Spare tires and wheel braces

What is your solution to the spare tire / wheel brace problem?

  • I have a car with runflat tires

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • I have a car but nothing to deal with flats

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • I have a spare tire, no extender and I am strong enough to undo the bolts

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • I have a spare tire and do the wheels myself, or re-tighten them at home

    Votes: 0 0.0%

  • Total voters
    11

Samson

Deity
Joined
Oct 24, 2003
Messages
19,172
Location
Cambridge
I have just had my second puncture at motorway speeds this year. In both cases it was fine, because I managed to get off the road within a small number of miles and change the tire for the full size spare I had. Also in both cases the flat tire was ripped to shreds before I found somewhere safe to park up, though I think the wheel itself will be fine. The last time I had to change a tire on the road, about a decade ago, was after hitting a block of wood on the road that I decided was safer to hit than swerve round. That destroyed the wheel properly, but I was able to continue my journey with the spare. This is a small price to pay for getting off the highway to a safer parking spot.

One thing we could discuss is the tendency of cars these days to not have spare tires. I do not understand this idea. I want to be able to carry on my journey after destroying a wheel or tire getting to safety, or by hitting debris in the road. I am carrying about over a tonne of metal already, do I really want to give up having a spare for another 20 Kg or so? Some people use that spray in repair foam stuff, it seems rare that could help you even if you trusted it, which I would hesitate to do. Even space savers irritate me, and I do not understand why they exist on company cars, but they are so much better than nothing or foam.

The other thing we could talk about is that in all those three cases I was almost not able to change the tires 'cos the wheel nuts were done up with pneumatic wrench at the tire place. This time I just managed by bracing myself within the door frame and using my whole body strength on the wheel brace, I may not have managed if it had been the front wheel. I used to keep a 40-50 cm length of scaffolding pole in my car, but I lost it along the way. I have to get another, but I am not sure the best way. Googling for it I get things like the below, I am not sure how they work. Surely a metal tube will work with any wheel brace, so is the best solution.

What do you have in case of a flat tire or damage to your wheel?

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I have a cellphone. :p

I doubt I would change it myself in the middle of nowhere because lack of proper tools. While I am a car mechanics aficionado and have lots of tools, including impact and dynamometric wrenches, they are all in my garage where I have many times mounted and dismounted wheels, brakes, shocks, etc but with the proper jack y tools. Working on the shoulder of the road is anything but safe, so I think the best option in such cases us to call your breakdown assistance.
Otoh my daily car has a proper full size spare wheel, but after years it is probably pretty deflated, and my weekend sporty car has not spare wheel at all but a ridiculous mini-compressor and a tube of glue of dubious efficacy.
 
I have a cellphone. :p

I doubt I would change it myself in the middle of nowhere because lack of proper tools. While I am a car mechanics aficionado and have lots of tools they are all in my garage where I have many times mounted and dismounted wheels, brakes, shocks, etc but with the proper jack y tools. Working on the shoulder of the road is anything but safe, so I think the best option in such cases us to call your breakdown assistance.
Otoh my daily car has a proper full size spare wheel, but after years it is probably pretty deflated, and my weekend sporty car has not spare wheel at all but a ridiculous mini-compressor and a tube of glue of dubious efficacy.
I have called the breakdown people a few times in my life, and it has always taken many hours. Changing the wheel only takes a few minutes.

The safety at the side of the road thing is why I am happy to drive a few miles on flat tire. It will cost me more, 'cos you will not be able to get the puncture fixed and you may damage the wheel, but getting off the highway makes such a big difference to your and other road users safety. It definitely means those tubes of glue will not work.
 
yeah...emergency roadside service for me :D
 
I just call AAA for any roadside service I need.

Add such an answer to the poll?
 
I managed to nail one of my back tyres earlier this year and was a little disgusted to discover that although the boot of our 'recent' model (2017?) Ford Focus had a wheel-well, all it contained was a small bottle of sealant, and a cigarette-lighter powered compressor to screw that bottle into -- unlike the previous Focus model we'd owned (from 2001-ish?), the wheel-well of which contained a jack, a short wheel-brace, and an actual spare wheel.

