's not clear why you need to deflate the tyres to fly anyway!

Um yeah, you can get a puncture even in France.
Surely a pump that will achieve what you need is kind of a must?

Something that copes with different valve (Presta?) types too maybe?
Not all garage airlines will inflate those, though continental bike shop's airlines in that region mostly will .

Or am I missing something or being old fashioned.