4" Sheetrock Screw diagonally right through my tire!

[doubledipsoon]

So I'm on my 314th eleven mile round trip, and the BBSHD is still way to good to be true, and continues to provided me with just another high octane mind-boggling experience. I'm coming down this hill at around 29 mph, and I've got a blown out rear tire in about 2 seconds. I pull over and check out my rear CST Heathen 26X2.25 with a 4" sheetrock screw sitting diagonally right through my pretty little knobby, and tube, with a little ooz of slime coming out of the puncture site. I wish I could have taken a picture of this artwork. 1 hr later, I was on my spare BBSH continuing where I left off. Watch those sheetrock screws!!!

 

[dogman dan]

Yeah, that's the thing, but you never can see them at 30 mph in time. One time I put a brand new rear tire on my commuter, and then half a mile from home, hit a bent up 3 inch framing nail. in the bottom and out the side. Got half a mile from that new tire.

The next day I walked that bit of road, and picked up about a half pound of nails and screws. Somebody had driven along dribbling shit all the way.

One reason I started riding 18 mph was much longer range, but the other was so I could have a chance to see those nails. The road has a nice bike lane, but nobody cleans it, so its full of sharp crap. Can't take a lane though, unless you go 45 mph.

 

[wturber]

Note the pattern. Rear tire punctures from these long things. Front tire kicks it up and the rear tire gets the puncture.

 

[doubledipsoon]

Yeah, these bike lanes are swept about once a year- shows how much "they" care about accommodating bikes. I mean, when you have thousands of cars per month speeding down the road, it's inevitable that bike lanes get littered with all types of garbage. Of course, then there's the old line of wisdom, "want to get hit by a car? -take a bike lane". I mean, with all the mobile devices producing distracted drivers, you'll definitely have many opportunities to get hit from behind. I know I have. That's why I face the traffic. Hey, I actually got pulled over by a cop for "riding on the wrong side off the road". He gave me a $187 ticket. I guess he didn't buy my excuse about getting hit by an opened door swinging right in my face. I say, take matters into your own hands, and create your own rules. Besides, no one "REALLY" cares if you become a statistic anyway, right?

 

[e-beach]

Yea, I had one of those once. I got about 70 miles on a $65 dollar tire. I was on my way to a big box hardware store when I got rear flat. Turns out I had picked up a 3 inch drywall screw that went into the bottom and came out the sidewall right at the edge of the rim. It actually knocked a 1/16 inch notch into the rim. When I got home I tried to patch the tire from the inside, but it had been so weirdly damaged it still bulged. I ran the tire and rim for a couple hundred miles more before the tire bulge was interfering with my brake pads. And the rim has started to crack at the notch in the rim.

One would think that tire manufactures would find a way to make steel belted e-bike tires.

 

[wturber]

Yeah, these bike lanes are swept about once a year- shows how much "they" care about accommodating bikes. I mean, when you have thousands of cars per month speeding down the road, it's inevitable that bike lanes get littered with all types of garbage. Of course, then there's the old line of wisdom, "want to get hit by a car? -take a bike lane". I mean, with all the mobile devices producing distracted drivers, you'll definitely have many opportunities to get hit from behind. I know I have. That's why I face the traffic. Hey, I actually got pulled over by a cop for "riding on the wrong side off the road". He gave me a $187 ticket. I guess he didn't buy my excuse about getting hit by an opened door swinging right in my face. I say, take matters into your own hands, and create your own rules. Besides, no one "REALLY" cares if you become a statistic anyway, right?

Differences in closing speeds and the risk of not being seen because drivers are looking for cars coming from the opposite direction are good reasons to ride with traffic, not against it. And the stats support this position. When you start looking at actual accidents and their frequency, it becomes pretty clear that riding against traffic is not generally a good idea. There are definitely exceptions. But a rider should be careful to avoid rationalizing and make sure that the case for the exception is pretty clear. Keep in mind that cyclists getting hit from behind account for less than 5% of bike/car collisions.

http://www.bicyclinglife.com/Library/riskfactors.htm

But that's just the baseline stats for most people. IMO, the idea is to skew the stats even further in your favor by choosing safer routes and maintaining high levels of situational awareness.

 

[dogman dan]

30 mph the wrong way. Someday somebody is going to step right in front of you, looking for cars the other way.

I have considered mounting a small broom just in front of the rear tire, or some kind of flexible deflector that almost touches the ground. The front tire tips up the nail, and then it gets the rear, every time.

Instead I just started riding slower, once I was no longer commuting. When I want fast, I hop on motorcycles now.

 

[doubledipsoon]

Yeah, there's no one right way to do it, especially if cars weigh a ton, and your little cool ebike weighs in at around 50 lbs. I believe it was Einstein who said E=mc2, so he's got the last word on who wins in a car vs ebike scuffle, for whatever reason. I just heard the latest statistic on pedestrians vs cars- it not rocket science to know that roads are evidently here for cars and trucks, (and mobile devices), and not for bikes or pedestrians, no matter how safe you try to make it. I mean, it was the HAL 9000 computer who said, "it is always attributable to human error", and there's plenty of that out there, intentioned or unintentioned. So when I get on my ebike, I ASSUME I'm going to be hit- that's what keeps me alive! Oh, and, by the way, riding on the right side of the road didn't do me any good when that semi pulled up behind me!

 

[wturber]

Yeah, there's no one right way to do it, especially if cars weigh a ton, and your little cool ebike weighs in at around 50 lbs.

But there are better and worse ways. So it is good to try to figure out the better ways. Looking at what happens to many others and why seems like a useful approach to me. But, of course, there are no guarantees. People traveling in steel cages get killed too - even when they are driving on the correct side of the road and using seat belts and airbags.

 

[wturber]

I have considered mounting a small broom just in front of the rear tire, or some kind of flexible deflector that almost touches the ground. The front tire tips up the nail, and then it gets the rear, every time.

Yeah. A flexible "cowcatcher" shaped device might work. And you'd want it low and fairly close in front of the tire. As it is, the tire in a tire approach has gotten me over 5000 miles without a puncture. So I'm sticking with that for now. But that won't help with a 3" screw through the sidewall.

 

[miro13car]

Open bed vehicles
NAmerican speciality
open bed vehicles
That is where from al this garbage comes from
Nobody opens sedans door and throws screes,nails on the road.
Screws,nails,cardboard boxes,pieces of garbage

 

[markz]

need sum pics bro

 

[amberwolf]

Nobody opens sedans door and throws screes,nails on the road.
Screws,nails,cardboard boxes,pieces of garbage

Yes, they do, though it's usually the window, not the open door.

Some just toss out literal garbage anything from paper bags and wrappers of fastfood/etc to glass beer bottles.

Some just throw out objects that someone else in teh car wants but the other chooses to keep away from them (sometimes these are "adults" rather than children)

But there are a very very very few that actually choose to sabotage others with materials that would damage things like tires, etc.

An equal few actually throw those things (from garbage to bottles to even larger and heavier stuff) at pedestrians and cyclists and other vehicles/etc.

I've seen all these happen numerous times over my decades on the roads.

 

[miro13car]

Open bed commercial trucks once they got to speed - all those debris start to fell off,
I saw it in my own eyes.
Saw big empty cardboard boxes thrown on the streets couple of times.
Trucks from costruction sites with all those hardware left after they finish the job...
Of course very few would throw houshold garbage
You see problem are sharp hardware

 

[amberwolf]

sure, that happens a lot and is the likely source of most of the stuff.


but what i pointed out is that it is not *only* that, and that your never-others statement in a previous post isn't true.