E-ST900 tyre removal

[pmburton]

First time owning a bike with these wide knobbly MTB tyres. got myself a puncture, and finding it impossible to get my tyre lever under the tyre to prise it off. Is there a knack?
These are the stock tyres - I believe there's a tube in there, but starting to wonder if these are tubeless (I believe it's possible to run them tubeless) - how would I tell, and if so, is there a different way one removes a tubeless tyre?
Hope someone can point in the right direction so I can get my bike back on the road/track again...

Paul.

 

[BeBiker]

The original tyres are very had to unbed, but it's possible by hand.

The wheels are tubeless ready, I did the conversion a few times on those bikes.

 

[neilski]

Place the wheel on the floor with the tyre deflated, stand on the tyre on one side of the wheel to hold it in place then stand on the tyre on the opposite side of the wheel near the rim and it should pop out of the rim.

 

[steve_sordy]

It may work for some, but I don't like the "stand on the tyre with both feet". Tyres can be really stick to a rim and all your weight on a wheel can bend it, unless you have the hub in a hole.

Ensure the tyre is fully deflated. If out on the trail I remove the wheel and put the side of the tyre on a solid surface, stump, rock, wall, gate, whatever you can find. If it's a rock, I usually place my glove between the rim and the rock to protect the rim from scratches. If I'm in the garage, I place the wheel on my Black & Decker Workmate that has a variable gap between two opening surfaces. The hub is in the gap and the rim is fully and firmly supported.
Then I use my mini-pump (on the trail) or a hammer (in the garage) to press down on the side of the tyre. The hammer head goes under my shoulder to give some extra weight onto the tyre.

The objective is to push the tyre bead out of engagement with the edge of the rim. Once I've got it moving, I work my way around the rim, until the tyre bead is completely free of the rim. Push the tyre bead into the rim well and then you can use a tyre lever. Pushing the tyre bead into the smaller diameter rim well allows the tyre to move and give you room to insert a tyre lever and pull it over the larger diameter rim. This method has only failed me once.

I once had a tyre that was effectively glued to the rim. On the advice of a trail centre LBS I had used Gorilla tape instead of rim tape. It was cheap, looked great and went on well. But over time, the glue in the Gorilla tape oozed out and stuck the tyre to the rim. Despite clamping the tyre in a vice and levering on the whole wheel I could not shift the tyre! I was on the point of cutting the tyre off when I thought I might as well let my favourite LBS have a go. I got the slight knowing smile as I handed it over and I was asked to wait while they did the job. Five mins later they asked me to leave it with them. Two days later I got a call to say it was off. It had taken two of them working together to get it off. Then I had to remove the Gorilla tape and that was a whole other horrible story (detailed on here). It had taken so long because they were hurting their hands and they and to keep having a break!

Moral of the story is don't use Gorilla tape as rim tape.