Plugging a RE-11, Safe at Higher Speeds?
 

My WRX has RE-11's on it. My wife got a screw in it, today and took it too Americas tire were they plugged it. I won't be home for a few days, but she said they plugged it, shaved the plug, then put a patch over it. I have not heard of this before, I seen either/or not both.

Is this a new technique? or am I just way out of touch with the tire fixing scene?

These tires see, AutoX, perhaps some HPDE's soon, and some pretty unreasonable mountain driving (light squealing on corners, 100+ on the straights). With the somewhat extreme use these tires see, will a plug negatively affect the tires safety at speed?

I wouldn't risk it, but a a plug plus patch on the inside wold probably be fine.

On my old Eagle F1s, I had four rope plugs in the right rear tire before I finally replaced them. Why did I replace them? Well, because I cut the sidewall on the right-rear.

Something was cursed about that corner of the car. I never had any problems at all with the other three tires...

I've never heard of plug-n-patch either, kind of thought the whole point of plugging was to avoid having to dismount the tire. Can't hurt, I guess.

I've gone 150mph on a plugged NT-01 and run a few track days on that tire.

I've gone my absolute record speed 174 indicated on a Honda 954 with a plugged rear.

I went 175mph on Josh's mountain bike with a plugged rear tire.

I'll be keeping it under 150. So I think I'll be fine. Thanks guys.

I recall reading something in the NASA handbook about using a plugged for HPDE. I had a small leak in one of my RE-11s and just left it but I am sure a plug would of been fine. If you ever do a HPDE I would be shocked if the tech guy saw the plug anyway

I had some qualms about the idea of tracking a plugged tire, until I actually had to plug a tire myself. I used the typical parts store rope style plug kit on a nail hole in one of my RS2s. Getting the reamer tool in there was an absolute whore and the plug was just as difficult. There is no way that plug is going anywhere. Drive it like you stole it.

ftfy

Also, I've never had an issue with a plug, at least, not yet... Though a plug+patch is advised if you have a shop do it.

I went 275mph while plugging your girlfriends anus.

I've plugged a sportbike tire before...

...I made sure to put a new tire on before my next track day...

Held on the street, but wasn't worth the risk to track on super-thin carcass motorcycle tires.

Must have been like throwing a golf ball through an aircraft hanger...

...And no, that wasn't a knock on his girlfriend...

;)

FYI, these are the only plugs I run. Walmart uses this style.

Huh- I've never seen that style of plug before.

As I don't have a spare tire, I carry one of these with me:

Attachment 240892

It's a system that lets you shoot a plug into the tire from the outside, which is very handy as an expedient temporary solution. They also make a smaller version with a hand-applicator instead of the gun, which conveniently fits beneath your average motorcycle saddle.

Ironically, I have only ever had to use it on other people's cars, however it works quite nicely. The plugs don't use any sort of adhesive and are covered with an oily coating which I suspect might cause the tire to resist a subsequent rope plug, however they're very quick and easy to install roadside and get you back to where you can have the tire dismounted and repaired from within.


Still, if you have the luxury of doing it in your garage, I still find the good ole' rope plug to be a perfectly adequate solution.

http://www.blogcdn.com/www.urlesque....an-connery.jpg

Guy at Les Schwab said plugs are bad. Cause you to drill out the hole even bigger to get the plug to fit. Which is apparently why they only patch, for what that's worth.

By that same reasoning, no one should ever make an expedient repair on a radiator hose if they put a pinhole through it.
http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/...500_AA300_.jpg

If you break off a bolt or ruin the threads in a bolt hole, you should probably just glue in the new bolt, wouldn't want to make the hole bigger to fix it..
http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51MADCrt2kL.jpg

And god forbid we break something that is metal, welders have been doing it wrong for years. Just push the two pieces back together and weld the perimeter of the parts, because the repair will be stronger if we don't cut more metal out...
http://www.twi.co.uk/twiimages/jk92f3.gif

A cynical man would observe that a tire store has a vested interest in endorsing the solution that requires the services of the mounting & balancing equipment that they just happen to have, rather than something you can DIY in your driveway.

That said, I have generally heard that if you have the choice of doing either, a patch on the inside is generally considered stronger.

I wouldn't take either of them on the track though. Tires aren't expensive enough to risk that.

--Ian

I plugged tires for a living all through high-school and early college. I've never had a ORANGE plug leak on me. Not one. I even double plugged some gnarly holes just to see if I could get it to seal.

I can't tell you how many hundreds of plugs I've done, over thousands of miles, and track days, on bikes, cars etc. Never had an issue. I have had patches come loose. Rare, but it has happened. I have less faith in patches, and they are a pain in the ass to do.

Note I specify orange plugs. The black ones are shit, they're not as gummy and they almost always leak. Buy orange plugs.

I don't like plugs. If the hole is small enough, I use the vulcanizing string and rubber cement. If larger, I will have a local shop plug and patch, but either tire will not see high speeds or severe service until it is replaced.

