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Dealing with a puncture.

I had a tyre blow out a few weeks ago. And today I saw a mate I shall call Jim, and he told me his next door neighbour had had a puncture yesterday. This is the comparison of our experiences.

Me -

1 Get the puncture, pull to a place of safety, turn on hazard flashers. 2 Get jack and wheelbrace out of car.
  1. Remove wheel trim and slacken wheel nuts.
  2. While wheelbrace is in my hand, wind down and remove spare wheel.
5 Jack up the car. 6 remove wheel,
  1. fit spare wheel.
  2. put knackered wheel in the rack and wind it up.
9 Lower Jack, tighten wheel nuts, fit wheel trim.
  1. Stow jack and wheelbrace, get in, Drive away.

Time from incurring puncture to driving away, approx 20 mins. (OK, I'm 63 now, and not as fast as I was).

Him - (as told to me by Jim)

1 Get puncture, hopefully pull to a place of safety. 2 Get Jack and wheel brace out of car. 3 Jack up car.
  1. Discover the wheel turns when trying to undo wheel nuts, lower car to the ground.
  2. Slacken wheel nuts, Jack up the car again.
  3. Remove wheel and put behind car.
  4. Attempt to remove spare wheel, discover that the lowering bolt is seized.
  5. Step back, fall over the punctured wheel, bang elbow/forearm on the ground, causing considerable loss of blood.
9 Call Jim and ask for advice. Advice is to try tightening, then slackening the bolt. 10 Putting all his weight on it, he manages to tighten it slightly. Can now undo it very slowly,with that awful shrieking sound we've probably all heard, with each turn of the screw. 11 attempt to remove spare wheel, fail, go back up top and turn screw a few more turns.
  1. Remove spare wheel from cradle. In the process, get some crap in an eye. Removing crap from eye, lose a contact lens.
  2. Discover spare wheel is also flat. And bald.
14 Call Jim again. Jim gives him the number of a local tyre place. It's shut. 15 Call out the AA!! Jim thinks it was a matter of pride that he thought he could do it himself and didn't want to call them.
  1. AA man arrives, and advises our hero to turn on hazard flashers. He does.
  2. AA man puts car on a towing dolly, and leaves the scene.
18 1 mile down the road, the AA van gets a punture, and has to be helped out by another AA van.
  1. AA man, concerned about the elbow injury, drops him off at A&E, and takes the car to his home.
  2. After some considerable time at A&E, get the injury treated, and head home. Get the one stroke of luck that day, as another neighbour is fortuitously also there, and able to give him a lift home.

Time from incurring the puncture to getting home - 7.5 hours.

Now matey is off work with his arm in a sling, Jim is still pissing himself at the thhought, his wife is telling everyone they know what a silly old bugger he is, and the car is sat on the drive. With a flat tyre.

Steve

Reply to
shazzbat
Loading thread data ...

I think you may owe me for a new keyboard...

Nick

Reply to
Nick Odell

Some similarities to experience of acquaintance of mine, many years ago.

Lady returning from holiday to home (200 miles), with two year old, in virtually new Renault 5.

Brake warning light starts flashing.

Stops, phones AA (pre-mobile phone days).

Van turns up after a bit, they don't touch brake faults so call out Relay lorry. Wait a bit longer, lorry turns up. Loads car, drives some distance where rules say they have to change vehicle. New vehicle is waiting there, but has a puncture, and no spare. Much waiting and fiddling before vehicle is fixed, then have problems loading the car. Eventually gets dropped off at home after fourteen hours on the road.

Car goes into garage, needs new sump and two drive shaft gaiters because AA knackered them while loading.

No trace of warning light fault. (Presumably a sticky float which cured itself?).

What would we have done? Checked the fluid level. Wiggled the wires. Checked that brakes feel alright. Drive home cautiously.

Reply to
newshound

He is lucky not to get a bill, unserviceable spare means the callout can be charged for.

Reply to
Mrcheerful

After my daughter passed her test and Dad "helped pay" for first car. Took her outside and showed/made her change a wheel. This was accompanied by Dad I don't need this and other mutterings. Pointed out I wouldn't come and do it if she phoned me late at night. A couple of months later she came in smiling. Been with a friend and friends boyfriend in his car. They had a puncture but neither knew what to do So she had changed the wheel for them.

Don't know what I felt more pleased about. The fact she had changed the wheel on her own. Or the acknowledgment Dad had showed her something usefull!

Bob

Reply to
Bob Dodds

My daughter only got a car after she was married.

I was eating my dinner one Friday night when the call came to say she had a puncture on the way home from work, on one of her rat-runs alongside grim tower blocks in a dodgy part of Manchester.

I told her to phone the AA, finished dinner, set off to find her, taking

6ft son with me. It was a Renault she was driving, the jack was rusted up, and the spare tyre was flat when I managed to wind it down from below the boot. I took the wheel and my daughter and found a garage air line, leaving my son in the locked car with a heavy tyre lever in his hand.

The AA man arrived as I was tightening the wheel nuts, so I let him put some grease on the threads of the jack...

Reply to
Gordon H

Moss Side?

Reply to
Mr Pounder

Hulme.

Reply to
Gordon H

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