Fixing a flat questions

[livemusic]

Small trailer of mine, haven't used it in months and the tire was completely loose on the rim. Long story short is I ended up breaking the valve stem. It was like it was rotten. Needed to be replaced, apparently! So, part of that rubber bottom is rolling around in that tire and I haven't been able to shake it out or get my fingers on it. FWIW, if anything, tire is 4.80x8, used to be a boat trailer, real small wheels! Is that rubber part rolling around forever inside gonna hurt anything? Trailer isn't used much. Tire has some dry rot, I don't want to spend extra going to a tire place, would hope I can just put a new valve stem in and air it up. If I don't solve it myself, will just have to buy new tires. But I don't wanna!

Second question... ever heard of putting Automatic Transmission Fluid in a dry rotted tire? Supposedly, makes the rubber swell and will fix dry rot air leak. So, that's two questions! (I put ATF in another dry rotted tire two days ago and so far it's holding. Too early to tell.) I have never had good luck with Slime. And it ain't cheap! I used the old Slime bottle and put about a cup of ATF in the bottle and squeezed it in like it's Slime, and then rolled the tire all around to distribute it.

[B.C.C. Lapp]

Is your trailer going on the road or just around your property?  In other words are we talking highway speeds?

The piece of rubber in the tire wont cause you any grief at low speeds.    I wouldn't give it a thought.
But I would not take a clearly dry rotted tire out on the road and maybe you shouldn't either.  If your talking high way use you gotta bite the bullet and get new tires.

I never heard of putting ATF in a tire.   I doubt it does much for long.  Curious to see what the other guys say about that.

[scsmith42]

Is your trailer going on the road or just around your property?  In other words are we talking highway speeds?

The piece of rubber in the tire wont cause you any grief at low speeds.    I wouldn't give it a thought.
But I would not take a clearly dry rotted tire out on the road and maybe you shouldn't either.  If your talking high way use you gotta bite the bullet and get new tires.

I never heard of putting ATF in a tire.   I doubt it does much for long.  Curious to see what the other guys say about that.

^^^ This.

[doc henderson]

they make a tool to pull valve stems into a wheel.  mine is a Milton I think.

[Southside]

ATF is known to swell rubber seals, o rings, etc and is used as an emergency attempt to slow down hydraulic leaks sometimes. I don't think it would do much for a dry rotted tire issue.

[doc henderson]

some have spoken of reconditioning things like a conveyor belt.  maybe that was where they were coming from.

[beenthere]

Maybe put a new tube in it. ??

I'd just get a new tire..
 

[treemuncher]

 

 
A flex camera like this and a parts picker will allow you to get the piece out without breaking the tire off of the rim. You could also place a piece of cardboard built into a ramp, cut & formed properly, into the upper 1-2 or 10-11 o'clock position & facing down while the tire is upright, blast air in at the 5 or 7 o'clock position to spin the piece around the tire until it hits the cardboard and is forced out along the cardboard ramp.

A rubber piece within the tire should not hurt anything. At higher speeds, centrifugal force should have it set to the inner circumference of the tire and somewhat locked in place until that force is removed.

Heard of ATF on rubber but never on tire usage. We used to grease the bead to stop slow bead leaks many moons ago when I grew up changing tires. Be sure to cover the upright portion of the bead when it sets or you could have some flying grease threads!

Slime is the worst chemical that I've ever tried on tires. I've had it rust out rims and destroy the rubber. I do swear by Amerseal to keep my tires sealed and minimize my wasted labor time.

[Stephen1]

I would just put a new tire on the rim and carry on...Tires have a 7 year shelf life. 
My son in law owns a Tire shop. If someone adds anything to a flat tire, like Slime, they refuse to work on that tire and rim they throw them out. 

[moodnacreek]

I would just put a new tire on the rim and carry on...Tires have a 7 year shelf life.
My son in law owns a Tire shop. If someone adds anything to a flat tire, like Slime, they refuse to work on that tire and rim they throw them out.

