So Friday, I am driving home from work. About halfway home, my tire pressure monitor light goes on in the MINI. I pull over, and my rear passenger tire is flat.

So I change the tire and put on the dinky spare. I get home and discover a hunk of metal in the tread, I pull it out, it looks kinda like an old key.

The hole is too big for a standard plug, so I take it over to a local shop that does good work, and they plug the tire for me. I put the tire back on the car. (First flat in 16 years)

Fast forward to last night. I am driving home from work, I am just a couple miles from work, and my tire pressure monitor lights up again. I figure, that the hole was really too big and the plug has a slow leak. Well it is about to start raining very heavy, so I pull into a parking garage at a local shopping center.

I get out and my drivers rear tire is very low, not flat but low. So I proceed to change yet another tire. When I get home I find a flat sharp 1" long piece of metal in the tread, this one I am able to plug myself.

Two flat tires in 4 days,what are the odds? Is it just dumb luck?

Steve

 

Yeah, hopefully you are just getting several years worth of flat tires in a short amount of time. Now, hopefully, on with another 16 years of no flats for you!

 

The only two flat tires I've ever had happened within 3 days of each other. That was 9 years ago. Knock wood...

I think you've just gotten them out of the way for awhile.

 

When we had the original factory Continentals (Non-runflats) on my '02 MC CVT, last year my wife managed to get both tires on the right side of car with nails. Not her fault, as at the time there was construction going on near her office.

A new set of tires was purchased back in December and no problems to date.

Also remember to ALWAYS reset the tire pressure monitor light everytime you fill up the tires with air, make a tire repair, rotation or a new set is installed. This will prevent the computer from triggering the light as the system needs to "Learn" the new tire pressures and establish a threshold.

 

I did, but this is a good reminder for everyone.

Steve

 

Check this out

06/12/05 Had huge bolt in my front right tire
06/15/05 A tahoe runs over a wood board and throws it to my front grill (the grill is replaced)
06/24/05 somebody rear-ended me, just a small scratch.

three strikes in 13 days.

But I will keep motoring

 

in Maine any more. They have to use a patch from the inside. Thought it was nation wide and driven by safety/insurance companies. Guess I was wrong.

 

The first tire on Friday was too big for my plugs, so the garage used a bigger plug and and inside patch. Yesterday, I just used a plug and did it myself.

Very possible that plugs are no longer approved/legal? However, no one informed me.

Steve

 

It may just be bad luck but if I were you I would start checking my tires
before I left work. You may have an enemy.

 

Hmmm.....could be. I never looked at it that way, but I guess you could have an enemy. At any rate, sorry to hear about your luck.

I agree with an earlier post, statistically you are getting your tire troubles out of the way for awhile.

 

in a previous car I had one month with 3 or four flats. Never the same on twice in a row and always something stuck in the tread. Dunno how I managed it but it did make me think that some people in my hometown needed to clean out their truck beds a bit more often

 

Oh yeah, it crossed my mind. I plan on checking when I leave from now on, at least for a little while.

Steve

 

I managed to get a nail through the tread on the way home from getting new tires installed...

Luckily, it was a simple fix, and they're still rolling alongh fine 18,000 miles later!

-Paul!

 

When I was young, and my parents REALLY pissed me off, I'd boobytrap a tire like that. Probably the meanest thing I ever did. I do feel bad about it now though. I still darenot confess though.

 

NEVER point them to NAM, then. That would be bad.

Glad to hear the habit didn't follow you into adulthood. Not that I haven't seen an unsuspecting car or two I've wished ill upon, but that's always based on the primate behind the wheel's behavior, right?

Cheers,
Matthew Z.