I think these big tire chain places go overboard with the liability excuses. There's absolutely nothing wrong or unsafe about a plugged tire. Like someone said earlier, these places don't get to be 1200+ store strong by NOT selling tires...
Discount Tire no longer patches plugged tires
- Thread starter Avery4
- Start date
I can't even count the number of plugs I have had "professionally installed" that have come out. Living in Southern California and the heat in the summertime may have something to do with it.....the installers say "the plug becomes part of the tire". Yea-right until it comes out......
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I don't like it but I can't argue with them. Better safe than sorry (for them).... Blame other people and lawyers for this stance. Plus, if they flat out refuse to repair a tire, your point would stand more but they frequently don't refuse to repair, they just insist on patching vs plugging.
I've plugged my own tires many times, only Chineseum trailer ones have ever leaked-but I'm not sure I would put one In a CUSTOMER'S tire. My luck they would get crazy with it & blow it out.
Discount Tire has has this policy by me for several years. And by the way, I've been plugging tires for 45 years without a single failure.
All of the tire pluggers out there might get by, but there are many reasons for a proper repair from the inside of a tire. Just think of popping a balloon with a pin. If you put a piece of tape over it, you can stick a pin through it, and it won't pop. A tire patch works in a similar way supporting the surface tension around the hole which a plug can't do.
The inner liner on the inside of the tire is a thin layer similar to an inner tube. Good luck trying to plug a tire with an inner tube.
The inner liner on the inside of the tire is a thin layer similar to an inner tube. Good luck trying to plug a tire with an inner tube.
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They won't patch a tire that has been plugged (temporarily) either.
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I just had a leaky tire fixed and they used a plug / patch one piece combo.
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When I first started out in the industry I repaired a lot of tires with either plugs or patches. I’d probably prefer a patch but honestly plugs work fine, in fact I have a few on my tires right now...had a one month stretch where for some reason I was picking up a lot of nails/metal. Had to install two plugs on one tire and one on another. Tires were basically brand new Michelin‘s and I wasn’t about to replace them. 40,000 miles later and they’re still going strong...no leaks or anything.
But the best solution right now are the plug/patch combination. Love those things! I actually use them on my tubeless mountain bike tires and they’ve saved me hundreds on tires. If you mountain bike, you know that mountain bike tires are almost as expensive as car tires.
But the best solution right now are the plug/patch combination. Love those things! I actually use them on my tubeless mountain bike tires and they’ve saved me hundreds on tires. If you mountain bike, you know that mountain bike tires are almost as expensive as car tires.
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Those things are great! Works great, easy to install.
Agree with this 100%. And would add it isn't "dangerous" at all. There is nothing wrong with a properly plugged tire repair. Just as you, when I was a teen working at a "Service Station", I made literally hundreds of these type of repairs. Most we would do on the rack with the tire on the vehicle. Simply because there was zero reason to remove it.
The key is as you say. The liberal use of a good tire rubber cement. This will melt the plug and the tire as one. I never had one come back for any reason. Discount is in the business of selling tires. So naturally they're going to frown on this. It simply doesn't hold water. (Or help improve their bottom line). The method has been successfully applied for decades. To many millions of tires.
If it were an honest danger, you would have heard about it from the DOT, or the Consumer Product Safety Commission, long before Discount started making noise about any of it.
Everyone here has done an awesome job of whistling in the wind to this, good job.
This is how it really went (goes) down. Largest tire(S) manufacturer meets with insurance companies (as every aspect of the automobile industry normally does). Tire manufacturer says to insurance providers, "We want to sell more tires and you want to pay less for accidents, we have an idea. There is a one in 500,000 chance that a tire plug repair could harm the driver, costing you money." Insurer: "We are listening", and the rest is history. Next step is to meet with the largest tire chains and have them start pushing the same ideas and even make them policy. Meanwhile, they are also meeting with some of the largest automobile industry publications like Motortrend,etc... and suddenly these publications are writing about how tire plugs are bad, going against a like 40 year norm. Eventually you have people like the first quote in my post also believing they are bad. And to him: no one here is talking about plugging a tubed tire, jeez.
PRo-tip: Plugs are not bad. I have used them in multiple vehicles over 40 years and was the norm when I worked for service stations as a younger dude. Air bags actually kill people every year. Why are they still legal? Because the cost outweighs the harm. The insurance companies save way more with them, then without them. Never lose sight of who controls our life and insurance providers are right there at the very top, spending millions and millions on lobbying every year. This tire plug thing is not even a liability thing. The liability thing is a scarecrow to hide behind.
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Have an older Mercedes in storage that had bead leak and would go flat in a few days. Shoved a $12 inner tube inside and it's been holding air over 8 years.
The trailer mechanic at work doesn't remove tires to plug them. I'm pretty sure we have a couple trailers with six plugged tires.
I've never had one leak, let alone fail...
