- Sales opportunity: Shelf life of the tyre sealant is four to five years
- Available starting in May: ContiMobilityKit as a retrofit solution plus replacement products in OE quality
- Manufacturer-independent: ContiTireSealant for systems with a squeeze bottle
More and more car manufacturers are dispensing with the traditional spare tyre. In 2015, one out of three cars that came off the assembly line in Europe had a sealant kit for punctures instead. For repair shops this means that it’s worth taking a look into the luggage compartment of every car that comes in. That is because the tyre sealants in these kits have a limited usable life and must be replaced after four to five years. “This is a service with which repair shops can score points with their customers, and it can generate increased sales,” says Peter Wagner, Independent Aftermarket Vice President at Continental. For example, Continental’s OE solution, the ContiMobilityKit with a 10-amp compressor, is installed by vehicle manufacturers about a million times per year. Wagner points out that most repair shop checklists already include a check of the sealant age.
Available starting in May: sealant kits and accessories from Continental in OE quality
Starting in May, the international automobile supplier Continental will be providing its aftermarket partners with complete tyre sealant kits as well as replacement products like the sealant – all in OEM quality. A 450-ml replacement bottle is available for the ContiMobilityKit. “Repair shops should be made aware that only the manufacturer’s replacement bottle is directly compatible with the compressor,” says Christoph-Emanuel Zinke, product manager at Continental. The filling hose can also be ordered individually. Since sealant residues can remain in the hose, it must be replaced after each use.
Drivers who want to switch at a later time to the sealant can obtain the complete ContiMobilityKit including the compressor as a retrofit solution. The kit can be used for almost all of the 50 top-selling summer and winter tyre sizes. Its advantage is that the sealant bottle can be connected directly to the compressor and the driver does not have to remove the tyre valve. “95 percent of flat tyres are caused by objects smaller than 5 mm in diameter – like nails,” explains Zinke. “In all of these cases the ContiMobilityKit can help. It seals damage to the tread up to a width of 6 mm, allowing one to continue driving as far as 200 kilometres without problems.”
Continental’s product range for the aftermarket also includes a 600-ml squeeze bottle of ContiTireSealant. This is for kits where the sealant is squeezed manually into the tyre instead of being pumped by a compressor. Since the bottle does not have to fit a compressor, it can replace any kind of sealant squeeze bottle, regardless of the manufacturer. Here too, a glance into the luggage compartment may well lead to extra sales: each year, some three million kits with a squeeze bottle of sealant are used by European car manufacturers.
For further information and videos on how to use Continental’s sealant kits, visit www.continental-mobility.com.
