You’re riding along, and suddenly, your bike starts to feel weird. It’s not handling very well and you can feel every bump in the road. You look down and see that dreaded flat tire. You open your bag and you realize that you left your tire levers at home. You wonder what other tool you can use instead of tire levers?
If you have no tire levers to remove your tires or put them back on the rim, try using your hands first. If that doesn’t work you can get creative and find a hard object with a flat, rounded end such as your pump, or your quick-release levers. You should stay away from using sharp objects, such as knives or screwdrivers, as they can damage both your rim and the inner tube.
Before reading on, if you’ve lost or never had tire levers in the first place, make sure to buy some. In general, you should always use the right tool for the job. Any bike shop will stock tire levers, or at least have a pair that they might let you use.
My all-time favorite tire levers are Pedro’s Tire Levers (available on Amazon). They are very wide and durable, clip together for easy storage, and brightly colored to make them difficult to lose on the road.
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They have a handy spoke hook that holds them in place while you fit another lever under the tire and an excellent shape for prying tires off the rim. They are also plastic (not metal) meaning you are very unlikely to damage any rims or tires using them, and they are very affordable while still being long-lasting. I keep a pair in my bike toolbox and in my saddle bag at all times, and many bike shops stock them.
Some multi-tools, such as the Park Tool IB-3 (also available on Amazon), even have a tire lever attached to them.
Let’s see what you can use instead of tire levers and how.
Tire lever alternatives
Your hands
Most tires can be removed by hand with a bit of elbow grease. Make sure that the tube is fully deflated, and push the bead of the tire into the center trough of the rim all the way around on both sides of the wheel. Then, you can try to push and pull the tire off the rim. Depending on your tire and rim combination, this may be easy, difficult, or even nearly impossible.
When putting the tire back on, place one of the tire beads in the center of the rim and work your way around on both sides, making sure that the parts of the tire where both sides of the bead are on the rim sit snug in the center.
Look at this man putting on the Schwalbe Marathon, a notoriously difficult-to-mount tire.
Four hands
If your own two hands are not enough but you have someone else nearby, you can ask them to give you a hand.
Once, I tried to put a really stubborn Continental Ride Tour tire on the rim of a Merida Speeder bike. It was painfully difficult, but I had no levers. As soon as I got some help from a friend, we could pop it on.
Your Pump
Depending on your pump, you may be able to use the lever that locks the chuck to the tube valve as a tire lever. It is not the ideal solution, but it may work in a pinch.
Quick Release Lever
If you have a quick release on your wheel hubs, you may be able to use the lever part as a tire lever. You should use caution, however, as these are a hard metal and could damage the rim.
Public Bike Repair Station
Although this isn’t really an alternative to a tire lever, it may still be a good option if you don’t have any on hand. Depending on where you live, you might have some public bike repair stations in your city that have some essential tools attached to them. In my town, they have tire levers, screwdrivers, wrenches, a pump, and some other tools, as well as a stand to hold your bike off the ground.
On a carbon fiber wheel, you should only use a tire lever or your hands!
Things you should NOT use as a tire lever
Screwdrivers
Screwdrivers are made of a tough metal and have a tiny surface area. No matter how careful or experienced you are you can very easily damage your tire, rim, or rim tape by using a screwdriver.
Spoons
Spoons are a very soft metal and are poorly shaped for use as a tire lever.
My grandfather tried this on my mother’s bike when she was little and destroyed a few spoons, much to the dismay of my grandmother.
Knives
Like spoons, knives tend to be a softer metal, and you can easily bend or snap them when using them as a lever. They are also sharp, meaning you can accidentally slice your tire or, worse, yourself on accident.
Needless to say, a pocket knife, such as a Swiss Army knife, is completely out of the question as it slices through anything with much ease.
If you have a pocket knife handy, you may use it to carve a tire lever out of a piece of wood, which may just do the job fine.
Easiest tires to remove without levers
Generally, folding tires are easier to remove and put on with your bare hands than wire bead tires, but there is no one magic tire that is easy to remove as it depends on your tire and rim combination and can even vary from wheel to wheel.
As you replace your tires and try new ones, you may want to keep track of which tires are easiest to remove from your rims.
In my experience, however, Continental tires tend to be pretty tight fitting, although they are still very nice tires.
Conclusion
Although I would not buy a bike or have a bike serviced at a department store, they tend to have longer business hours than bike shops and if they sell bikes, chances are they also sell tire levers (and inner tubes!) or have a pair on hand to change an inner tube. I have bought a pair of tire levers from Canadian Tire before, and I keep them as a backup set.
Happy pedaling!