I buy my tires at Discount Tires. They repair tires for free if bought from there. I think they will repair all your tires if you have one set of tires from there. They also rotate them for free.
It is water based, and it turns to a solid lump on contact with air. So the part that is in contact with the leak solidifies very quickly... and then the rest of it solidifies into crap splattered all over the inside of the tire and rim after a while... which is why they tell you to clean it out and have it patched within a couple days.
But the real reason why tire guys hate the stuff is that the propellant is explosive and can ignite if a spark occurs. So warn them about it so they can be careful about breaking the bead.
--scott
I think the OP's insinuation is he can patch a tire that they won't patch. That's his choice to make. We all make choices that pros won't make for us.
Each tire he "saves" (which is his personal choice to do) nets him $100 (or whatever) plus the $20 plus he saves what he calls elapsed time doing it.
Did you take into account that tires need to be replaced every few years?
I don't know how many cars are in the guy's household, but for easy math, assume 4 cars & 4 years per tire, that's a hundred more dollars a year.
The benefit of doing repairs at home are why people do repairs at home. Those who will never repair things at home will never see the benefit.
There's no way you can't get patches and stems and weights for less than the professionals are going to charge you for the lower quality items.
I've noticed people who have never done something are always the ones saying that it can't be done. We need to ask someone who has done it.
Whoever posted those videos shows that it can easily be done at home.
I have in my trunk tucked inside the spare tire which is flipped upside down so that the wheel rim forms a round well an emergency flat tire kit.
There are foldable chocks, two blinking multi-color LED lights with the batteries in a ziplock bag outside the device (I gave up on leaving batteries in the device after ruining a half dozen mag lights - remember them?). Also I gave up on flares (they always made a crumbly yellow mess over time) & triangles (which work fine until the wind blows them away), a cigarette lighter air pump, and a tire repair multi-plug fixit kit.
The fixit kit contains an awl and an open-ended insertion tool, glue, a thin sharp knife, which is important for shearing off the ends.
While the kit comes with four or five four inch long plugs, the reality is once it's opened to the air the kit is ruined - so it's a one-time use kit.
I guess the green goopy stuff could be a useful addition, but notice above the things I've discontinued because they don't really work when you need them a few years AFTER you've put them in the temperature cycled trunk.
I suspect that after sitting in a hot trunk for a couple of years, the pressure would be gone from the can of green goopy stuff.
Of course, the answer is replace it every year, but who does that? Most people who say they do that, are lying because most people don't.
Just like many people say they change the oil every 3K miles, they don't. And while many say they rotate tires every 3K miles, most don't.
My reason for bringing that up is few of us will even look into that emergency kit after putting it there - until we need it on the road.
When you're on the side of the road, covered in mud splashed over you on purpose by truckers (yes, I've been there) on a slope, in the rain, at night, and you're patching a tire - that's when you put those flimsy foldable triangles down on the road with those weights, and then you instantly watch them blow across the road when the next trucker splashes you (and yes, I've been there). Same with flares. Same with corroded batteries left inside the device.
If it goes in the trunk, it better be designed to last for years in hot/cold cycles like you can't believe.
I bring this up because the green goop is not likely to have survived. I know the counter is people will "say" they replace it every year.
I won't. I'll leave it in the trunk.
I suspect by the time I really need it, I can't rely on it working.
Thanks for the link, but it's a lot of work taking the tire off the car, prying it open, patching the puncture, and then putting the tire back together and onto the car (minus the balancing). I haven't encountered enough tire punctures in my life to justify saving that once in a blue moon $20 expense to get someone else to fix it for me.
Do you bullshit on purpose because you want to sound like you know something? Or do you actually believe the bullshit that you just said?
Maybe I need to simplify that for you.
Are you a liar? Or are you just stupid?
No need to respond. I'm just telling you that you shouldn't be saying the bullshit that you do.
If the tire changing machine at HF costs $100 then it pays for itself the first time you need to replace 4 tires on your vehicle (at $25 per tire).
The ability to repair your tires at home is just an added convenience.
What I mostly hated was all the waiting, and driving, and traffic, and disappointment being told in the end that they mainly wanted to sell new tires. Worse, they didn't have the same tread pattern but that didn't bother them. I don't know if it matters but I know it "could" matter sometimes if the tread pattern makes a difference (which you won't know until it's too late).
