+1. This has happened to me more times than I care to recollect; as long as there is no track time involved it should be safe to drive on a properly repaired tire.

 

Discount Tire (if you have one in your area) will match Tire Rack's price.

I've driven Porsches and Corvettes for 40 years. I don't track them and I basically at the speed limit. I have mine fixed at Discount Tire if they are not near the side walls. Discount Tire or Tire Rack will also sell you tire insurance for a very reasonable price.

ChuckJ

 

Find a good tire shop if you want to patch it. That is a better repair than plug.

If you track or do high speed runs, I would not repair it.

Sometimes you will find used tires on craigslist or ebay. If you rather replace one tire instead of patching it, that's another option.

Too many tires go to waste these days. Most tire shops won't repair tires because they make more money selling new ones.

If you do get a new set, I would get N spec tires. Stiffness of the tirewall is important to 911.

 

To be honest even if you track the car I doubt anything would happen. If the patch fails, you lose air. You will not get a blowout situation.

Dave

 

You are probably right but if you were going 120mph+, you don't want to have a flat

 

We do this for a living.

Each properly installed patch reduces the speed rating by 1 level. There is no reason you should have any issues at the track or on the street with a single patch.

 

Concur.
I've had 4 different tires patched.
1-996
1-M3
2-997 C4s

No issues and tire lasted until out of tread.

No sure why this is overhyped. Sure a new tire would be the best solution however I seriously doubt a patch is costing reliability. Its like a plug door on an airplane. The air pressure is always pushing against it additionally sealing the hole.

 

With the threat of lawsuits so prominent today, I think this has been an industry concern-- and, of course, it is much more profitable for the tire makers and tire sellers to push replacement rather than patching the hole. Here in Phoenix, Discount Tire wouldn't patch a front P0 on my carrera s out of liability concerns. If they did and it ruptured while you were going 140 mph, the jury might see you guiding a motorized wheel chair with your chin and award you millions in settlement from the company. But I do wonder if a patched tire would be reasonably safe-- hell, I used one of those do-it-yourself tire plug kits with a little rubber cement by the side of the road after taking an ATV key in a front tire in the mountains. Waited 30 minutes for the sealant to dry and inflated it with the factory pump and then drove 130 miles at 55mph in the Arizona heat and it held air all the way home and sat for a week just fine.

But I did buy a new tire-- with hazard insurance!

 

I had a slow leak over a 2 week period and discovered it was a small nail. I got it patched and planed to replace the tire. That was a year ago. The patch is holding just fine.

 

Not sure where you heard that but I picked up a nail in one of my rear tires. Made the same hole a nail would make on any other tire. Tire went just as flat too.

 

On the issue of patching there tires, there is no reason they can not be patched if the repair is well within the tread width. However, given the fact they are speed rated to 186 MPH and these cars can come close to hitting those speeds (on the track of course) one would agree that patching the tire should never be done. Now if you rarely get over the posted speed limit I should think these tires can be safely patched without any issue. Porsche won't do it because they don't know how you drive the car and don't care to know. For them, replacing the tire is the only totally safe way to go. If the new tire fails they can blame it on the tire manufacturer.