Current Issue

Technical > Four Wheel Finesse

September 2005 Issue

Bring ’Em Back Alive — Part 1

by Jim Allen

The emergency repairs outlined in this story are not offered as permanent, or proper. Combine them with common sense, judgement and use at your own risk.

Tire abuse, tire abuse! Well, what’s new? It’s what four wheeling is all about. Today’s tires are the best they’ve ever been and, amazingly, can often handle being wadded up like this. But not always!

There are only two types of four wheelers. Those who have experienced a trail breakdown and those who will. Over the whole of the four-wheeling sport, most of those breakdowns are minor, or relatively so. Other times, they are a four-wheeling jigsaw puzzle of major proportion. We’ll cover some breakdown scenarios in this and the next coupla issues.

You’ll see ‘wheelers react very differently to a trail breakdown. The ideal is to be analytical and calm. Yeah, you may be looking at a big chunk of your next paycheck gone in a flash, but you have to get that busted machine home to be able to fix it. Some sickos actually love the challenge of the trail repair.

Then there are the not-so great reactions, from that frozen, helpless “deer-in-the-headlights” look to a foaming-at-the-mouth, incoherent rage. Neither attitude is helpful. Trail buddies, cut the poor slob some slack. Save the barbs for the campfire after the rig is up and running and the unlucky one has had a chance to unwind with a cold adult beverage. Right now, the guy needs your help.

Step One

The first step is to find out the extent of the problem. That may take some “exploratory surgery.” Then see if the parts and repair expertise are available to fix it in situ (Latin for on the spot). If not, find someone who can make a parts run. Expertise may be in short supply, but a few gearheads can usually figure something out. By the way, if you “borrow” the parts, make sure you either return them later (get an address), buy replacements or pay for them outright. This is best figured out at the time. I still owe a good Samaritan a set of u-bolts from about 15 years ago!

Unless it’s very clear what parts you need, it’s better to wait until the exploratory surgery is done before sending out a parts runner. It can be useful to send the busted parts out with him for an exact match. Cell phones are great for this stuff if they work where you are ‘wheeling.

There are times when a corncob repair is necessary. That’s OK as long as you know that something is potentially dangerous (steering suspension, wheels, tires, etc.), and the repair cannot be trusted with anything more than getting you closer to civilization and onto a trailer. It’s your life, respect it! Remember also that a corncob repair sometimes makes a later permanent repair more difficult and costly. Gauge the effort of doing a more permanent repair now (i.e. running off for the correct parts or having the rig hauled out and professionally repaired) against the later expense of a corncob.

Workin’ in the Wild

Wrenching in the dirt is challenging and can be dangerous. The first step is to find a good place to work. If you have to lift the vehicle, do so on level ground, or as level as possible, and block the vehicle as needed. Use tires, rocks deadwood or whatever as jackstands. I’ve known two guys that were badly hurt by vehicles that fell on, or rolled over them.

Keeping dirt out of oily innards can be a challenge. Use a tarp at the repair area as a “clean room.” If a dusty wind is blowing, build a windbreak. Cover opened assemblies with rags, bags, paper towels or whatever. Wrap removed parts to protect them. A can of brakecleen is a nice thing to have but you can probably think of other things that can be used to clean parts if needed.

Small parts have a bad habit of disappearing during a trail repair. Take a few minutes to round up some containers to drop nuts, bolts and small parts into. Cut the top off a water bottle, a gallon jug, even a soda can. Anything but stomping these parts into the dirt.

Try to keep the environment clean too. Collect any drained oil or fluids in a container. Soak up as much spilled fluid as possible and collect all the oil soaked dirt you can in a bag and haul it out. There’s a great product called the Trail Pail and will soak up spills of over four gallons. We’ll try and show you this neat do-dad another time.

When a rig breaks, there’s usually no shortage of willing helpers. Sometimes there are too many and it turns into a 15-Stooges event, with people tripping over each other and arguing about how best to do the job. There should be one guy kinda directing the action. Ultimately, the default person-in-charge is the owner of the busted rig, but with the agreement of the owner, a more experienced person often takes over. Just remember that the owner has veto rights to anything done on his rig.

Tire Problems

Tire trouble is the number one trail problem. Leaks, cuts, gashes, popped beads and so on. Aired down tires in rockcrawling situations are very vulnerable, as are tires run fast over gravel roads. Non-beadlocked tires aired down too far are also vulnerable to sudden deflation from popping the bead.
Basic tire repair strategy involves first looking at the problem. Unless its a popped bead that you can reseat or a tread nail hole you can plug with a plugging kit, your best bet is to install the spare. Your spare should match the tires on the ground in every way and with it, you’re back in business 100 percent. When you have a second flat, then you have a problem.

