Mystery flat

This morning I found my van with a dead flat left front. Totally flat. Like, no air at all flat. So I pull the wheel off and look for the obvious nail or gaping hole and find nothing. I fill the tire back up and it seems to hold air fine. Three hours later it's not lost a pound of air.

WTF?

jg

Piss off any neighborhood kids lately?

Is the mysterious flat on the side of the vehicle in the dark away from prying eyes or right out under a street light?

I think I saw this on Letterman's "Stupid Bird Tricks"

914Driver wrote: Piss off any neighborhood kids lately? Is the mysterious flat on the side of the vehicle in the dark away from prying eyes or right out under a street light?

+1

Sounds like neighborhood kids.

The neighborhood kids aren't nearly that resourceful. And the birds know where they keys are. They'd have just gone joyriding.

My theory is some sort of spontaneous bead release.

jg

tire valves can be sticky.

Dude, you've got Bloods in your 'hood:

Palm Coast Busts Bloods in Home Invasions

They probably let the air out of your tire, then went to Denny's and loosened the tops on all the salt shakers in one of their brutal initiation crime sprees.

Margie

Armadillo's.

Yep stuck valve or stupid kid. Try letting a little air out of the valves, press them fairly hard, and make sure that they slam shut immediately. Also put a little soapy water on the valve itself and at the base of the valve and see if there are any bubbles (or greasy child fingerprints).

i had a valve core go bad like that, it became a slow leaker. Couple bucks for the removal tool and new cores and I was good.

I used to carry the tool around to be able to pull and discard valve cores if someone did something stupid like slam the side of my car with their door, but I never did use it, honest!

pigeon wrote: I used to carry the tool around to be able to pull and discard valve cores if someone did something stupid like slam the side of my car with their door, but I never did use it, honest!

Wire cutters are much faster.

if it comes back, it could be what mid 2000's GM chrome rim owners are fluent in..."Chrome peal"

my girlfriend's Oldsmobile had that...aftermarket rims or non chrome ones are about the only cure.

Maybe the air in the tire had already expired.

Forgot to rotate the winter air in.

Wally wrote:

pigeon wrote: I used to carry the tool around to be able to pull and discard valve cores if someone did something stupid like slam the side of my car with their door, but I never did use it, honest!

Wire cutters are much faster.

But the average person will have no idea what's wrong with a tire with a missing valve core, and it's non-destructive assuming the idiot doesn't try to drive on the flat.

pigeon wrote:

Wally wrote:

pigeon wrote: I used to carry the tool around to be able to pull and discard valve cores if someone did something stupid like slam the side of my car with their door, but I never did use it, honest!

Wire cutters are much faster.

But the average person will have no idea what's wrong with a tire with a missing valve core, and it's non-destructive assuming the idiot doesn't try to drive on the flat.

It's WAY easier than that.
Step 1: Take a small pebble and put it in the cap.

Step 2: Screw the cap on.

Step 3: Walk away.

The pebble will depress the valve core and the tire will be flat in no time.

One of the tires on my wife's Maxima will occaisionally lose air. She has taken it in and they found no leak. We still don't know what the deal is.

I've had slow leaks on aluminum wheels, but this sounded like something quicker. Overnight is relatively quick for a slow leak.

I would take the wheel/tire into your favorite tire shop. Have them replace the valve stem and guts. You could have them also check the where the tire seats on the wheel and clean out the hole in the wheel where the valve stem is inserted. If that doesn't take care of it you may need a new wheel and/or tire. On my Maxima and Miata I change the wheel/tire combo every six months. Just put on the summer/auto-x tires on the Max this week and when I was checking the AS tires to store for the summer I pulled a very thin nail out of the tread of the tire almost a half inch long. But, knock on wood, the nail went in parallel to the tire and no air leak that I could detect. That happens to me a lot around here, I pull bunchs of metal trash from the tire but the most common flat tire problem for me is the valve stem going bad and leaking.

I've had about 6 punctures on my potenza re750s on the Z. It's starting to get annoying.

Your problem sounds like a loose valve stem core. Tighten that sucker up. That sounds like a good way to deflate a tire in exactly your timeframe. The cores on my Koesi wheels came loose a few times and they would leak like that.

Does the van have "stem mounted" TPMS units?

Replace the seals on the stem.

I see two cars a week with this problem.

get a squirt bottle with soapy water and soak the tire down. If it is loosing air in 3 hrs you will find it. Slower leaks (several days) sometimes need a dunk tank.

Check the beads, valve stem, everything. I've seen leaks just about everywhere. I've even seen the aluminum corrode around the valve stem seal and cause a leak there.

914Driver wrote: Piss off any neighborhood kids lately? Is the mysterious flat on the side of the vehicle in the dark away from prying eyes or right out under a street light?

JG, you own a gun. Why don't you sit out on your front porch, and shove ammunition in whenever children come by.

So THEY'RE who loosened the salt shaker caps at my table at that Denny's.

So THEY'RE who loosened the salt shaker caps at my table at that Denny's.