The place where I have been taking my vehicles over the years for oil changes and tire plugs has a new policy:
“For insurance reasons, we no longer plug tires. We only install an inside patch.”
A plug was less than $10, and a lot of times the mechanic would do them for even less if I had it in for an oil change.
An inside patch costs $20.
What’s the deal? Is a plug more inherently dangerous than a patch?
BTW, this is not a Mom ‘n’ Pop gas station. It’s a branch of an instantly-recognizable large company (whose name you can often see flying overhead at sporting events).
Kind of along the same lines, my cars spare “donut” tire went flat. The tire store told me they couldn’t repair the donut or sell me a new one because it was against the law. The only place I could have it done was a dealership. What’s going on here ??
Depends on the garage. Most will still put in a plug. No garage wanting to stay in business will patch a hole in or too close to the sidewall, though. Major blowout potential.
Plug them yourself. Really, the kit is available at any auto store and the procedure can be done by a 10 year old. Prices out to less than a buck a plug.
In the mysterious world of automobile sales, repair and supplies, on never knows the reasoning behind things. Some places will plug tires, others will not because an inside patch is supposed to be safer. You can still buy the plug kit in almost any store where they carry auto parts, but, beware! The plugging device in the cheaper kits has a tendency to snap off.
I’m still steamed over buying an in stock replacement dealer headlight assembly for $150 that took them probably $5 to make and another off brand copy would have cost me $30 and the junk yard would have sold one to me for $10.
I hated those little emergency tires. I threw mine out, went to the junk yard and bought an almost new tire with rim that would fir for $20. {I love junk yards.}