It’s pretty straight forward to mount a tire. With a tire machine it is even easier. The machine spins the wheel as you apply pressure to the tire. After you get one side of the tire around the wheel you start on the other side.
Seating the bead can be a little difficult at times. Especially if the tire doesn’t seat even after you’ve put 50 psi or more of pressure. On the other hand mounting a tire without a machine isn’t as easy.
Not only do you have to do a lot more physical labor, getting the tire to seat is even more difficult. There are plenty of videos online of people mounting tires with some ether and a match. After your spray the ether, or starting fluid, around the rim of the wheel you light a match. The tire typically seats very quickly.
In some cases the tire can either catch fire or explode. It’s not so much that the tire tears apart but it’s more than the wheel can going flying through the shop. That is what happen to the guys in the video below. They tried to seat the bead with ether and a match. Watch as the man almost looses a leg in the process.
What is your preferred method of seating the bead of a tire? Let us know in the comments below!