GB1402016A - Method of and apparatus for demounting mounting and inflating tubeless tyres on vehicle wheels - Google Patents

Abstract

1402016 Tyre changing apparatus B & J MFG CO 13 July 1972 32804/72 Heading B7C In a tyre changing apparatus having a base, a vehicle wheel support on the base, and means for mounting and demounting tyres, e.g. a rotatably mounted tyre lever 23 and pneumatically operated bead breakers 28, 30, a tyre bead seating device is provided on the base comprising orifices, e.g. 150, and means for supplying pressurized air to the orifices, in use, the orifices injecting air under pressure into the space between that rim flange of a vehicle wheel which is in contact with the wheel support and that bead of a non-inflated tubeless tyre on the wheel which lies adjacent said rim flange, the air being injected in sufficient amounts, without the use of a mechanical seal bridging said space, that the tyre is expanded to cause its beads to seat sufficiently on the rim to permit complete inflation through the tyre valve. The bead seating device may, as shown in Fig. 3; comprise three arcuate tubular segments 144, 146, 148 having orifices 150 on their radially inner periphery and being received in a recess 198 in a flat wheel support surface on the base, movable wheel gripping clamps 180, 182, 184 being located in the gaps between the segments, the segments being connected to three air supply tubes themselves connected to both a common air inlet and three rods 201, 203, 205 coupled to a piston-cylinder device 200, in use the device 200 serving to raise the segments into engagement with the lower sidewall of a tyre on the support surface thereby urging the upper bead of the tyre into seating engagement with the wheel rim. Alternatively the segments may be in fixed position, in which case the upper bead of a tyre is seated manually prior to injection of air through the orifices 150. In a further embodiment, Fig. 4, the bead seating device comprises a plurality of orifices spaced around the larger diameter end of the outer, wheel supporting surface, of a frusto-conical wheel support 16, the orifices being in communication with an annular tube integrally formed on the undersurface of the support 16 and supplied with air by a pipe 48. Alternatively a tube having the orifices may be welded to the outer surface of the support 16 to extend around the larger diameter end thereof leaving a gap for the passage of a bead breaker 30 towards and away from a wheel and tyre on the support. Reference has been directed by the Comptroller to Specification 1,315,780.