Visitors arrived in a new Vauxhall with no spare wheel, but a can of gunk.
I pondered what would happen if they got a puncture beyond the repair capabilities of the gunk.
They'd call the breakdown service provided free by their new car warranty they replied.
I pointed out most breakdown services require you to carry a serviceable spare wheel........
Any new car owners here who can answer?
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As cars without spare wheel are common nowadays, based on small prints on recovery policy, the car will be either towed to nearest garage or own home as applicable.
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Wife's Fiesta has the gunk - if she uses it, is the tyre still repairable or does the gunk = new tyre?
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Latest on whether the gunk prevents repair is that manufacturer's say gunk is 'water soluble and so ok to repair.
Where this hits a wall for the ordinary motorist is when the tyre place says (justifiably) that gunk removal to repair is labour intensive, time consuming, costly and messy making the repair option uneconomic for them - this then means gunk use = junk tyre.
Spare tyre is still the way to go imo..............
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I have now seen several times cars left at the roadside with a wheel missing and one corner on a jack or axle stand.
Assumption is that either rellie or breakdown contractor has taken the wheel into town for new tyre.
What you do in the middle of the night or on a Sunday on Lewis I've no idea.
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>> Hypothetical question >>
real question:
how many punctures per miles driven per year on average does the average UK driver have to deal with?
Going by my own experience, it has been zero.
To-date, I have carried spare wheels/tyres and none of them have been used for a single metre. It will have cost me hundreds of £s in wasted fuel lugging all that weight around.
On the other hand, a newly qualified young driver that I know managed to get a burst tyre within the first 1000 miles of driving, in a car without a spare. Even though covered for recovery with the AA, the driver decided to look up the location of nearest tyre garage using a smart phone, and gently drove the 1 mile there, and managed to get a brand new tyre fitted just an hour before the garage closed for the day. A decision has yet to be made by the driver whether to buy a space-saver or a full size spare, or to carry on as before hoping that the gunk will be enough if faced with a puncture in future.
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When the Volvo was delivered the guy pointed out that it was a can of gunk and no spare, but his advice was just to call out breakdown people anyway.
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My Cruiser has a silly little get-you-home wheel, only usable on the rear because its rolling diameter is smaller than the real wheels. It has clearly never been used, and won't hold pressure even when inflated by a garage (it won't inflate with an ordinary garage airline).
I keep meaning to get a proper wheel and spare, but still haven't got round to it. When I do it will take up a lot of room in the boot. I live in permanent fear of a puncture and having to phone the AA.
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I suppose the halfway house is to at least get the pram wheel fixed. Is it really not to be used on the front?
If you got your little wheel fixed, you could at least get the breakdown service out to swap the wheels about in the event of a front wheel puncture. Better than being marooned.
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>> where to find space for spare tyres:
>>
>> i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2013/01/04/article-2257030-16BBEDBC000005DC-376_964x522.jpg
>>
I bet they also know how to use tyre levers but do they have a pump on board?
I think a little unloading would be required prior to using a normal on board jack.
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>> how many punctures per miles driven per year on average does the average UK driver
>> have to deal with?
>>
>> Going by my own experience, it has been zero.
Our two existing cars have approx 270k between them in our ownership. Add in bit more for the old BX and let's say 290k since November 2000. Probably four or five punctures over that time so one every 60-70k.
Normally thats the sort of risk where I'd say probability and consequence didn't justify action. But thought of being stuck in middle of nowhere with no mobile signal, a wait for a repair truck and either a flatbed or further wait for tyre to be fitted. No thanks. Ands that's before adding in S*d's law where the incident happens in France or the road to Rodel by the Bays (Harris).
Reminds me, I need to run through a wheel change to prove I still can and to train The Lad.
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We've had one on the Outlander, and one on the Civic in the last year. I had a couple on the previous car, both in the underground office car park that they were always dragging old office furniture through it, leaving odd screws all over the floor.
A spare is a Good Thing, even if it's a spacesaver.
