How to Inflate your Bicycle Tires

Okay okay, hear us out. We know this seems like we are grasping for content. But to your surprise and ours as well we often interact with customers who have just gotten into cycling that may have not touched a bike since they were a kid, let alone know how to inflate a tire with a presta valve. A properly inflated tire is not only important to having control of your bike whether you're hitting the trails or braving the roads, but is important to your rack's performance as well. If your tire pressures are low then your rack may not be able to effectively clamp the tires of your bike, resulting in excess play in the bike or worse watching your bike catapult into the car behind you. While this may sound extreme, trust us we’ve seen it all. But with all my justifying out of the way, let's get to pumping these puppies up!

You'll first want to identify two main things, what type of bike you have and what style of valve your bike comes with. Starting with your bike, generally road/gravel bikes are going to require higher tire pressures than say a mountain bike. We recommend doing a bit of research into what people more experienced in the sport recommend as a baseline for tire pressures in your discipline of cycling. As a mountain biker myself I typically run 23 - 26 PSI depending on the conditions. But we're not here to debate tire pressures on reddit, let's just tell you how to inflate them. Identifying if you have a presta or schrader valve is the first step. A schrader valve will look like the valves on your car tires. It may have a cap, but underneath it is just a threaded valve. Add your floor pump of choice and start pumping that baby. There’s not much to adding air to a schrader valve. Presta valves require a bit more thought, but not much. To identify if you have a presta valve, check to see if at the top of the valve itself if there appears to be a little piece that could be turned. Give it a turn until it's a bit loose, and press down on it. If air comes out then you know that you have a presta valve. To inflate your tires with presta valves, you will either need a pump that accommodates presta valves, or if you already have an old trusty pump laying around that does not work with presta valves head over to your local bike shop and ask for a presta valve to schrader adapter. From there the process to add air is the same.

We hope you found this information helpful, and as always if you have any questions for us reach out to our Rack Experts! They can be reached by email at info@rackwarehouse.com, or by phone by dialing (800) 272-5362