I pride myself on being able to change a spare tire. I'm a Maine girl, and like to fancy myself as being more familiar with tools than most other females my age (but that really isn't saying a whole heck of a lot). My dad taught me how to do it a few years ago and it really is rather simple. Jack the car up, take off the bolts (in the all-important star-shaped pattern), take the tire off, put the new one on, put the car back down and presto! The spare tire is good to go. Assuming, of course, that you can get the spare tire out of it's hiding place.
This was my issue yesterday. I was already frustrated with myself for having backed into the chain-link fence around Ben's house...and now even more angry and upset that it gashed my tire. Unfortunately, the adrenaline rush that you get from these emotions did not translate into super-strength, and so even though I managed to pull back the carpet on the trunk, take out the jack kit, and unscrew the plastic bolt - I couldn't for the life of me get the tire out of the trunk. To do this, one really needed three hands - one to hold back the carpet far enough and two to coax the tire out of its lair.
So I called Ben, sniffling (because of the old and my general upsetness). He, like a good, loving fiancé, came over to the ShopRite parking lot to help me. Together we got the tire out, and he figured out the jack and jacked up my car...but he couldn't get the lug nuts off. I tried. I couldn't get them off either - even by stepping on the wrench.
By this time, we are both frigidly cold. And so we did the next logical step - called AAA.
The guy came and he had it changed in 10 minutes.
As it turned out, even if we had managed to get the bolts loosened, we wouldn't have been able to take the mangled tire off of the car (the AAA guy needed to apply some tricks to get it off).
If we had managed to figure out how to get it off, we wouldn't have been able to put the spare tire on because the bolts were having difficulty lining up with the holes (the AAA guy performed another trick to get this to work).
AAA saved the day. But the next time I need to change a tire on a car...it's all mine.
3 comments:
My wife's car had a flat tire once. I had changed many a tire before and thought that it would be a snap. But it had these bizarre lugnut covers...it took a whole hour to get them off. Overthinking the design, to be sure.
Good for you, it must have been so frustrating... but I guess there are times we all need to shout help!
"You are woman hear me roar!" How resourceful to find another resource when a didn't work as you had been taught. And then to find the right resource to do c and d when b didn't work either.
My father taught me too on our old Ford wagon, and volkswagon. He made me change everytire on those cars, and change the oil and anything else in them. But these new cars are something else, including the spares.
Glad you got it changed. Sounds like there was a mistake in manufacturing or one on purpose.
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