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I've used tyre gunk once. I had no choice really as it was a motorcycle tyre, straight forward screw through the middle of the thread which was found to be "Unrepairable because the casing was damaged".
Yeah, right.
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>> I pointed out most breakdown services require you to carry a serviceable spare wheel........
Not true, only if its standard equipment if supplied as new.
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So there is a chance that using gunk is going to result in you having to buy a new tyre where you might not normally?
As a follow up, I assume you also then have to buy a new can of gunk as well to fit in the moulded space under the boot carpet? How much is that?
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>> So there is a chance that using gunk is going to result in you having to buy a new tyre where you might not normally?
>> As a follow up, I assume you also then have to buy a new can of gunk as well to fit in the moulded space under the boot carpet? How much is that?
In answer to 1st question - Yes more than likely.
2nd question - depends on make/type of car - probably average of £50 for the gunk.
Ah.... and sometime the gunk gets into the inflating pump... another £50 to £100........
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>>2nd question - depends on make/type of car - probably average of £50 for the gunk.
Thou jesteth? They were flogging gunk squirters in Aldi or Lidl a while back for about £5 and Holts Tyreweld is under £10 in Halfords.
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£50 does sound a lot, but this is Mercedes Benz gunk don't forget!
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I'll cough to carrying an aerosol of tyreweld in the vintage car, but the front wheels are different from the back and there is no place to put one spare wheel - let alone two.
However, I regard it as something to get to a place of safety, and unless local, not home.
But if I use it, I won't wreak a tyre as it's a tubed tyre - and the polluted tube may be cleanable and thus repairable by me, I tend to have more time than tyre shops etc.
Longer trips I'd carry tyre irons and a spare tube but it's not something I could change by the roadside even if such was done by some in 1930.
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As I've mentioned before, I've used an aerosol sealant, probably Holts Tyreweld, on a return bike trip heading for Zeebrugge.
It worked well and kept me going for a few weeks afterwards. However, the good news, I decided to do the proper repair and took the tyre off, tubeless, there was absolutely no trace of any goo at all . The tyre was as new inside.
I wouldn't be so confident about manufacturer supplied stuff, though. I removed a leaking Fiesta one from one of the cars and it was foul sticky stuff like cold molten rubber solution. I got some on my hands, in spite of using a poly bag to get it out of the tray.
This is the type you attach to the pump and let the air take the crap into the tyre. No wonder our customers just phone up for help with flat tyres !
Ted
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>> So there is a chance that using gunk is going to result in you having
>> to buy a new tyre where you might not normally?
>>
Risk vs Reward.
>> As a follow up, I assume you also then have to buy a new can
>> of gunk as well to fit in the moulded space under the boot carpet? How
>> much is that?
>>
Cheaper than the £100 plus per year a lot of drivers pay to the RAC/AA but never call on their services.
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I have a hypothesis. Those who don't really need or believe they need a spare tyre don't really need their cars.
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>> I have a hypothesis. Those who don't really need or believe they need a spare
>> tyre don't really need their cars.
>>
I'd go along with that. On the few occasions when I have had a puncture I have always felt very vulnerable driving around without a spare in the time before getting it repaired. I often sling another spare wheel in the boot just for peace of mind, or if I know one of them has a slow leak and I am worried it might suddenly worsen.
I did once have two punctures on the same dirt track - I think the owners tipped their ash on it, and had been burning wood with nails.
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>> I have a hypothesis. Those who don't really need or believe they need a spare
>> tyre don't really need their cars.
>>
I have a counter theory.
Those who believe they need a spare are driving:
Trabants,
or on third world roads,
or or living in the past.
2013 started on Tuesday.
Get with it.
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The recovery man (or lady) will say do you want a tow home/nearest garage or shall I tow you to a service area and call a 24 hour mobile tyre fitter such as ATS?
I carry the tyre seal and have a spare, if I had a flat I would use the sealer first as it's less hassle and when I did use it about 10 years ago, it worked fine and I kept it in for a week. It didn't leave any mess as it is not sticky, but rather like a big donut of jelly baby.
