Science: Tubeless Tires

When a puncture wrecked one of his best tubes, Engineer John McGay decided it was time to try his pet idea—eliminate the tube and use the inflated casing alone. He told his repairman just how he thought it should be done. It worked. Since then, in cahoots with Victor F. Barnett, associate editor of the Tulsa Tribune, he has tirelessly preached his tubeless-tire recipe to everybody who would listen.

When Tulsa car owners, adopting the McGay method, got satisfaction from some 600 tubeless tires the city commissioners followed suit. Now all city-owned cars with drop-center rims are tubeless. Plant cars and trucks at Tulsa’s Douglas Aircraft plant are being changed over.

Engineer McGay’s system is simple: 1) The rim (which should be drop center) is cleaned and smoothed; 2) the valve (preferably oversize) is fitted into the regular valve opening in the rim, secured with a lock nut and rubber washer; 3) holes and cracks are sealed with cold patches or vulcanized; 4) all irregularities are sanded smooth, especially on the beads; 5) the tire is mounted, then blown up rapidly and tapped at the same time to make sure that the beads seat themselves evenly; 6) tire and rim are immersed in water for the usual bubble test. Sometimes, in order to seal the smaller cracks, it is necessary to inject a pint to two quarts of liquid cement. Once the tire is made airtight it requires only the usual care.

Tire companies look a bit askance at the tubeless idea. They admit that it will work in a pinch, but they warn against its hazards in the event of a blowout—they say it would give the car a far worse wrench than usual.