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How to change tyres


Lewis

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Today saw a lot of tyre changing so I thought it might be of use to someone to document it

Obvivously axles stands should be used, care should be taken with airlines and hammers etc

Oh yeah - and dont put cars down on their discs - it makes it incredibly difficult to refit the wheels

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Removal

Firstly - get your wheel/tyre and deflate - a valve core removal tool helps greatly

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Then break the bead

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Working your way around the rim

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Untill the tyre is free from the rim

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Turn over the wheel/tyre and repeat the process

Then insert a large tyre lever between the bead and the rim, pull down and place a foot onto the lever to hold it in place. With your other foot hold the back of the tyre down away from the bead and insert the second lever, pull down to unseat the tyre. Take small movements of the lever to release a couple of inches of the tyre at a time

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Insert the lever between the tyre and the rim and pry the rim out - it should come out of the tyre fairly easily, if not use the above process but obviously you want to end up with the rim outside of the tyre not trapped between the beads

Result:

One tyre

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One rim

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Repeat on the other wheel/tyres

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Refitting

Apply tyre soap to both outer tyre beads and one inner to ease the fitting

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Lie the rim on the floor and place the tyre on top

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Walk or kneel the tyre into the rim

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Use your heels to stamp the bead into the rim, gradually moving around the tyre

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Once one bead is over the rim is it time to fit your inner tube if using them. Ensure that there are no twists in the tube, or debris inside the tyre as either of these things will reduce the life of your tubes. Fit a cable tie to the valve stem so that it cannot slip inside the rim whilst you are fitting the tyre

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These tyres were quite an easy fit - sometimes it will be neccessary to use the handle of a sledge hammer to tamp down around the bead. In other cases it may require the use of levers, or the head of the sledge hammer

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One tyre fitted

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If applicable refit your valve cores now

To seat the tyre bead onto the rim a good seal is required. Often this can be acheived by stamping the rim whilst supporting the tyre, this will seal one bead, then lean onto the top of the tyre and attempt to seal the outer bead whilst inflating.

When the tyre will not seat using this method a stout ratchet strap can be used around the circumfrence of the tyre to force the beads to seal, great care must be taken when doing this as the ratchet strap will be put under enormous tension very quickly as the tyre inflates.

A third option is to use a tool called a "Cheetah" which is really just an airtank with a large valve - the nozzle of the valve is held against the open bead of the tyre and then the valve is opened releasing 100psi into the tyre, this will quickly seat both beads.

Cheetah in use

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It is good practice to inflate each tyre to around 60psi to allow it to settle, regardless of what pressure the beads seated at. The tyre can then be inflated/deflated to the desired pressure. In these tyres we are running 14psi

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Refit your wheel/tyre assemblies to your vehicle ensuring that you tighten the wheel nuts to the specified torque, and recheck after a day or two of use

Lewis :)

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On many rims the internal lip to retain tubeless tyres has a "low point" usually opposite the valve hole in the rim. It is a hell of a lot easier to break the bead if you start there... so check the first rim you do and see where it is for the other three!

Before the health and safety police get tuned up, some will also say that you should only ever inflate tyres in a cage etc etc. I don't bother with that any more than I bother with axle stands when I am changing a puncture, but it is "the right thing to do" :) and having heard of tyres that have gone up through a roof when they exploded on the rim, I do stand back a bit further than I used to - it is probably about as much use as squinting when using the angle grinder but it makes you feel better :huh:

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On many rims the internal lip to retain tubeless tyres has a "low point" usually opposite the valve hole in the rim. It is a hell of a lot easier to break the bead if you start there... so check the first rim you do and see where it is for the other three!

Good tip - I'll have to remember that one

having heard of tyres that have gone up through a roof when they exploded on the rim, I do stand back a bit further than I used to - it is probably about as much use as squinting when using the angle grinder but it makes you feel better :huh:

Yeah thats familiar - when my mate was using the cheetah I was hiding behind the workshop stanchion :rolleyes:

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Really good and informative writeup!

Maybe one warning should be made - when dealing with wheels (rims) which can be divided (dont know what they are called in english) one should (obviously) always deflate the tyre completely before undoing the retaining bolts! It is quite surprising the number of people who manages to get themselves killed or injured by forgetting such an obvious thing.

One other comment regaring tubes - I always inflate and sequently defalte the tube when it is installed in the wheel to make sure it is free of any twists.

Walk or kneel the tyre into the rim

(....)

Use your heels to stamp the bead into the rim, gradually moving around the tyre

I take it has been a while since you have worked with 12 layer XZY-tires.... I will take a lot more persuasion than just a walk...

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Another tip: a high lift jack under the front of a vehicle can make a workable bead breaker (and would probably be even better if you made a new "foot" for it that was "bead breaker shaped" instead of using the normal "foot")

If changing split rim forklift tyres with a retaining ring (rather than bolt together rims which are basically safe) keep the hell out of the way during inflation because if the rings come off during inflation, they REALLY go for it and getting a belt round the head with a couple of kilos of steel ring propelled by 100psi would make most kinetic recovery accidents look quite tame :huh:

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Another tip: a high lift jack under the front of a vehicle can make a workable bead breaker (and would probably be even better if you made a new "foot" for it that was "bead breaker shaped" instead of using the normal "foot")

When removing the old tyres from the disco steel rims on the photo's above it was neccessary to use the landing legs of a loaded articulated lorry trailer to break the bead, not just in one place but inching around both sides of the rim :o

Alternatively my mate often uses the stacker truck/forklift to drive around the bead to break them, however with the pasting I was given in the 8274 thread about using equipment that a lot of people dont have access to I left those tips out of the write up above

Lewis :)

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When removing the old tyres from the disco steel rims on the photo's above it was neccessary to use the landing legs of a loaded articulated lorry trailer to break the bead, not just in one place but inching around both sides of the rim :o

Alternatively my mate often uses the stacker truck/forklift to drive around the bead to break them, however with the pasting I was given in the 8274 thread about using equipment that a lot of people dont have access to I left those tips out of the write up above

Lewis :)

Aharrrrr so we have caught you out and it wasn't as easy as it looked in the photos :P;) ;)

I must admit I have never tried breaking the bead on tubeless type rims (with the inner bead retaining hump - i.e. most wheels these days) using a high lift but it certainly works fine on ordinary Defender steels (tube type). I just use the tyre machine at work now which is much easier :)

Something else worth saying is that a lot of the newer low-profile alloy wheel/tyre combinations fitted to newer vehicles have a very, very shallow wheel well and you can more or less forget about doing them with anything other than a pro tyre machine - tyre levers are downright impossible. Even my Discovery 2 wheels are very difficult to do without a proper turntable machine, I'd say D3 wheels would be out of the question. Then again most D3 owners probably don't fix their own punctures :)

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I must admit I have never tried breaking the bead on tubeless type rims (with the inner bead retaining hump - i.e. most wheels these days) using a high lift but it certainly works fine on ordinary Defender steels (tube type). I just use the tyre machine at work now which is much easier :)

Work your way slowly round the tire with levers or crowbar. Push bead down and out. Usually takes three full circles before the bead lets go... Same procedure as used when breaking the bead on tubeless tractor tires... There is a specialized tool for this, cant rememer the name.

Totally agree though, it is much, much easier using the tyre machine!

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