Last edited by: sooty tailpipes on Sat 5 Jan 13 at 18:16
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Early 2CVs could be bought new with solid tyres (like the ones on a child's tricycle and perhaps not all that much bigger). It must have been assumed that the suspension would make the ride compliant enough for French farmers anyway. I never saw one so equipped to my knowledge but have often wondered what they were like in use. In any case they might have saved one a lot of hassle and expense over the years.
When young I very often repaired inner tubes, removing the covers myself not without difficulty and once wounding an inner tube severely by incautiously using a big sharp screwdriver as a tyre lever. There's a knack to this as to most other things. I even put a gaiter in a bulging sidewall once in a fabric crossply tyre. People were driving horrible things in my youth, or I was anyway. Of course these were not sporting vehicles really. But I must have done tubes in a few early radials too before giving it best and letting the professionals do it with their valuable kit. Of course an energetic amateur couldn't begin to cope with modern tubeless wide radials.
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>> But I must have done tubes in a few early radials
In fact certainly did. But steel belted radials with a big puncture in the tread would often puncture a repaired tube in short order with small sharp broken steel wires. Tyre professionals would always carefully feel the interior of the cover to ensure there weren't any of those.
For some time, too, the more obliging tyre places would put tubes in tubeless tyres that wouldn't hold air for whatever reason. But the regulations (and I suppose the profit motive) made them more and more reluctant and they haven't done it at all for ages.
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>>.......the more obliging tyre places would put tubes in tubeless tyres that wouldn't hold air for whatever reason.
>> But the regulations (and I suppose the profit motive) made them more and more reluctant and they haven't done it at all for ages.
>>
IIRC the reason was that tubeless tyres have a rough finish inside and unless they are buffed smooth, just fitting a tube will almost certainly cause the rough points to rub a hole in the tube - Not good.
I do think safety concerns may have driven the regulations ( I hope).
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>>IIRC the reason was that tubeless tyres have a rough finish inside and unless they are buffed smooth, just fitting a tube will almost certainly cause the rough points to rub a hole in the tube
I've experienced that, but I do run down to 12 PSI off road and I don't use those wheels on the road. At those pressures you need tubes to keep the air in.
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Thank you for your advice John H, forgive me if I ignore it.
Last edited by: Humph D'Bout on Sat 5 Jan 13 at 19:38
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That geezer who thinks Bentleys are amphibious doesn't believe in spare wheels either. He just buys another car when he has a puncture.
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>> Thank you for your advice John H, forgive me if I ignore it.
>>
Same here.
There are many things that can leave you stranded in the middle of nowhere on a cold wet night but I'd be seriously P'd off if it was because of a flat tyre (not that I'd complain if Peaches Geldof was in the passenger seat, of course).
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>> There are many things that can leave you stranded in the middle of nowhere on
>> a cold wet night but I'd be seriously P'd off if it was because of
>> a flat tyre
I drove over something on the M4 a couple of years back, in the dark and at speed. Didn't know what it was, never saw it, but I heard it...then gradually noticed the O/S/R puncture.
Limped to the nearest police ramp with a total flat and reversed up it (not easy because of snow) and chickened out by calling the AA (big yellow van and flashing lights parked between me and impending doom).
Tyre was Kaput. Spacesaver was a nuisance for the next 150 miles in a fully laden estate car (Christmas).
A tin of gloop would have been utterly useless and it would have put a number of hours on my journey as we'd left at silly o'clock to miss the traffic and expected heavy snow. Try keeping your 2 year old quiet, whilst you wait many hours for another tyre and where was Mr AA to find me another tyre at 0400 on/near the M4?
Then i'd have to make do with an odd tyre, which i really do not like, so that would have been more expense.
The people that buy new cars, really need to sort their priorities out. Forget the bling wheels and low profiles, ask for normal wheels/tyres..and a spare. More comfortable and decent peace of mind.
