Lidl cycle bit of handy gear

[Yellow Saddle]

I've never really understood the wheel balancing argument against sealant , my bike wheels are unbalanced anyway so with a bit of luck a puncture in the right place should make things better

You are right, to an extent. An unbalanced wheel on a road bike just cannot be felt, no matter how bad. However, on a mountain bike the picture changes. The tyres are so much larger that one of those golf balls in there is much larger than what can form in a road bike's skinny tube. When they get to that size I've pictured, they can be felt. It doesn't feel like an unbalanced wheel in a car - typically a shaking steering wheel if on the front wheel and a vibration in your seat when it is the back wheel. It is a fore-aft feeling as if something is pushing the bike forwards and backwards are a frequency somewhere like 10Hz. With a suspension bike the feeling doesn't change. The stiction in the fork and shock overcomes the wheel moving up and down quickly. However, the fore-aft shake is still evident.

The brands that cause the problem are not as important as the substance. There are three or four basic compounds used in sealant. The two that cause the problem are latex-based (like Stan's Batseal etc) and glycol-based like OKO. The formation of latex golf balls is particularly quick in very hot weather - hotter than the UK can produce. The formation of glycol salant isn't temperature related but caused by the plugging particles - paper or rubber crumbs - dropping out of suspension and bunching together. I have never been able to figure out why this happens but it doesn't seem temperature related.

 

[Yellow Saddle]

Let me try asking again, more directly: what brand are you using?

It's a bit rich to ask @Yellow Saddle for that information while failing to provide it yourself. Are you actually using this stuff, or just posting what you read on the internet?

I missed that bit, sorry. I have addressed that in my last post.

 

[Yellow Saddle]

What brands ? The tube i opened just looked like a milky white fluid , rather like a wet rain coat . That was after i punctured the tube about 20 times and left if for a few months .

That was probably a latex solution. That stuff definitely coagulates quite quickly - long before the tyre wears out. If you inflate your tyre with CO2 when you have latex in there, you have an instant golf ball. The CO2 drops the PH of the ammonia used to preserve the latex and the latter then crashes out of the emulsion. Quit well documented but watch out for the non-chemists who think the CO2 freezes the latex. It is not a temperature issue but a PH issue.

 

[Cuchilo]

Let me try asking again, more directly: what brand are you using?

It's a bit rich to ask @Yellow Saddle for that information while failing to provide it yourself. Are you actually using this stuff, or just posting what you read on the internet?

I wasn't aware i had been asked , now go away .