Yes, I do plan on up grading my Spyder, hopefully by next year. I'm in no rush but hanging out around here does make it very difficult to wait. :driving:

Cool, save them pennies, bro. Hell, I'm picking one up next week, and hanging here makes it tough. :icon17:

I don't even have it yet, and the OG is already asking for pics.

as mentioned before, monitor tire pressure you will be fine. If you routinely travel at extreme speeds at that point the probability will have it where something else will play a larger factor in creating an incident than a patched tire.

Its a replacement, but the same make and model of the OEM. I actually had a blowout in the sidewall about 2 mos ago and had to replace that tire. This time they were able to patch it.

Which dealer do you go to Steve? thanks.

I drove my 350 with 3 patches, they were actually plugs.... two in one rear tire and one in the other, never had any issues, but this was daily driving and NO track. As long as you are not tracking the car, I think you would be fine.

John

Town Fair Tire, but I dunno if they are in Cali..........

zero impact whatsoever, you will be fine

I've even done track days on a patched tire before, in my Z, and had no issues. So long as the procedure was done properly, you're good to go

Ridiculous. Do you own an oil field? If I bought 4 new tires for every time I got a nail in a tire, I'd need a second mortgage on my home. I just did a track day with nails in both of my rear tires. I found the nails when I swapped to my winter tires later that week. Guess what...everything was fine.

If you get a nail, get it patched and stop worrying unless you're Michael Schumacher and planning a 24hr Le Mans with your Z.

:iagree:

The tire stores have become masters of quoting "we can't patch that, it will reduce the speed rating", as well as "the nail is too close to the sidewall, we are not allowed to patch it" ................ translation....... "now fork out $350 for a new high performance tire, we're happy to sell you one at our price, forget Tirerack, you have a flat here and now". I had that game played on me about a month ago..... too close to the sidewall? Damn nail was almost 2 inches in from the side of the tire. It's a racket to sell more tires. Then, if the tire is leaking air fast enough and they have you over a barrel, they will suggest "and you might want to spend another $75 for the "road hazzard insurance", so next time this happens you'll get a new tire. But guess what, if down the road the new tire happens to pick up a nail, suddenly you hear: "oh, it's ok, this is one we can safely patch" :eek:

as an experiment ive plugged my own tire in the past using those off-the-shelf plugs
you push into the hole with a tool and pull out and cut.

even after a year or so and more than 10K miles through both summer and winter,
no issue. for street even those do fine. if you had it plugged from the inside out
at a tire store, im sure they will hold up even better. my previous car running
GSD3's had a 1/4" sized huge plug in there done professionally and was able
to run it the remaining life of the tire with no issue.

:iagree:

After my incident mentioned above, I did a lot of internet research and came to your same conclusion, then went to Pep Boys and bought one of those kits...... it's now in the rear hatch of the Z.

John

for those who drove fast on patched tires and got no blowout, it simply means that has not happened yet. Not necessarily mean it is safe and you are risk-free.

Important. you run on the patched or you run on the new and get nailed... The result could be the same... it costs your life..it costs you a new tire or/and rim.

Drive safe.

Here is the right answer. As an ex-tire designer, your biggest issue will be long term reliability. The biggest problem with patching is the time period before it happened. What causes a failure in the tread of a patched tire is the breakdown of the belts, by rusting - all it takes is some water that got in the hole at any time. The water travels down the belts, (and probably won't be noticed initially at all), but what happens is the belts start to rust and separate from the rubber, get weak, and then the real problem happens (break). I will patch a tire just to get somewhere or until I have the time to replace. I never run a tire that has been patched longterm. After designing tires (for one of the best tire companies), and working for a car company and being able to visit other tire manufactureres and diagnose tire failures, I would never keep and drive on a patched tire - just not worth the risk.

How is water getting into the tread? If the nail goes in and there isn't a leak, then the seal (now including the nail) is water tight. If there IS a leak but the tire has not gone flat, any water would be expelled from the defect. The only way I could see water infiltrating is if the tire is allowed to go flat.

Doesn't take much, you assume you have a perfect seal while the nail is in there, which will never be the case, with the pressure build up and how much the treads/belts shift during every rotation into the contact patch. Again it is usually never noticeable until it fails later on. Usually when you get a nail, there is a slow leak, even if it is very slow (not noticeable over days), there is some leak, hence an opportunity to get water in. It could just be condensation over night, from a warm/cold/warm condition. Now if you never drive through the rain or in any puddles, etc, and your weather is stable, then you have a better chance. It is like car insurance, you gamble with something happening - with tires, it isn't worth it to me, I drive this car like it should be driven, and a failed tire on an on/off ramp/back road, would be not be a good situation (over $200) - and I have seen this happen to tires many, many times.