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I have a cracked tyre on my Road bike. I think I put it in the gazebo and exposed it to the sun.

It's cracking along the tyre wall, in continuous fashion.

enter image description here enter image description here Would it be safe to ride on those crack tyre? As they are fairly new, I don't want buy a new one if it is ok to ride, i.e. no catastrophic failure.

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  • A picture is really needed if you want us to help. If unsure you can always go to a local bike shop and they could tell you (or try and sell you new tires...)
    – Bibz
    Jul 7, 2015 at 18:12
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    Did you ride with low pressure? It can often cause cracked sidewalls, especially if the tire hasn’t been made for it (i.e. puncture resistant touring tire).
    – Michael
    Jul 7, 2015 at 20:07
  • don't think it's pucture resistant, put I did run it with 30 psi... suppose to be 90 psi so ... :D
    – Nhân Lê
    Jul 7, 2015 at 22:49
  • Yeah, that tire probably won't fail tomorrow (especially if kept properly inflated), but it's lifetime has been severely compromised. Plan on replacing it soon.
    – Daniel R Hicks
    Jul 8, 2015 at 11:36

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The cracks will expose the internal structure to elements. So yes, they are not going to last as long as non-cracked ones but very probably not going to explode right away either.

The Nokia tires that used to be popular in my country developed cracks between tread and sidewall after a few months' use and could still be ridden for years afterwards. Your mileage may vary.

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Generally, if fairly new tires start to crack, they were poor quality tires to begin with. That's a red flag on its own.

Don't use them. Bicycles only have two tires between you and the ground, that means if your only front tire fails at speed the chances are good that you're going to end up on the ground.

Without a definitive image of the damage, damaged and cracked bike tires are always a simple matter of risk. If you want to risk injury, possibly severe injury if your luck is particularly bad, then keep using the tires. Otherwise, err on the side of safety and spend $40 or $50 on a new pair.

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    Look for online sites to buy your tires, you can save almost 50% from a bike shop if you can install them yourself.
    – Bibz
    Jul 7, 2015 at 18:08
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    While @Bibz is correct, you can save money online, I personally like to shop at my local bike shop when the price isn't too far off from online. This is especially true for "consumable" items like tubes, tires, brake pads, chains, cassettes etc. If people aren't buying these items, the shop will stop carrying them, and items which are expected to wear out are the kind of items that I really want my bike shop to stock, because I don't want to have to wait for shipping times on items that I may want in a hurry. Also, shop around, some bike shops have wildly different prices than others.
    – Kibbee
    Jul 8, 2015 at 16:09

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