I have just read both websites for these products. They seem very similar as it appears that both can be washed out and then a permanent patch put on. Fix-a-flat, though, has it's own "air". Other than this, is there a reason to buy one or the other?

Thank you for all your help!

i have had used Slime, but it still leaked. A lot slower, but you still had to pump up the tires every one to two days.

never used the other one.

I found it to be more slime than anything. I had to stop and get just a normal tire plug on the way home after using it. The hole was not even that big. So I started keeping a tire plugging in the vehicle.

Ditto here, I don't trust the liquids, I carry a tire plug kit in both vehicles.
I have used Slime once and didn't have any problems, tire lasted quite a while, actually till the tread wore down.

The thing is, if you only carry Slime or Fix-A-Flat and the hole is to big your screwed, so my suggestion is if you want to carry one of the liquids you should also carry a tire plug kit also just in case.

I wouldn't use either one for a passenger car except in a dire emergency, but I do use Slime on my ATV. I use it as more of a preventative than anything else. I put a bottle in each tire every 3-4 years. In my experience it works well. It seems to permanently plug slow leaks, and turn regular leaks into slow leaks. It is especially good for troublesome leaks around the rim. I have never had much luck with Fixaflat. It's too watery. As others have said, you are better off getting a plug kit along with a small portable compressor.

I like fix-a-flat. Not perfect bud for around $5, its worth having one in each car. Used to carry a foot operated pump and might have to find another one to add back in.

Teacher

The products are slightly different.

Slime requires you to remove the valve core, which effectively renders the tire completely flat. Fix a flat can be used when the tire is low on air.

I also use it in my ATV tires with pretty good success.

the flat must be fix as soon as possible. The slime doesn't work for large tires. I have heard many stories of Canadians who used the slime with total failure. The slime leak out of the tire while the car in motion.

If you go with Fix-a-flat, don't let the bottle rattle around in something like a tool box. It will find some way to develop a hole in it & get all over everything near it.

I like slime, but have never used it on a OTR tire. But it works well on holes the size of nails and screws. For car and truck tires i use a plug kit, this is the kit i use.

http://www.safetyseal.com/

Very well made but a little pricey.

I carry a fix a flat can in every vehicle, and am happy to report that I have never had to use one of them, so I can not comment on their effectiveness. As for "slime," that sounds like the Neverleak that we used to put in our bike tires when I was a kid, to keep the tires from going flat when you ran over a goathead. That stuff worked great...

CAUTION: If you ever use fix a flat. When you have the tire change Please, Please tell the tire changer that you have used it. The air up component is flamable. If you tell him then if it goes bang you won't be responsable. There have been injuries and even death from the blasts that havwe happened from them. In fact do it if you use any aerosol inflation product.

Decades ago there were stories of Fix-a-flat causing injuries when the mechanic dismounted the fluid/gas-filled tire while smoking or near a source of flame. Evidently the stuff used was highly flammable. I was never quite sure of the real relative risk but after a time I noticed that the cans of Fix-a-flat started to come with stickers to affix to the tire and warn the mechanic.

The last can of this stuff I used had no such stickers or warnings so I suspect that they reformulated it to make it less a hazard.

I recently used a can and was careful to tell the tire mechanic that I had used the Fix-a-flat. He gave me a quizzical look. I told him of the potential fire hazard. He was glad to know it but politely informed me that nobody in the shop was allowed to smoke.

Makes me think that if an experienced tire mechanic didn't immediately know about it or consider it a clear hazard maybe it isn't quite the issue it used to be. By any means, as far as I could tell, there were no explosions or guys running around on fire so well enough I guess.

I have used Fix-a-Flat with mixed success. If the hole is not some small and regular like a nail puncture and is instead something more like a split, it does not work so well. It has worked on the small holes. If I can't fix the tire with a plug, I can't fix it with Fix-a-Flat.

In the last month I've used plug to repair a hole in one of my Darling Bride's tires and also on in my Jeep.
Takes only a few minutes to local hole and insert plug.
Easy as pie. I keep a plug kit in each vehilce.

the first day at my newest job (construction) I was informed that I had a tire going flat in the parking lot when some of the hands returned from lunch. I had to go out and get my Gang box out of the truck and in order to do so i had to get the tire back reinflated so the forklift could get to my box. there was a screw drove in the tire.I used a can of fix a flat on the tire then used my Sears Diehard jump start/compressor to reinflate the tire. It took about 20 mins to reinflate the tire back to 35 psi. I left the screw in the tire until the weekend when i had time to remove the tire and remove the screw and plug the hole with a plug kit.

In my opinion fix a flat is alright for temporary fixes but a patch kit is much better.

Last job I was at the head programmer was always messing with me so one day while I was in the lunchroom where I could see my truck he let a little air out of my tire so I walked out and pulled out my air compressor and put some air in my tire foiling his joke. I then reached under the back seat and pulled out a socket set and reached under his car and put a socket on one of his bumper bolts and ask him if he ever heard about the college joke where they disassembled a car and put it back together in the dorm

I recently used Fix-a-Flat in my leaking ATV tire, with amazing success--I have since beat the living you-know-what out of the tires and it is still up--but it was a fresh can. My only experience. I do want to use slime in my ATV tires next.