Punctures

There are some great tire repair kits out there. With them, you can make safe repairs to tread punctures on tubeless tires. A repair with a single plug is totally safe. If you have to use two, maybe. More than two, maybe not. It’s safer if the repair is on the tread and not on, or near, the sidewall. Plugs are not generally considered safe for sidewall repairs. Sidewall damage is usually considered reason enough to replace the tire. In the short term, especially at slow speeds, the tire can be used on the trail if needed to get home, but high speed operation makes it dangerous. A damaged sidewall can come apart. If a blowout can send a stock Explorer into the ditch onto it’s roof, what’s going to happen to a lifted short-wheelbase rig?

1. The Safety Seal plugging kit is often seen out on the trail. It’s the best style to have because it has self-vulcanizing plugs. Some plugging kits use a vulcanizing glue, and that’s fine as long as the glue is fresh. The self-vulcanizing plugs seem to last longer in storage than the liquid.

2. First, pull whatever is stuck in our tire or find the hole. Then, use the probe tool and ream the hole, also using the kit’s special lubricant. The tire can have air in it or be flat.

3. Once you’ve got the hole reamed, thread a plug into the insertion needle, lube it with the provided lubricant and push it into the hole until the sleeve on the tool touches the tire. That will leave a pair of little tails sticking out. Push the sleeve against the tire to hold the plug in while you remove the needle. Air the tire up and it’s ready to use. You can nip off the “tails” with side cutters.

Yeah, you may be looking at a big chunk of your next paycheck gone in a flash, but you have to get that busted machine home to be able to fix it. Some sickos actually love the challenge of the trail repair.

Popped Beads

Most tire repairs require that you have an air compressor or an air tank, if nothing else to refill a tire with air. For reseating beads, you need a lot of air volume or a lot of patience. If you are running rims on the narrow side for your tire size, reseating a bead isn’t too bad. The opposite can be true with rims on the wide side. Whatever air source you use, remove the valve core to get maximum flow.

Various methods are used to seat the bead, from a cinch strap around the circumference to a couple of guys pushing and squeezing on various parts of the tire. There’s even the old ether trick. Call it “explosive reinflation.” I admit to doing it myself on occasion. I admit that it works but without knowing you personally, I don’t trust you enough to show you how because the cost of a mistake is very high.

Suffering Stems/Breaking Beads

Seldom is it necessary to remove a tire from a rim in the field, but sometimes you need to break the top bead to replace a valve stem. There are easy and hard ways to do this, as shown in the photos.

Drastic Measures

This is a kind of catch-all for when you run out of options... and tires. This is for when you need a way to limp closer to civilization and driving slower than molasses. For some Bozos out there, if it holds air, it’s good enough to drive at 80 mph. And heck, they can just sue somebody when everyone but them in the truck gets killed as a result. Don’t be a Bozo.

1. It’s just a little stick... which happens to be stuck through the sidewall of this tire. It doesn’t have to be a spike or a sharp rock to kill a tire! Do you try and repair it or not? If you have a spare, no.

2. So, you’re down to a tire like this or one that’s worse. To get you to the trailhead, it’s acceptable to stuff the cut like this so the tire will hold air. This repair will not hold forever because the sidewall on a radial works a lot and can sometimes cut or spit the plugs out. Keeping the tire aired up will help. You shouldn’t drive on the highway with this kind of repair, even though you may see people who do. Russian roulette is Russian roulette... every time you pull the trigger you have a one in six chance of hitting the full chamber.

3. Some ‘wheelers will carry a tube for when a tire is so badly damaged that it cannot be made to hold air. If the tire is cut, you must first put a patch over the cut or the cut may pinch the tube. In a screaming emergency, you might get by with stitching the cut closed with fishing line and using duct tape on the inside to make a smooth surface that won’t chafe the tube too quickly.

Sources

• Blue Devil Products
• 408-410-1811
• www.bluedevilproducts.com

• Extreme Outback Products
• Tyrepliers
• 866-447-7711
• www.extremeoutback.com

• Safety Seal
• North Shore Laboratories
• 800-888-9021
• www.safetyseal.com

 

 

• Shop for parts: www.4wheelparts.com
• Copyright
• User Agreement

Site designed and maintained by Cornerstone Coding