Fill a Car's Flat Tire with Foam

If you've ever experienced a flat tire on the road while driving in town, you know the sinking feeling when you hear and feel the rumbling of your rim against the city pavement. Or maybe you just woke up for work and find your car on a "gangster lean" due to a slow leak. Either way, your first instinct may be to sigh and then go pull your spare tire and jack out of the trunk. But maybe there's another solution.

You can fill a car's flat tire with foam instead. It is a temporary fix, but a reliable one. Fix-a-flat is one of the more popular varieties - you can find it in just about any auto parts supply shop or convenience store. There is also a tire sealant called Slime that you can use.

The procedure to fill a car's flat tire with foam is fairly simple-the only small challenge you might have is getting the rim lifted off of the ground. The tire has to be at least semi-filled in order to fill it with foam and get things moving.

If you have a portable car battery charger, it might have a built-in air machine. Use this to fill the car tire with air. If you can safely (and slowly) make it to a gas station close by that has an air machine, that's another option. In the last case, you can call for a road service and ask the driver to bring an air machine.

Once the tire is partially or completely filled with air, screw the hose of the tire foam fill product onto the tire nozzle. It takes about 10 minutes to fill the car's tire with foam.

The last step is to drive your car a few blocks (preferably at least two to three miles) to assure that all of the foam gets distributed completely around the inside walls of the tire. The foam will then set and seal the puncture until you can get the tire repaired (plugged) or replaced. In most cases, you can still have a tire fixed even if it has foam inside, if it is still in good condition.

When you fill a car's flat tire with foam, you avoid the hassle of having to jack up your car, unscrew those tight bolts, put on the spare, and then screw it back on. You won't get dirty either, which is ideal if you were all dressed up and ready to go somewhere when you discovered the flat!). So keep a few cans of Fix-a-flat or a similar car tire foam product in your trunk, just in case.