Orange plugs? I've never seen orange plugs. In the glovebox of my cars you'll find a walmart tire plug kit with the "shit" black plugs which I've been using for 15 years now on everything from my crotch rockets to lawnmowers, cars, even drag slicks. This is a stretch, but MAYBE saw 3 tires that were too far fucked to plug.

That plug device Joe posted is very interesting to me, so I ordered one.

Fancy way to say "plug."

Go to google, search tire plug, and images. Over half the images are of plugs, that happen to be orange. Any parts store sells them. I think they are sometimes specified as "heavy duty."

Where I worked 2 dozen plugs was a slow day. Sometimes we would run out and use black plugs. Just holding them in your hand you could feel they were less sticky, and we would often have to re-plug them or the customer would come back a couple days later complaining of a leak.

Just sharing my experience. I'm sure black plugs could work for some, but I've done a metric FUCK-TON of plugs in my day, and the orange ones are worth their weight in gold.

Not doubting your experience at all, have just never seen them before.

Might pickup a couple of those, too.

This is a tire, douche. Not a weld, not a threaded hole, and not a radiator hose. I offered some facts about what a major tire distributor said, it was not meant to start arguments.

I brought the tire in and they patched it for free. They could've used any method they wanted. Happened twice, once when I had bought tires there, although I didn't show any paper work to prove it, and another time when I brought in my dad's truck tire, which had tires on it bought in the stone age.

I don't think any speed will upset a plug. It's a piece of rubber infused fiber, coated with rubber cement and jammed into a small hole for a super tight friction fit... never come out if done right. Then with the patch also inside, I would say you are perfectly safe.

During college, I worked at a service station along a highway. Used to plug tires all the time using the orange rope plugs. I always told customers to take it easy at first so the plug can vulcanize to the tire's rubber. One day a biker on some super ricer crotch rocket whatever pulled in with hole in his rear tire. I plugged it and gave him the schpeel. He proceded to do a burnout in the parking lot and said "that's good enough" and tore out of there.

the 100% correct way (when taken into a shop) is a plug patch. when installed correctly, it'll last the life of the tire without problem. reaming the hole makes it the correct size for the brand of patch plugs. cement is used on the shaft and the patch. the area under the patch must be scuffed with the appropriate tool for the patch/cement to hold properly. once installed the patch must be covered with a blk. butyl rubber compund to replace the butyl rubber inner liner that was sanded away by the rasp used on the area under/around the patch. all tires have a butyl rubber liner inside and THAT is what holds the air in your tires. NOT the rubber tire/tread/carcass! that's why if you ever use fix-a-flat, it's temporary. if you've left some in there for a long time and removed the tire, you'd see a brownish film inside along with the fix-a-flat (looks like old condom mixed in). what happened was that solution ate through the butyl rubber liner, now the tire will have a slow leak forever. anyone that has ever had a real drag slick knows this as the tires on their dragster will go flat in a couple weeks sitting in the garage. they don't come with the liner. that's also why hoosier, mickey thompson, etc.. drag slicks are offered with tubes. you don't have to run them, but the tires will seep out air constantly without them. the plug is an important part of the repair also. without it, water will get under the patch, but worse, it will get into the belt package rusting it out from within. when those steel belts rust and break, you have tires with big ol' lumps in the tread area, tread separations where the tread actually starts falling off the belts, and ultimately, blowouts.

if fixed properly, you should have no problems taking that tire up to it's speed rating.

^^^ Very clear. Thanks.

Somebody used to work at a tires shop :)

spoolin2bars nailed it. The one problem with the "string" plugs is that water can also migrate through the string and contaminate the steel belt...aka rust. Rubber plug and patch or combo unit (plug and patch unit in one).

Americas Tire here in Camarillo did the same plug/shave/patch on my 4Runner a few weeks ago. It was free of charge, and my wife said it was probably the nicest automotive related experience she's ever had. The tires are some horrible fucking chinese pieces of shit from the previous owner that I can't wait to replace, but they've still got about 15k good miles on them.

In any case, it'll be damned hard not to go to Americas Tire for my next set of rubber on my regular cars.

yeah, they're the west coast division of discount tire. That's actually one of the ways they became a giant in the tire industry. The founder would do a free tire repair or rotation for anyone whether you bought tires from him or not. Policy they still continue in some regions. He's still alive and its still a family owned buisness despite doing over a billion a year in sales!

Rope is fine for a get-you-back-on-the-road solution. For high speed highway and track use I'd prefer to see a "mushroom plug" or patch installed.

Thank you very much

And thank you very much.

Losers. Everyone else is losers. Told you patches were the way to go.

Plug patches are the only way to go... If you've ever seen one done or done one yourself you'd realize they're not going to come apart or harm the tire... They cost more, and take longer to do but are worth it... I worked at a Sears tire store for a while, and thats what they used exclusively. I've known several people that have run them at autocrosses and the track w/ no incidents... In fact, our 275 hoosier A6s ate a fucking hood pin at the first event we ran them at... plug patched and that tire is fine now (hood pins make monster holes btw)