BANG! lesson learned...

[ParkRNDL]

so tonight I'm picking away at the rust spots on this crusty '68 Panther, and it's getting late. I figure I'll clean up the front rim and put on the new Kendas tomorrow or Sunday, and before I call it quits for the night, I decide to take it out and cruise it up and down the block. I get two houses down and turn around, and then go a couple houses the other way and turn around, and just as I'm rolling back up to my driveway CRACK! like a gunshot. Dang. scared the bejeebers out of me.

yeah I'm actually really lucky that I was barely rolling and right outside my house. just walking it up the drive like this it got all tangled in the front fender. if it had happened 3 minutes earlier when I was rolling downhill and picking up speed... yeesh.

no more playing around on crunchy tires for me...

 

[Duchess]

Yikes, wow that one really let go—even the rim blew out! That's not messing around.

When I was a kid, the highish-functioning sociopath who (probably still) claims to be my father severely overfilled my mother's bike tires and one of them blew out while it was on the bike rack and, yeah, it was like a gunshot. I was amazed at how loud it was because I used to pop tires all the time and they just hissed (of course, I blew mine from skid contests and running over things, not overinflation). If I had grown up just a few blocks away, I'd have probably ducked under a parked car for cover.

 

[RustySprockets]

The rim is fine--what you see is actually the tire bead, draped loosely over the side. The wire hoop looks to be completely eroded and the cotton(?) cord carcass in a severe state of disarray. I think we've all had them pop from time-to-time, but rarely in such a spectacular manner.

 

[horsefarmer]

Couple years ago picked up a 1969 Schwinn lightweight. Original tire looked good, so I pumped 'em up to 65 psi and my wife and I went for a ride. After maybe 5 mi of pretty rough road, we made it to smooth blacktop then I heard a rubbing sound that got louder each time. I turned to look at the source (the rear wheel on the Schwinn) and the tube was pushing out the side of the tire! Then "bang", a 2" chunk of sidewall ripped free from the bead. The rim was rusty inside so at one time water got in and maybe rotted the tire carcass.

 

[Bigcam59]

I just had this happen to me at work...twice. first time I figured the tire wasn't seated right and put in a new tube, only to watch the bead sloooowly pull away from the rim. The second tube blew before I could deflate it in time. Turned out to be a defective tire.

 

[handyandy1100]

I had a tire blow out on me Saturday. Pulled the old Huffy Nel Lusso (with funky red tires from the factory) out to ride and found the tires were low on air. Over to the compressor we went. The sidewall said inflate to 40 to 65 psi. I started to air up the front tire and got it to just under 40. Hit the valve again to continue inflating and KER-POW! The thing exploded about 2 feet from my face. Tore the bead off the sidewall too.
Wasn't a big fan of the red tires anyway. Gave me an excuse to put different tires on it! LOL

 

[horsefarmer]

Back in the day, I stopped at a service station and aired up my 10 speed lightweight bike tires. Promptly blew both tubes. I believe the air compressor provided too much volume and ruptured the tube immediately. Hand pump provides much more control.

 

[Grant]

That doesn't even look like a tire anymore!

 

[Wildcat]

My brothers and I found a way to make a big bang without firecrackers. We had a refrigerator compressor modified to fill bike tires, although very slowly it worked great. We would take old tubes, tie off the bad part and let the compressor fill them until they blew up. Maybe a half hour wait sometimes. They would get huge before they blew.

 

[Rustinkerer]

Happened to me when I had my apartment at the beach 20 something years ago. And I parked my '57 Schwinn behind the couch. Of course, it blew at 2 am, I couldn't figure out what happened until I went to pull the bike out the next week! Also happened to a 31" tire on my Jeep, at 10pm. -Adam

 

[dropstep]

I had a tube blow recently sitting in my basement. I aired it up out in my garage and carried it in. Came upstairs and about 30 minutes later boom, scared the .... out of my wife and knocked the monark over