Jupiter E-bike Flat Tire - Tube Repair

I suppose it was bound to happen. I got a flat tire on my e-bike. I don't really remember getting a flat tire on a bike in the past but I can't imagine it didn't happen. I went to Sequim with my wife a few days back (she had an appointment). I brought my e-bike to ride around while waiting and started out by riding on the Olympic Discovery Trail but there were more pedestrians than I liked so I decided to get off the trail and ride on one of the little-travelled roads.

There were hardly any cars and no pedestrians, so I was happy. After 5 miles into the ride I came across a couple of dogs on the other side of the street in a fenced yard barking at me. I was looking at them and then, "thud", I ran over something. I kept going for several seconds hoping I didn't get a flat but then I started hearing that dreaded sound of air escaping. Bummer, a hole in the back tire. First thing I tried to do was keep riding slowly but that didn't work so I stopped and looked to see how far I was from the car. Three miles. That's a bit of a hike pushing a bike with a flat.

On all my other bikes in the past, I carried a pump, tools and tube patch kit but I hadn't outfitted my new electric bike, so my best option was to start walking, as my wife had another 50 or so minutes at her appt and I had nothing better to do. I texted her and asked her to text me when she was done. I then started walking. After 2 miles I stopped, as I found a nice place on a little-travelled small, new residential housing development that would work better for loading a bike into a car than on a busy road.

Once home I ordered a tube repair kit, as I didn't have any rubber cement on hand. The kit came the next day and I then went about getting one bead of the tire off the rear rim (I didn't bother removing the wheel from the bike, as that would have been a major undertaking due to the electric motor in the rear hub). Once the bead was off, I was able to fish the tube out of the tire. I then put air in it and found the hole. It's the nearly 1/4" cut in the center of the photo below.

Here's a shot of it after abrading the surface. The hole got bigger.... This tube is the thinnest I've ever seen.

I applied some glue, let it dry, then slapped on a patch. I reinstalled the tube, got the tire bead back on the rim, and pumped the thing up. Air was escaping out of the valve stem hole. Hmm..... Out came the tube for the second time. I aired up the tube and found a tiny hole. Not sure how that happened but I patched it up and put things back together. I pumped up the tire and air was again escaping out of the valve stem hole. Hmm..... Out came the tube for the third time. I aired up the tube and found a second tiny hole, about an inch from the first tiny hole. I don't know what happened but I surely must have caused those two small holes. I patched the tube for the third time and put things back together. This time there were no leaks. Yay.

I've since dug out my bike tools and air pump, and will be taking them with me in the future.

Now that I think about it, there was a time I remember getting a flat. I was probably 9. There was a small hole in the sidewall of my bike tire from me running in to something. The tube was protruding slightly from the hole. I pumped up the tire and the protrusion got bigger and bigger. I was kind of fiddling with it, spinning the tire back and forth and letting the protruded tube growth bump against the bike frame. I guess things got out of hand and the tube popped.