Originally Posted by
Tourist in MSN
Someone several years ago on this forum commented that it could be very hard to find the itty bitty thing that caused the puncture inside of a tire. They would wipe the inside of the tire with a ball of cotton and often the cotton would snag on the sharp item like a thorn, making finding it much easier.
Probably me. It’s an old trick around here.
I will say that while I’m not a fan of sealants, I have used them on some of my excursions to southeastern Colorado. After getting over 65 punctures when I taunted the Goathead Gods (there were many more but I just stopped counting), I started to use old tires (used from my local co-op), tire liners,
and Slime tubes. At the risk of taunting the Goathead Gods again and all that entails, I haven’t picked up a single goathead over multiple trips to the goathead capital of North America. All that weight...and I implore the Goathead Gods to consider my sacrifice...is horrible but it seems to work.
Gaze upon the horror that is a couple of goathead plants.
DSCN1199 by
Stuart Black, on Flickr
DSCN1200 by
Stuart Black, on Flickr
Nearly all the green you see in the first picture is goathead plants. Each yellow spot you see in those plants will produce 5 seeds, each one a caltrop which has a better than 50% chance of sticking a thorn into the air to puncture a tire. Each plant can products hundreds to thousands of flowers.