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In my yoof, my summer holidays would often consist of 3-4 weeks driving to eastern parts, when Yugoslavia, Turkey, Greece and Bulgaria were exotic destinations. I always carried 2 spares to minimise the possiblility of delays on time critical parts of the journey. From memory, the only time I actually needed a spare was when I needed 2! Both rear tyres punctured at the same time when SWMBO was driving. Somewhere in Yugoslavia I think. I recall screaming a warning about something in the road but to no effect.:)
Perhaps I should consider adding a second spare to all my current vehicles? I do however carry a can and a full size spare - the skinny is relegated to the garage.
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>> The people that buy new cars, really need to sort their priorities out. Forget the
>> bling wheels and low profiles, ask for normal wheels/tyres..and a spare. More comfortable and decent
>> peace of mind.
Except many new cars have nowhere to store the full size spare, so its not even offered as an option. Expect that situation to reach 100% of cars with no spare wheel storage space in the next 10 years.
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>> Except many new cars have nowhere to store the full size spare, so its not
>> even offered as an option. Expect that situation to reach 100% of cars with no
>> spare wheel storage space in the next 10 years.
>>
There would be if the consumer demanded it.
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>>There would be if the consumer demanded it.
And therein perhaps lies the rub. Most won't even think about it until after having discovered they needed a spare tyre...
As with most things now all they really care about when buying things is whether it's shiny and cheap.
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>> >> Except many new cars have nowhere to store the full size spare, so its
>> not
>> >> even offered as an option. Expect that situation to reach 100% of cars with
>> no
>> >> spare wheel storage space in the next 10 years.
>> >>
>>
>> There would be if the consumer demanded it.
Only if Government stopped this stupid race for diminishing CO2 targets. Anyway why demand it? I have driven over half a million miles, and in that time have had 3 punctures that would have been journey fatal without a spare. A space saver would have done the job both times there as well. My last was 100k miles ago, in a slime equipped car. I called a mobile tyre fitter and it was fixed in two hours.
there are no full size spare tyres any more because no-one needs them and no-one is clamoring for them.
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>>Except many new cars have nowhere to store the full size spare
But you still have to do something with the full sized flat.
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>> But you still have to do something with the full sized flat.
Well exactly. The whole damn no-proper-spare scam is a load of penny-pinching excrement designed to force everyone to behave like a rich gent and stand by the side of the road smoking a cigar and chatting up blushing wenches while saluting engineers are summoned to do the job. It doesn't matter how many miles people say they've done without all that many really inconvenient punctures. If you can't change a punctured tyre for another proper balanced wheel then you are screwed for carrying on at a proper rate until help arrives, you poor little wimp (despite yourself in my case).
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>> >>Except many new cars have nowhere to store the full size spare
>>
>> But you still have to do something with the full sized flat.
>>
Exactly. Everyone here who claims that modern cars have nowhere to stow a spare wheel presumably just ditch their flat tyre by the roadside and then buys another one.
It must be a hard choice deciding which bit of kit to abandon if your car is that small.
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>> Exactly. Everyone here who claims that modern cars have nowhere to stow a spare wheel
>> presumably just ditch their flat tyre by the roadside and then buys another one.
>>
>> It must be a hard choice deciding which bit of kit to abandon if your
>> car is that small.
Rearrange - Badwagon on leap.
You all, conveniently forget however, that makers have to find a permanent storage space for a full size spare wheel, for the life of the car, whereas your full size flat tyre and wheel now in the car is only a temporary (only a day or two) storage issue.
Now, whats the next fatuous reason for having a full size spare. (or two different size ones in the case of a certain GLEC)
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>> Now, whats the next fatuous reason for having a full size spare. (or two different
>> size ones in the case of a certain GLEC)
>>
Not all GLECs. Only certain variants.
My GLEC has same size wheels and tyres all round, however its a space saver spare, not a full size spare.
