Can You Repair Sidewall Tire Damage

Your tires might not be the well-nigh complex office of your vehicle, merely they're arguably among the virtually indispensable. Keeping your tires in good status is integral to both safety and functioning, so when they endure impairment, information technology's important to take care of it immediately. You're probable familiar with patching tires, but are there limits to this practice? For instance, can you lot patch the sidewall of a tire?

Where the Rubber Meets the Road

Tires take more going on than meets the eye. Over the years, tire technology has evolved to brand them stronger, longer-lasting and safer in diverse driving atmospheric condition. There are many parts of a tire, but the two master external parts are the tread and the sidewall.

The tread is what contacts the road. It's very thick, it wears down over time, and information technology'southward the office you pay special attending to when you're watching out for alignment issues. It is meant to wear downwards, merely evenly.

The sidewall is thinner because information technology is not designed to contact the road and wearable down. Information technology protects the inner plies of the tire, which are structural, and it flexes as the tire rotates and bears the weight of the vehicle.

Patching Your Tires

Many people keep tire plug kits in their vehicles for emergency roadside repairs, but patches are a lilliputian more than in-depth. In order to properly install a patch, the tire must be safely removed from the vehicle and the rim. The hole or tear area must be cleaned upward and covered with vulcanized cement so that the patch can be installed from the within and sealed before the tire is reinstalled on the vehicle.

The patch adheres to the tire'southward cloth around the impairment, and the added pressure of inflation actually works to printing the patch outward further plugging the hole. If washed correctly, this creates a seal that tin can last the rest of the tire's life. Patches are viable for repairing small holes or tears, by and large, those that are 1/iv inch or less.

Fixing Damage in the Sidewall

If you accept a leak, pigsty or tear in your sidewall as opposed to your tread, you lot should not repair it with a patch. The thinness of the sidewall gives petty textile for a patch to adhere to, and the damage to the sidewall leaves the tire structurally compromised. As mentioned before, the sidewall tends to flex, putting extra stress on the repair and increasing the likelihood of patch failure, which is more probable to occur at higher speeds and pressures.

Patching the sidewall is only not a good idea, equally a leak or blowout while the vehicle is underway could result in loss of control with catastrophic consequences. So if y'all end up with a damaged tread, y'all tin plug and patch away, but if the harm is to your sidewall, you're going to have to replace the tire, which usually means replacing the fronts or rears in pairs.

So can yous patch the sidewall of a tire? The reply is a solid no. Luckily, sidewall damage is far less common than damage to the tread, and you can minimize information technology past paying attending to route conditions, not overloading your vehicle, staying away from the curb when you're parallel parking, and keeping your tires properly inflated, rotated and maintained.

Check out all the tires, wheels and accessories available on NAPA Online, or trust one of our 17,000 NAPA AutoCare locations for routine maintenance and repairs. For more information on patching tires, chat with a knowledgeable expert at your local NAPA Machine PARTS store.

Photos courtesy of Blair Lampe.

Blair Lampe View All

Blair Lampe is a New York-based professional mechanic, blogger, theater technician, and speechwriter. In her downtime she enjoys backpacking wherever her boots will acquit her, rock climbing, experimental theatre, a well-baked rosé , and showering honey on her 2001 Sierra truck.