[moodnacreek]

I would just put a new tire on the rim and carry on...Tires have a 7 year shelf life.
My son in law owns a Tire shop. If someone adds anything to a flat tire, like Slime, they refuse to work on that tire and rim they throw them out.

I add stuff to tires all the time. Have you ever fixed a slow leak on a 15", 3 piece rim. 20 ply forklift tire? What is the harm in putting any liquid in a tire tube. Liquid may not leak where air will sometimes. If my quick fix does not work I save the sealant when i break the tire down for another tire. It sounds like your shop would not put never seize on the lug nut. threads either.

[beenthere]

Interesting discussion. 

Just ran across a Youtube video that talks about tire products put into the tires. 
Fuller Bros. TIRE LIFE® - YouTube

[Stephen1]

Moodnacreek okay for when you are doing to your own equipment for sure.  But the slime and such is horrible stuff to try and fix a flat tire after it coats the inside of the tire and rim.

[DanielW]

Putting ATF or (more commonly) antifreeze in a tire is to help with bead leaks - it's an emergency, shade-tree fix to swell the rubber on a tubeless tire so it seals a leaking bead. Ok for a side-of-the-road fix or (for me) when you need to keep a tractor tire going to get some hay in before it rains, but not a long-term solution. It won't help with other cracks, and ATF will cause the rubber to degrade fairly quickly.

I confess I've used antifreeze to swell and seal a bead a few times on farm equipment and just left it in - doesn't do any harm. My justification is I can't see glycol antifreeze being any worse than calcium chloride or some of the other solutions the load farm tires with.

[sawguy21]

Calcium carbide?  Is that how you seat the bead on the rim? Most times we used calcium chloride, man I hated working with that stuff.

[livemusic]

UPDATE

It's been a month since I put the ATF in the two tires on two different trailers that, prior to that, would not hold air due to dry rot. FWIW, they are still holding just fine.

[rusticretreater]

I think he was saying long term exposure to antifreeze can't damage the rims any worse than Calcium Chloride.

I have one rim on my log arch that would not seal up no matter what I did.  Then I did what drag racers do.  So I drilled a couple of holes through the rim where the issue was, put some flex seal there, and some small sheet metal screws into the rubber.  Sealed it up and its been a few years now and holding well.

[AndyVT]

Valve stem on the loaded rear tire of my M6040 Kubota failed and also the rubber base of the valve had degraded enough  to  weep beet juice. 
I bought a Quikstem repair valve. that is installed from the outsideof the rim. 
To remove the old valve stem, I sawzalled off the stem close to the rim and then punched the remaining inner stem base into the tire figuring that it would cause no damage to the  tire. 
And it has not in the year or more since I did it. 
Just sayin', I doubt it will hurt yours

[JD Guy]

If your tire market is anything like here you can purchase a tire/rim combination for less than the tire only with labor. Doing it yourself would likely save you a few dollars.

Glad your "farmer fix" has worked out for you  !

[TroyC]

If the bead is broken, put a block of wood on the tire and wedge the tire together with a big screwdriver. Use a grabber (long finger thingy with push button on top) to reach in and get the broken stem part. If that doesn't work you will have to pry one side of the tire off with two big screwdrivers. Use dish soap for lube!
Those 8" tires are a bear...... I used my log splitter with a couple boards over the tire to break the bead. Then hold tire inside rim and remove valve stem bottom. Use a puller (like shown above) to pull new stem in. Personally I would not run it with the broken piece inside. I have seen things inside tires cause damage to the inner lining of the tire as it rolls around inside there.

On my small boat I use the 5.70x8. They carry more weight and can be had in a 'C' rating, as cheap as 35.00 ea. Like I said, they are a bear to mount, won't fit on my regular tire machine or balancer.

[Ventryjr]

I don't have any input on ATF.  But I did get a free lawn mower with 4 flats that would barley take any air from my 12v inflator and certainly couldn't mow on 1 air up.  I Dump about 1 quart of green tire slim into each tire and now they all hold air for a few days.  It even bubbles out of the dry rot cracks on occasion. Just my $0.02