Tuesday, November 2, 2021

A **bang** in the night

Yesterday I spent time doing some fall clean-up chores: gathering wood debris, raking leaves, and tidying up the driveway.

I finished stacking the overflow firewood on the porch.

I also brought all the kindling I had split during my woodsplitting marathon onto the porch, stacked in a metal water tank for the winter.

Needless to say, the wheelbarrow was in constant use during these chores. At one point I noticed a bolt had gone missing and one of the legs had worked loose from the handle. Don found a replacement bolt and repaired it. He also noticed the tire was nearly flat, so he pumped it up a bit. I thanked him and finished my tasks.

Many hours later, around 9:15 pm at night, Don and I were peacefully reading. The dog was asleep on his bed. All was quiet.

Suddenly we heard a loud BANG on the porch, followed instantly by a softer metallic ting. It made us all jump. We scrambled for flashlights and poured out onto the porch to see what made that commotion.

We saw nothing amiss. No animals. No intruders. We were about to shrug our shoulders and go back inside when I remembered the ting. I looked closer at the wheelbarrow parked next to the water tank.

As it turns out, the tire on the wheelbarrow had split. When Don pumped it up, the tire held for a few hours before it simply exploded, throwing rubber shrapnel at the water tank.


It also spewed this horrid fluorescent green goo on the porch. I wiped it up so Mr. Darcy would not be tempted to lick it. (No idea what it is.)

Impressive, no?

I guess the wheelbarrow is out of commission until we get a replacement tire.

But at least the mystery of the BANG in the night is solved.

13 comments:

  1. It's experiences like that that make for good stories. Sorry for the inconvenience of needing a new tire - we had a tire explode this summer so I can relate. The green goo is possibly Slime, a fix-a-flat product?

    ReplyDelete
  2. Agree w/Heather - looks like someone either used a can of fix-a-flat or added the preventative that a lot of cyclists use

    Spend the bit extra - grit your teeth - and go with a solid tire - did that years ago after fighting to keep air in tires and haven't had an issues since - and - it was from Ace...

    ReplyDelete
  3. That is an impressive split in the tire. Usually they just get a small leak.

    ReplyDelete
  4. I have quite come around to the idea of solid tires on such equipment. It really does make a difference.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Nope, not snow. It's just the light reflecting off a wet road.

    - Patrice

    ReplyDelete
  6. I third the solid tires. I have replaced 4 different sets of the cheap China tires with solids and have never had a problem since!

    ReplyDelete
  7. I had a similar experience... on my truck... About a half hour after towing our camper trailer home, we were sitting in the living room when we heard... and FELT... a humungous KA-BOOOM! 'sounded like a fuel tank explosion! I went outside and the truck was sitting there with half the sidewall of the left rear tire in shreds. I put it down to the grace of God that this didn't happen while we were at freeway speed with the trailer on in 100*+ heat!

    As for the wheelbarrow tire, I can honestly say I'm getting to the point in my life where I don't want to be fixing things all the time. I bought a solid tire for mine, and have yet to regret doing so...

    For all the other things; the "farm" wagons, the lawn tractor, and the like, I do use Slime as well...

    ReplyDelete
  8. I second the comment on the solid tire. Costs more, but will last.

    ReplyDelete
  9. I agree with the solid tire commentary but have to add, should you get another wheel barrow get it with 2 tires. I love mine, it is virtually un-tippable with a larger load, not that you are as old as I am but it really helps with diminishing upper body lack of strength.

    ReplyDelete
  10. Went with a two wheeler years ago, best money I've ever spent on a wheel barrow. Has solid tires. I've changed most of my equipment to solid tires, well worth it. Now I'm looking at a heavy duty cart.

    ReplyDelete
  11. When I was growing up my family had a similar experience. Middle of the day, we were all outside on the farm when there was a mighty BLAM! Being well raised farm kids, we all hit the ground. Turns out the spare tire on the little Datsun truck had exploded. It was underneath the truck in its holder. No idea why it did that.

    ReplyDelete
  12. The green goo, as Heather mentioned, is probably a fix a flat product.

    ReplyDelete