Alright saturday i got some Firestone Firehawk tires. Loved them. took a look at them today, and theres a big a$$ screw in the front left. I tried unscrewing it to see how deep it was, and i stopped when i heard the air hissing. Right now its screwed down under the tread so it wont come off on the road, but WHAT SHOULD I DO???????

 

um, take it to any tire place and have them repair the tire for like 10 bucks? i'd say to do it yourself, but i think you're supposed to take the tire off the wheel for that and i doubt you have that kind of equipment handy.

 

alright.... i was PRAYING that i didnt have to fully replace it. That would ruin my week... thanks

 

Make sure you find a place that will do a hot-vulcanised repair. Most places cheapskate with cold patches. Hot is best for safety.

 

sell the car

 

Why would you buy brand new tires w/o road hazard protection? It usually costs nothing if you buy them at the right place. Then you never have a plug they always give you a new tire minus tread used. Plugs are horrible, I will not use them, once you have had a high speed blowout you won't either. Especially if you drive your car aggressively and or race with it. I would cut it with a knife and send it back as a defect, firestone is used to that by now, especially since it is brand new. Do you really want a plug in your tire for 35,000 or however long they last? Tell them the knife mark was a bubble then it exploded, you were on your way to the tire place when it happened, sound good. They can't prove otherwise, it is a defect, good luck.

 

By state law you must get it patched. No more pluging. Its going to run you up there. It works like a plug but it has a nice round contact surface area. They must dismount the tire from the rim, sand down where the nail went through, clean up the area with tire/rubber cleaner use a drill bit to make the screw hole larger and a nice clean opening. Put some glue patch in that area pull the patch through, make sure its 100% flat on the tire use a sealer and slap everything back again. last but not least cut the plug part of the patch that sticks out of the tire. Its 100% effective will not blow out! We do it this way at work I don't know how others do it but there are stages to this, you can do it like a scum bag and just slap on the patch without any of the steps above but risk the patch moving.


The ones I use at work is better but this is a general idea of what is being used now.

 

Yep, take it to the tire store and let them remove the screw. A good tire store will be happy that you let them remove the screw, since fixing the flat in the shop is not a complicated task, if you give them plenty of time to do it properly. Unless of course your tire store is a bunch of schmoes with no service plan and they charge you for all of it. Tire stores that back up your purchase with a service plan will use proper patches since that is the cheapest thing for them.

Dave

 

Discount tire should do it for free, even if you didn't buy the tires from them, that is if you have one near you.

 

Yeah there's a discount tire 5 mins from my house. I'll head there tomorrow. Otherwise i'll head back to Tires Plus, see what they tell me.

As for sabotaging it and calling defect......what happens when they see its a clear knife mark, call BS on my story, and i get screwed with a tire that i cut myself when a plug would have worked just fine.....

 

Definately take it back to where you bought it if you have a road hazard prot. If not try a place like Discount Tire... hpoe it works out.

 

Yeah at the time they were throwing all this crap at me, We can change that taillight for 65, Replace the lower control arm (bad ball joint apparently), add our road hazard plan, new sway bar endlink, and replace rear rotors and pads all for 650 + change for labor.... I said do my brakes... didnt even THINK of road hazard. now i regret not spending the 50 bucks. Either way, tire places are shady trying to force all this crap on me. I knew beforehand what needed to be done.... The fact that they wanted to charge me 60 dollars to change my damn tail light bulb ( cost me 1.27 and 3 minutes of my time) turned me off to spending ANY more than i needed there....

 

The only time you'd need a new tire is when the sidewalls get punctured. Also, you should get a road hazard with any new tires. It's worth the extra money especially if you are paying at least $150 per tire.

 

Get a self repair kit and plug the darn thing. I've been plugging my tires for years not a problem yet. Cheap, easy, effective(As long as the puncture isnt too big).

 

I have firehawks on my 88, dont like them. I also saw quite abit of bad reviews about them. To each his own. Just get the repair kit. Not hard, doesnt take long either.

 

go to discount.
no need to freak out.
but chancse are you didnt buy firestone from discount.+
32

 

That's why I go to my tire guys. They always have had the 'road hazard' plan in place - if you bring it to them, they fix it for free. If it needs replaced, and it's fairly new, they'll credit you for the tire that died. No extra fees, none of that garbage.

Dave

 

so would discount charge me for the repair.... thing is i am completely broke right now...

 

I think they will charge, that would be a bad business practice to not charge.

 

ahaha. Seriously though, like everyone else said you don't need to purchase a new tire. If the tire place will fix it for free then go there. If they won't then buy a kit and do it yourself. The kit will pay for itself eventually because it will happen again sometime.