However, I was more disgusted when the mechanic rang us to say that not only did the nailed tyre need replacing, but we also had to shell out an additional whack of cash (nearly as much as the tyre? more?) to replace the electronic pressure-sensor inside the rim -- because in 'repairing' the tyre long enough to get the car to the mechanic, the sealant had gummed up the old sensor, rendering it useless.
 
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Most of the electronics like that are a deliberate scam.

All sorts of sensors that do fairly menial things but break the system when they fail, and they're far and away the most likely component to fail. Then need to be replaced new, naturally. Same sort of design principles that had those Boeings overriding pilot input to force crashes.
 
I just call AAA for any roadside service I need.

Add such an answer to the poll?
Am I able to? I try and edit the OP and I cannot from there. If a mod has to do it feel free, and perhaps it would be good to change it to multiple options allowed, for the case of two cars and "I have this, but would call the AA(A)".
 
Done and folks get to choose 2 items.
 
Most cars in the US have the "emergency only" spare. Also called a "space saving" spare or "temporary" spare. Which is a half width tire which will allow you to, hopefully, limp to somewhere safe to get help. Although American light trucks would typically carry a full size spare. For SUVs, one thing that can help distinguish between a truck based SUV and a car based one is which spare you have. although not always. The temp spares are all about the saving of some weight and space in the vehicle.

My car has a temp spare. But I carry a lug cross bar to loosen the lugs if needed.

powerbuilt-torque-wrenches-940558-64_1000.jpg
 
Most of the electronics like that are a deliberate scam.

All sorts of sensors that do fairly menial things but break the system when they fail, and they're far and away the most likely component to fail. Then need to be replaced new, naturally. Same sort of design principles that had those Boeings overriding pilot input to force crashes.
Yep, for daily use cars, I am increasingly leaning towards not very modern cars. Not too old to be a pain in the ass though, I mean, I don't want frozen carburetors in the morning or sweating while parking because there is not power steering for instance. Later 90s or early 2000s is the sweet spot I think.

For hobby cars I totally go for pre-90 cars. Nothing better that finding a cheap old classic and restore it yourself to its original glory.
 
Yep, for daily use cars, I am increasingly leaning towards not very modern cars. Not too old to be a pain in the ass though, I mean, I don't want frozen carburetors in the morning or sweating while parking because there is not power steering for instance. Later 90s or early 2000s is the sweet spot I think.

For hobby cars I totally go for pre-90 classics. Nothing better that finding a cheap old classic and restore it yourself.
I am totally with you about the daily use cars, by 2000 manufacturing quality had got so good I am sure 20 year old cars are more reliable than 10 year old cars 30 years ago.
 
I am totally with you about the daily use cars, by 2000 manufacturing quality had got so good I am sure 20 year old cars are more reliable than 10 year old cars 30 years ago.
A 20 years old car can be almost as good as new if it has been properly maintained regardless kilometers, basically if oil has been replaced with the proper frequency and the car is rust-free. A cylinder compression test will give you the info you need to answer the first question and the rust issue is mostly a problem in very cold climates because the salt used to dissolve snow or something like that, still looking under the car before buying is obligated. Everything else is fixable.
 
A 20 years old car can be almost as good as new if it has been properly maintained regardless kilometers, basically if oil has been replaced with the proper frequency and the car is rust-free. A cylinder compression test will give you the info you need to answer the first question and the rust issue is mostly a problem in very cold climates because the salt used to dissolve snow or something like that, still looking under the car before buying is obligated.
Well, there is a lot to go wrong that can make a car that age uneconomical to fix. I have not had a car die because of rust or because of the oily bits of an engine for ages, but faults with the ECU or sensors are the sorts of things that have caused me to scrap my last few cars. Problems like that can be so expensive to trace down and fix.

Fortunately cars that age are stupidly cheap here. Unfortunately that is not good for them still being cheap in another 20 years.
 