If I had the tire press, I would just do it my self and take the risk of my efforts, which is why I'm asking here on a repair & automotive tech group.
Thank you for answering the question as faithfully as you could. Nobody else even tried to answer the question before saying what they'd do.
It seems reasonable that 1/4 of the tires that are flat "shouldn't" be repaired if people follow the rules rigidly (which tires shops will do).
For one, I would think most tires are "driven on" for some distance after they're flat, either because it's a slow leak or the driver needs to get off the road to a safe place before changing over to the spare tire.
It would be good to know how long a flat tire can be driven on before it's ruined. Is it 100 feet? 1 mile? More? Less? I don't know. Any idea?
Also we've all had nails/screws that are close to the edge, where I don't know exactly where 'too close' might be, but I'm sure a shop will be more conservative on that than I am for my own car (although for my wife & kids' cars, I'd tend to be more conservative than I am on my own vehicles).
Along the same vein, glass and metal shards are problematic due to their shape, where the question would be at what point is the slice too big.
There is also the case of multiple repairs in a tire, or a repair that is too close to a pre-existing repair, which tire shops must have rules on.
And of course, there might be age-of-tire restrictions (anything over 3 years, for example) or wear-bar restrictions or cracks in the sidewall.
Given that a flat tire is already, by definition, a "used tire", I'm sure some of these factors can easily weight in on a portion of tires out there.
If that portion is 1/4 of all the tires will fail, that sounds reasonable.
Touche!
I was so focused on describing a trunk fixit kit has to last years in hot and cold cycles like you can't believe, I forgot all about the spare tire!
Mainly I was pointing out that the green goopy stuff isn't likely to be there when you need it. I prefer a cigarette lighter air pump instead.
But you're correct that if you get a flat, what you need is the emergency stuff (lights, flares, triangles, shiny clothes, a plastic bag to lay down on, and a big "f*ck you" sign on the top of the car to those truckers.
Oh, and you'll need that jack of death too. And the chocks. And a tire iron (which should last for years as it came from the factory).
I think they design those tire irons to be torqued to 85 foot pounds & no more (someone told me that they designed them that way for a normal man).
I just step on them. Does anyone else do that? Or is it just me who does?
I believe the pressure inside the pressurized Slime Tire Sealant will stay there forever because the content is "tire sealant" so by nature the gas will never leak from its own container. I have WD-40 in my trunk and never lost pressure.
The sealant is some water-based gooey stuff with lumps of thick resin. I don't think it will degrade over time inside of the can. There are also other versions that are not pressurized, but you have to use valve-core tool inside bottle cap that it comes with to remove the valve-core before you squeeze the content into the valve.
It is very dangerous to fix your car tire beside the highway. Even police vehicles parked on the roadside with full emergency lights blaring can get wiped out by on-coming trucks. For some reason a car parked on the side of the road would attract other cars to ram into it.
The best bet if you have a tire puncture on the road is to pump tire sealant into the flat tire, then pump air into the tire with a battery air pump, and get to safety ASAP.
You still need the air pump after you've injected the green goopy stuff into the tire. The tire sealant is meant to be injected into a flat tire. You need to use air pump to bring the tire pressure up so you can drive away.
I believe the pressure inside the pressurized Slime Tire Sealant will stay there forever because the content is "tire sealant" so by nature the gas will never leak from its own container. I have WD-40 in my trunk and never lost pressure.
The sealant is some water-based gooey stuff with lumps of thick resin. I don't think it will degrade over time inside of the can. There are also other versions that are not pressurized, but you have to use valve-core tool inside bottle cap that it comes with to remove the valve-core before you squeeze the content into the valve.
It is very dangerous to fix your car tire beside the highway. Even police vehicles parked on the roadside with full emergency lights blaring can get wiped out by on-coming trucks. For some reason a car parked on the side of the road would attract other cars to ram into it.
The best bet if you have a tire puncture on the road is to pump tire sealant into the flat tire, then pump air into the tire with a battery air pump, and get to safety ASAP.
I just read the warning on the can. If you don't believe it you can take it up with them.
--scott
I love to fix many different things at home, but I have an aversion to prying open car tires myself, especially when it is a lot of work, and not expensive to pay others to do it.