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>> ........ whereas your full size flat tyre and wheel now in the car is only a temporary (only a day or two) storage issue.
No room in the boot?
OK, be fine to have in the passenger footwell for a short while.....
news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/edinburgh_and_east/8600833.stm
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>> (not that I'd complain if Peaches Geldof was in the passenger seat, of course).
Bob might :)
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>> >> (not that I'd complain if Peaches Geldof was in the passenger seat, of course).
>>
>> Bob might :)
I think it may be a little late for that!
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I carry a couple of cans of Tyreweld, a trolley jack and a battery booster with compressor in the Vitara. That's for work, though. Try compressor first, then goo and compressor. Only as a last resort will I change a wheel on one of the firm's cars now...gerrin too old for crawling about in the wet and cold.
Had a flat on the Aygo a week or so ago. It lives on a fairly rough car park and has a space save but I managed to get 20ish psi in and hot-footed it for National Tyres at some speed before it went down. Another new tyre...woodscrew in the shoulder.
The luxury of having your full sized spare hung on the tail door without a cover means you can give it a thump to check the pressure every day or so......you can't do that with one under the floor !
Ted
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>>The luxury of having your full sized spare hung on the tail door without a cover means you can give it a thump to check the pressure every day or so......you can't do that with one under the floor !
>>
To me low profile tyres always look as if they need more air so they get checked more often than the old fat tyres.
Having a full sized spare in the boot, I am going to invest a whole fiver in a flexible valve extension. I will then be able to check and inflate (if required ) the spare without even lifting the carpet in the boot.
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The 320d has no runflats, being the ED version, but also still comes with no spare. There is a can of gunk and a compressor, but this is going to be of very limited use inflating the molten shreds of torn rubber that pass for a tyre after it has gone flat at motorway speeds.
You can have a space saver spare if I recall correctly, but it is a cost option of many hundreds of pounds.
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>>You can have a space saver spare if I recall correctly, but it is a cost option of many hundreds of pounds.
And there's still no space for it.
mytyres will sell you a 16" steel wheel with an appropriate sized tyre fitted for about £100. A 205/60/16 is still a pretty big lump though, so if you need the boot space for other things I would suggest bonnet mounting, or a small trailer.
Thinking about it. a nice cover or bag and moving as appropriate between the rear footwell and the boot might work as long as you never have four occupants AND luggage.
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Someone at work with a BMW with run flats needed the car transported home once. He'd hit something and it had torn a chunk out of the tyre wall. It wasn't flat but no way was he going to risk driving a few hundreds miles on the motorway. No local tyre places had the necessary tyre.
So it was taken away on a transporter. So much for run flats.... Although if it did not have toughened side-walls it might have been a blow out I suppose.
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Just bought an XF Jag, no spare so bought a full diameter "space saver" for £110.
Very sexy orange alloy wheel, obviously doesn't fit in the spare wheel bit under the boot floor because the battery is in the way, bought a jack and wheelbrace as well because you don't get those either.
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>>Thinking about it. a nice cover or bag and moving as appropriate between the rear footwell and the boot might work as long as you never have four occupants AND luggage.
>>
I seem to have the best of choice, a full sized spare with a full sized wheel well AND a handling kit.
A large thick plastic bag (of course it is dark green with the proper logo on it) some surgeons gloves and paper towels. :-)
Got to keep standards up old chap, what !
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A friend had a puncture experience as a passenger in a 911 about 25 years ago. The space saver went on, but of course the punctured one wouldn't fit in the "boot". A plastic cover was however provided, but it was a bit crowded in the cabin for the rest of the journey. Basically it travelled in the passenger's lap.
IIRC even the space savers on some Porsches were stowed deflated and collapsed, and a compressor was supplied for inflating them before use. I don't know whether it was one of those or not. I expect they've given up with them altogether now.
I well remember those Rover 2000/3500 boot-mounted spares Humph; had that in mind, but I thought a bonnet mounted one would be more pleasingly incongruous on the ultimate driving machine! I had one on the Land Rover - it made the bonnet quite heavy.