Well, there is a lot to go wrong that can make a car that age uneconomical to fix. I have not had a car die because of rust or because of the oily bits of an engine for ages, but faults with the ECU or sensors are the sorts of things that have caused me to scrap my last few cars. Problems like that can be so expensive to trace down and fix.

Fortunately cars that age are stupidly cheap here. Unfortunately that is not good for them still being cheap in another 20 years.
Yeah, untraceable electric issues can be a pain to fix. I have had several Citroens and therefore know about them... Still in old enough cars, if you manage to diagnose properly, electric and electronic issues can be fixed without spending that much. You can find many perfectly working ECUs in scrapyards and even hack them if needed to work with any engine, and most sensors are cheap and easy to replace. I replaced the ECU, the whole fuse box and lots of strings in one of my Citroens. (Mid 2000s)

With more modern cars they have managed to make them unfixable. It is planned obsolescence in its purest form.
 
A 20 years old car can be almost as good as new if it has been properly maintained regardless kilometers
Of course one point that is more relevant to the thread, a 20 year old car with a full size spare is more reliable than a new car with no spare, for some values of reliable.
 
Most cars in the US have the "emergency only" spare. Also called a "space saving" spare or "temporary" spare. Which is a half width tire which will allow you to, hopefully, limp to somewhere safe to get help. Although American light trucks would typically carry a full size spare. For SUVs, one thing that can help distinguish between a truck based SUV and a car based one is which spare you have. although not always. The temp spares are all about the saving of some weight and space in the vehicle.

My car has a temp spare. But I carry a lug cross bar to loosen the lugs if needed.

powerbuilt-torque-wrenches-940558-64_1000.jpg

I think new cars sold in the USA have done away with the expense of an emergency spare tire, tool to loosen lugs, and tiny jack. (couple hundred $$$)

They just stick a can of foam in there now or something. :p
 
To loosen the nuts, secure the lug wrench and then strike it repeatedly with something. Pulses will free the nuts better than straining.
 
I'm not sure exactly what an "extender" is, but I think I have one. My Honda comes with a small-size spare tire, a tire jack (to lift the car off the ground where the tire needs to be swapped), and a tool that is like a large Allen wrench so you can get enough torque on the lug nuts to remove them easily, even if you're wimpy in terms of upper-body strength. I successfully changed my tire a few years ago in 19ºF weather (-7.2ºC), never having practiced before, just by following the instruction manual.

I also carry a tire inflator kit since the spare is not kept up to proper tire pressures.

I definitely appreciate that Honda included that with the car, as it would have been a lot less convenient when I hit that pothole that popped a tire otherwise, and it's one less thing to worry about when I go to the boondocks, including the bookdocks that are backwoods enough to not have cell phone service. Note that my Honda is not particularly new anymore, so I wouldn't be surprised if many newer Hondas don't include such features.
However, I was more disgusted when the mechanic rang us to say that not only did the nailed tyre need replacing, but we also had to shell out an additional whack of cash (nearly as much as the tyre? more?) to replace the electronic pressure-sensor inside the rim -- because in 'repairing' the tyre long enough to get the car to the mechanic, the sealant had gummed up the old sensor, rendering it useless.
I have one of those tire pressure sensors that ran out of battery in one of my tires currently. The prices that places charge to replace it vary widely. The last one that broke I left broken for two years (it's not that difficult to check the tire pressure manually in the autumn), until I found a tire shop that would replace it for about half the cost of a tire. The place I went to this summer wanted about one-and-a-half tires' cost to replace it so I haven't fixed it.

It's at or near the top of my list of useless features. And the software is mediocre enough that if one of them breaks, it doesn't make use of the other three. Would be nice if it set "rear right sensor unoperational, front right tire low, left tires okay" or something like that, but no, unless I pay to fix the one broken sensor, none of them provide any value. So instead of paying $250 to fix it I just use a $5 tire gauge and knowledge of what time of year the tire pressure falls, usually late October around here and sometimes again in early December (when it's time to swap for snow tires anyway).
 
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