Home > Community > Do you need to use rubber cement when plugging a tire?
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Jay T Arnott

Do you need to use rubber cement when plugging a tire?

Dave Hunter  Follow

In the side wall and near the edge of the tread.

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Darla  Follow

Very little sticks to silicone other than a silicone adhesive itself, short of the silicone substrate being etched in some way. I would strongly suggest using a silicone based adhesive to adhere two silicone surfaces together to achieve acceptable results. A silicone based caulk, silicone transfer tape, or even VHB or UHB tape are all good options.

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Liz O'Callaghan  Follow

Yes

Bycycle innertubes can be patched with a special stick on patch they call scabs, but I have never tried them.

Tire plug and patch kits have a special rubber glue that reacts to the rubber (vulcanizing).

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Brenda Barlow  Follow

Thru out my 40+ years of plugging tires I've never heard of a tire blowing out because it was plugged.?

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Daniel Bernard  Follow

Generally synthetic as this can be manufactured to a detailed spec, whereas natural always has a certain amount of variation.

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Burtay Mutlu  Follow

Those little hairy nubs are caused by mold vents. When the treads are made, rubber compound is pressed into a mold. In order to make sure each of the treadblocks is filled with rubber and doesn’t have an airbubble trapped these vents provide an escape route for the air and make sure they are 100% filled.

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David Miller  Follow

Tire plugs made of solid rubber, common in decades ago did require rubber cement to prevent them from working out of the tire. Modern tires made of rayon or dacron fiber, like small ropes, are saturated in rubber cement or another adhesive compound from the factory, and as long as they are tacky when you remove them from the package, you don’t need rubber cement to seal them.

Plugging a steel belted radial tire for an automobile isn’t easy, since you must use the plugging tool to force the plug through the steel wire belts in the tire casing. The plug will only seal off if it is slightly larger than the hole it is filling, so applying rubber cement to the plug does help to lubricate it, making it easier to install.

In my opinion, plugs should only be used in the tire tread, and only if it is still thick enough to allow the plug enough surface area to grip. Sidewalls have too much movement and flexing during driving that may cause the plug to fail, and very thin tire tread also reduces the plug’s grip and may allow it to work free. Large holes or cuts in the tire should be repaired by a tire service professional who may use an internal patch or even a “boot” and inner tube.

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David Rosen  Follow

Not at all. For clean punctures through the tread it's the main repair technique. If done properly the tyre is completely roadworthy for the remainder of its life.

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