Lesters

[tlbranth]

I just scored a set of Lesters for my CB750. The wheels don't have the tubeless tire 'ridge'. Can I still go tubeless? I.E. will the wheels hold air?

[desertrefugee]

If it helps at all, Terry, I have been tubeless in my 78 GL1000 with comstars for eight years without a problem. There are no ridges on the comstars either.

[Sandy]

I run tubeless on 2 sets of Lesters on GL's for years with no trouble.

[Fred Camper]

On my Gl1000 I also run tubeless.

[tlbranth]

I figured it'd be OK. Just thought that back in the day I don't think there were any tubeless tires for scooters so didn't know if these'd seal up OK. Thanks for the input

[Shadowjack]

This is a long discussion on the Africa Twin forums. People are trying various methods to seal the spoke nipples on the tube wheels and run tubeless tires, because it's easier to plug a hole then to wrestle the rear tire off in the woods.
Upshot is, the front wheel has no bead-retention ring, but the rear does. This causes great anguish in some people. I've sealed my spoke holes according to established practice, and I decided not to worry that the front tire would roll off the rim if the pressure was properly set. But I did get a set of tire pressure monitor caps to keep track of the pressure more closely.

[redglbx]

I’ve ran Lesters on my red 76 almost from new (19 & 16”), the bike just handled very badly but I blamed the shocks because that’s what all the magazine testers said at the time, I was working for Goodyear at the time and they introduced their tubeless HST line and being an employee with a pretty good discount I thought I’d give them a try, so I bought a set of Lesters to mount the new HST’s to.

Surprise, surprise the handling was immensely improved, so much so I wore a hole in my engine guards and had to buy new ones.And I’ve basically run them tubless the whole time, except sometime ago I was advised to run liquid tire balancer/sealant, DON’T !! It ate craters into the rims causing them to no longer seal, I don’t add anything but air now.

One other thing is that the spoked wheels on my 76 LTD have never been any problem and the handling on it exceeds my willingness to push it.

Lesters

[GL1-242]

I'm tubeless on my lesters.

Paul

[kjmarti2]

I’ve ran Lesters on my red 76 almost from new (19 & 16”), the bike just handled very badly but I blamed the shocks because that’s what all the magazine testers said at the time, I was working for Goodyear at the time and they introduced their tubeless HST line and being an employee with a pretty good discount I thought I’d give them a try, so I bought a set of Lesters to mount the new HST’s to.

Surprise, surprise the handling was immensely improved, so much so I wore a hole in my engine guards and had to buy new ones.And I’ve basically run them tubless the whole time, except sometime ago I was advised to run liquid tire balancer/sealant, DON’T !! It ate craters into the rims causing them to no longer seal, I don’t add anything but air now.

One other thing is that the spoked wheels on my 76 LTD have never been any problem and the handling on it exceeds my willingness to push it.

Lesters

My dad ran the liquid sealant stuff in his Lester's for many years while running tubeless tires. The rear wheel doesn't seal well now and when he gave me the bike it needed to be re-inflated every week. I'm running spoke wheels now but think I might like to go back to the Lester's on my next set of tires.

The question is, can damaged Lester's be fixed so that they seal properly again and if so by who?

[redglbx]

On mine, I still have a tube in the front rim but at the next tire change I’m going to do what I did on the rear that seems to have fixed that and that is to spread & smooth a very good 2-part epoxy into the divots caused by the balancer/sealer, seems to have worked well on my 16” rear. It seems to be holding air fine !

I used a fairly thick 3m 2 part epoxy that took a while so it didn’t just run out of the divots and once I had them all filled I went back and sanded them smooth, seems to be working but we’ll see at the next tire change how well it’s held up.

[Shadowjack]

I’ve ran Lesters on my red 76 almost from new (19 & 16”), the bike just handled very badly but I blamed the shocks because that’s what all the magazine testers said at the time, I was working for Goodyear at the time and they introduced their tubeless HST line and being an employee with a pretty good discount I thought I’d give them a try, so I bought a set of Lesters to mount the new HST’s to.

Surprise, surprise the handling was immensely improved, so much so I wore a hole in my engine guards and had to buy new ones.And I’ve basically run them tubless the whole time, except sometime ago I was advised to run liquid tire balancer/sealant, DON’T !! It ate craters into the rims causing them to no longer seal, I don’t add anything but air now.

One other thing is that the spoked wheels on my 76 LTD have never been any problem and the handling on it exceeds my willingness to push it.

Lesters

I seem to remember reading a period road test of an early spoked-wheel GW, where they replaced those with cast wheels (no idea if they were Lesters), and they had the same results as you. No more uncertain handling.

[Sidecar Bob]

I haven't experienced it myself (in fact, I have tubes on tubeless rims on all 6 of my wheels) but everything I've read says tubeless tires will hold air and work on rims without the ridges and you might get lucky and ride like that for years but if the tire loses pressure at speed without those ribs to keep the beads against the rim the results could be disastrous.