How to Fix a Flat Tire With Ease?

Flat tires are not a very uncommon scene if you use your vehicle on a regular basis. This can be caused due to various reasons such as a small nail or piece of metal puncturing the rubber of the tires and releasing the air from within. Now it is necessary for you to fix such a problem immediately to continue with your ride. In this blog, we have provided the steps that can be followed by you to fix your flat tires. There are certain tools i.e patch kit, spare tire which will be required by you to both replace or fix flat tires in cars. 

Fixing flat tires

It should be noted that reworking of a flat tire is always considered a short-term remedy. Tires with patches should not be driven for more than a distance of 100 miles. The best solution is to replace the flat tires. But to do so, you may have to drive the vehicle to the vehicle maintenance store. Hence, following the steps below can be of effective help to address the immediate crisis.

Remove the wheel with the flat tire – you should first remove the flat tire. It can be done by using a lug wrench which is needed to loosen the lug nuts. Special care should be taken to ensure that the lug nuts should only be loosened and not removed from the bolts yet. Then you should affix the car jack to the particular jacking point of the vehicle on which you are presently working. Adopt proper safety measures as jacking the car on an incline can be extremely dangerous. Lastly, remove the lug nuts and take off the flat tire.

Find the area of leakage

Now, it is time for you to find the leak in the tire. Most of the time it is visually impossible to find the object which punctured the tire. If you can do so, pull it out carefully. It can be easily done with the help of pliers. In case you are not able to find out the leak, inflate the tire and feel or listen around the surface for an opening or escaping air. Another prominent way of doing it is to inflate the tire and spray it with soapy water. The escaping air will then form bubbles at the point of puncture helping you to locate the actual spot.

Plug the hole

After finding the puncture or the hole, ream it out to ensure that the plug will fit in it. Then you should plug the hole and apply the necessary adhesive and then insert it into the hole until at least two inches of the material sticks out from the tire. You should then let the adhesive dry and ultimately cut off the protruding excess of the plug. 

Test the plug

You are now required to test the plug. For that, you are again needed to inflate the tire and check for the escaping air with the help of techniques that have been mentioned above. 

Refit the tire wheel

The last step is to refit the wheel. To do so you should reattach the tire and lug nuts, lower the car and remove the jack. You should also make sure to follow the torque requirements in your car’s manual. This is exactly when you will be able to understand the significance of torque wrench.

If you have a spare wheel you can also choose to replace the flat tire. Tires are the only vehicle parts that stay in direct contact with the road when the car is in motion. Therefore, you are advised to take proper care of them. In case you are unable to do so rely on vehicle maintenance and repair stores that take care of your car on your behalf. Car Lovers is one such one-stop shop that does it all for you at the most reasonable prices available.