I am not so sure of that as I've grabbed plenty of spray cans in my life only to find that they're dead. I guess most were probably used though.
The temperature cycles in a trunk are horrific so it would be useful to find what the manufacturer suggests as a reasonable replacement period.
As I already mentioned, there are a lot of things people told me to do that I realized aren't great ideas (like the aforementioned flares, which just turn into a crumbly yellow mess after years in a wet/dry hot/cold trunk).
One of those things was WD-40, which people seem to think is some kind of miracle water cure for just about every ill that a mechanic could imagine.
I long ago gave up on the smelly stuff (it gives me a headache) and I've never even fretted about it. When I need oil, I use oil. When I need to loosen rusty nuts, I use ATF and bang a lot. When I need to "displace water", I spray it with the compressor air gun.
What does WD-40 do that Jesus' own miracle water doesn't do?
I don't use the green goopy stuff but I "thought" it was pressurized.
My beef was that it's going to lose pressure when stuck in a hot/cold trunk for years, such that when you really need it, it will no longer be there.
I've had this happen with halon fire extinguishers when I first started driving as people 'told me' I need to keep one in the car. When I needed it, it wasn't there for me, and that alone taught me a valuable lesson.
If it's going to go in the trunk, then it can't be a can of pressurized anything because the moment you are under pressure, it won't be there.
If the green goopy stuff is not pressurized, then that would be fine.
Whether or not it's "very dangerous" is up to people to determine themselves. I've pulled over to pee for example. Is that very dangerous?
In some situations, like on the Pulaski Skyway, it's already very dangerous just to be driving on the thing, let alone being pulled over to the side.
In other cases, such as in the middle of Montana on I80, you could park an entire herd of cattle in the median while you work on putting the spare on.
What's "very dangerous" are those damn truckers. They drive close to you just for their own fun. If you don't know what I mean, you never drove in NJ along roads like Highway 9, or Route 202, or Route 1. They're assholes.
I'm aware there are many stories where people rammed police cars which had their lights on. Worse, truckers (yes, in NJ) aim to get as close to the police as they can, just for their own glee - and every once in a while (read the news) they actually hit the policemen (by accident) doing that.
Did I mention yet that the most dangerous situation when you're pulled over to repair your car are the truckers love to mess with you as they drive by?
Nowadays, with cellphones, which none of us had when we drove half our lives or more, you can just call AAA for the ladies and for the men, you can call the government 511 who usually tows you off the road for free.
Once off the road, the government free towers leave you in a safe spot where you can then safely work on the care to your hearts content.
I think even the basic AAA will tow you five miles to a gas station for those women who feel the need for the safety. From there they can call you.
I've never needed a tow in my long life, but I've seen lots of cars parked on the side with big stickers on the rear window so others must have not figured out what was wrong with the car and had to abandon it on the side.
I never bought a new car but I know how to repair them which is useful because unless you lose an axle, you can usually limp home on chewing gum.
Well it says they sell new tires too, but they assume I'm there for used tires. If they ever didn't have my size, I guess they'd sell me new.
I was buying new from a used tire place. They charged 2 bucks each to dispose of the old. As I was getting the new ones, the guy behind me was buying my old from the dealer for 20 each.
I have a small fire extinguisher in the driver's door pocket that is as close to me as possible in my car. The small fire extinguisher has a built-in pressure gauge. It has never lost pressure. I think I have had that same fire extinguisher in all the cars I had gone through in the last 20 years.
Not exactly the one I have, but like this:
I've bought used tires. When I was a kid. The problem is you don't know how long they sat flat. The belts might be ruined. Then again, maybe not.
Certainly if you sold recent tires and the guy behind you bought them, he got a good deal.
But what I do now is mailorder the tires to get the best price. Simple Tire. Tire Rack. Amazon. Whatever.
They'll ship them directly to the tire installer. Often there will be free shipping - which is important sometimes.
Sometimes (less so now than years ago) their might not even be a sales tax.
And they'll give you an out-the-door price for the installation & disposal that the tire seller has already negotiated with the tire installers.
So you know what it will cost when you factor it all in. Plus you get the choice of the entire world's warehouses.
Not just what one tire shop happens to have in stock.
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