Last edited by: Manatee on Mon 7 Jan 13 at 12:36
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>>I well remember those Rover 2000/3500 boot-mounted spares
>>
So do I
With todays wide rims and large diameter wheels that would kill ALL vision out of the rear window.
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Boot lid is one of the good places for a proper spare. But with my car it would make the lid too heavy for its pneumatic struts necessitating a moveable prop. The other problem is possible theft, but perhaps the thing can be attached firmly from inside and some sort of cover made or improvised.
2CV and DS carried the spare under the bonnet above the engine or in front of it. V8 Bristols and some 2 litre models carried it inside the N/S front wing between the front wheel and the door. There's always somewhere to put it. What makes people imagine that it is better in some way to do without it? Seems perverse to me even taking into account the absurdly wide tyres put on bread-and-butter cars these days.
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Talbot Samba also had the spare sitting on top of the engine.
Was probably equivalent in width to today's space savers mind you!
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The original FIAT Panda (maybe only the 4x4 variant?) had the spare under the bonnet somewhere too. Step-son had one - that's the only reason I know.
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My 750cc Panda's was under the bonnet, along with jack and the wheel brace which fitted in a holder on the windscreen washer bottle.
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That FIAT Panda 4x4 was pretty much worthless - if you'd paid for the work that went into it it would be more than it was worth after patching up.
Step-son had a 4x4 Sisley. Bought it for about £400. Sold it without any work on it later for about £1600 I think - could have been more in fact. A good profit. Went to a farmer on Anglesey who needed/wanted a small 4x4 for his wife to get around. Had to be small and 4x4.
Last edited by: rtj70 on Mon 7 Jan 13 at 18:12
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I quite covet a Mk1 Panda again if a good one could be found. Both my ex and current wives have had one at one time and I really liked them. Great wee cars until they rust. Good in the snow, useable as vans and surprisingly nippy when nipping is the order of the day.
The spare wheels were indeed under the bonnet. Titchy little wheels. An oddity of the design was that the plastic hub caps were held on by the wheel bolts, which seemed a little over-engineered given the utilitarian nature of the rest of the car.
The seats were more or less deck chairs but surprisingly comfortable nonetheless. You could take them all out quite easily for reasons I never really dwelled on but removing all but the driver's seat made for a huge load carrying capacity in such a small car. I once got a very large Christmas tree and a wife in one with room to spare.
Must be the last car I've owned which had 3 different keys or even 2 different ones for that matter. One for the doors, one for the ignition and one for the petrol cap. Little keys though so no real hardship.
The parcel shelf affair in the front was a sort of cloth hammock. I put a radio in the oldest one which just sort of sat in there next to its mono speaker which kind of jammed it into position.
Neither gave any mechanical bother, despite extreme neglect, other than the ubiquitous fraying and eventual snapping of their clutch cables. I had to jerry rig a hand operated clutch on one of them one late night using some twine fed through the bulkhead and the judicious use of a thick ski glove. Took quite a bit of pulling but it worked, sort of. Enough to get home anyway.
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>>I had to jerry rig a hand operated clutch
Wimp!
I often drove my old A35 that had broke yet another clutch operating rod. Even started it on the handle, in gear.
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Jury rig Humph, jury rig!
Jerry built is what you drive now.
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>> Both my ex and current wives have had one at one time
Do the current wives get on well with each other?
>> An oddity of the design was that the plastic hub caps were held on by the wheel bolts,
Other more current FIATs have the wheel bolts going through plastic hub cap to hold then in place, e.g. the Seicento.
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>> An oddity of the design was that the plastic hub caps were held on by the wheel bolts,
>>
IIRC the Uno had the same arrangement
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Small Fiats have an appetite for clutch cables, the Seicento eats them at regular intervals too.
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>> Boot lid is one of the good places for a proper spare.
>>
Or bonnet lid:
tinyurl.com/bheg8wh
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Hypothetical question - movilogo
