Tire pressure

Patton wrote: To perform an experiment, let's say we have in hand a motorcycle wheel with mounted tire (no tube), and another matching motorcycle wheel with mounted tire (with tube) in hand. No raised ridges.

Inflate each to say 20# psi.

No tube -- Use a tire tool to push the tire bead away from the rim. I'll bet the tire deflates.

Absolutely no F'ing way you can budge the tire away from the rim at 20 psi. ZERO chance. Even without the extra bead/ridge, when installing new tires you typically have to use something like 50 psi to move the tire out until it seats on the rim.

Look guys, my other bike (non KZ) that came with tubes still has tubes. I know dozens of guys that have converted the same wheels to tubeless but I didn't do it. Honestly though, I can't come up with a technically based reason to tell them they are wrong when the manufacturer ran tubeless without the extra rim bumps.

The stock Morris Mag wheels on 1976 KZ900-B1 LTD:
Front is 19" diameter and 2.156" rim width.
Rear is 16" diameter and 3.0" rim width.

Long since obsolete stock tires:
Front -- Goodyear Eagle G/T, ML90-19, @ 26psi.
Rear -- Goodyear Eagle A/T, MT90-16T, @ 22psi (one rider) and 24 psi (two riders).

Am pretty sure that only the rear wheel rim has raised ridges.

Came new from KHI (i.e., Kawasaki Heavy Industries aka Kawasaki Factory) with tube in front wheel and tube in rear wheel, as specified in the FSM.

Good Fortune!

Nessism wrote:

Patton wrote: To perform an experiment, let's say we have in hand a motorcycle wheel with mounted tire (no tube), and another matching motorcycle wheel with mounted tire (with tube) in hand. No raised ridges.

Inflate each to say 20# psi.

No tube -- Use a tire tool to push the tire bead away from the rim. I'll bet the tire deflates.

Absolutely no F'ing way you can budge the tire away from the rim at 20 psi. ZERO chance. Even without the extra bead/ridge, when installing new tires you typically have to use something like 50 psi to move the tire out until it seats on the rim. . . .

Would think that psi isn't critical to the experiment so long as both psi's are equal, and can be much lower (perhaps the 8# earlier suggested as being woefully low -- maybe even lower), because the idea is to see whether the tubeless deflates when the bead is pushed inward from the rim but the tubed doesn't deflate when the bead is pushed inward from the rim.

Good Fortune!

That was in the time of 8 ply tires.
Steve

Patton wrote:

Nessism wrote:

Patton wrote: To perform an experiment, let's say we have in hand a motorcycle wheel with mounted tire (no tube), and another matching motorcycle wheel with mounted tire (with tube) in hand. No raised ridges.

Inflate each to say 20# psi.

No tube -- Use a tire tool to push the tire bead away from the rim. I'll bet the tire deflates.

Absolutely no F'ing way you can budge the tire away from the rim at 20 psi. ZERO chance. Even without the extra bead/ridge, when installing new tires you typically have to use something like 50 psi to move the tire out until it seats on the rim. . . .

Would think that psi isn't critical to the experiment so long as both psi's are equal, and can be much lower (perhaps the 8# earlier suggested as being woefully low -- maybe even lower), because the idea is to see whether the tubeless deflates when the bead is pushed inward from the rim but the tubed doesn't deflate when the bead is pushed inward from the rim.

Good Fortune!

The air pressure would have to be woefully low for the tire to move off the bead, and both the tubeless and tube type tire would equally dismount at the same time. That's my point. I'm struggling to find a scenario in my mind where have a tube inside the tire in such a situation as described would make much difference.