Last updated on July 1, 2026
My First Repaired Flat(Click for full size…)
I repaired my first bike tube flat today. I was able to use one of the wide patches to cover both holes from Saturday when a sheet metal screw damaged my tire, tube, and rim.
Repairing a flat tube seems to be pretty easy. I just removed the valve stem, flattened the tube, cleaned the area with isopropyl alcohol, scuffed it up with sandpaper, cleaned it again, applied the rubber cement, waited for that to dry, peeled the patch from the backing, solidly squished the patch in place peeled the protective top layer off, and called it done.
I then pumped up the tube a bit and let it sit for a while to see if it’d lose pressure, and it didn’t. I then re-flattened it, folded it up, tucked it in an old sock, and put it in my bag as a spare. Yay!
That’ll do it. I let them sit for an hour if I have the time. Bonus points for clamping it in a vice for the first few minutes. Once it bonds, if you try to pull it off you’ll just rip the tube; the patch is stronger.
I’ll probably do the vise thing next time… I’d forgotten that my benchtop one has rubber jaws, and was thinking that the only ones handy (drillpress and bench) are serrated jaw, and that wouldn’t be good. I ended up solidly pressing / rubbing it with the plastic end of a screwdriver handle. The patch is a little stiffer than the tube itself, but it seems like it’ll be pretty okay.
I don’t squeeze the crud out of it; you never want to squeeze all of the cement out of a joint, but the vice just holds everything together uniformly while the rubber vulcanizes. Just snug. Those patches actually are really good and will almost certainly form a perfectly good bond with no help from a vice, but if I’m patching at home and have time, I use the vice just because.