It is very important to have an understanding of how you can change car tire when it goes flat. It is obligatory for all car drivers to understand the basic repairing tips of car in case of an emergency.
No doubt, these days people have facility of cell phones and they can call to mechanics within minutes at any place.
But sometimes, if you are in an isolated place or have no time to wait for a mechanic as your important meeting is within minutes and your car broke down so it becomes necessary to at least know the basic steps for changing a flat tire.
Following steps will help you understand that how flat tires can be replaced with new ones. It is very easy process and anyone can do it.
1. Pick a safe place for replacement of tire:
First of all, when you have to change car tire, select a roadside even area. Always try finding secluded place and switch on your car’s emergency lights so that traffic does not get interrupted.
2. Check if you have spare tire and emergency kit:
Before changing tires on your own, do check if you have spare wheel (which is not flat) and tool kit. If you don't have the needed supplies, there is no point in continuing as you were not prepared for such emergency. Continue with the following steps if you have all required tools.
3. Set parking brake:
When you are all set to change tire, first of all set parking brake and block the diagonally opposite wheel with a brick or some heavy object to avoid rolling of car when the flat tire is in air.
4. Spare wheel and Jack is a must have:
Whenever you leave the house, make sure, spare wheel and jack is in your car. Try putting jack under the frame close to tire and confirm that jack is in proper position i.e. metal portion of car frame.
If jack is not in accurate position, it will blow away the plastic as you start lifting the car. In this situation, read your owner’s manual and try to fix the jack at the right place. You can see gap behind front and back wheels wells for right positioning of jack.
5. Put jack firmly to provide support to car:
Always make sure that you put jack firmly on underside of the vehicle. Make sure that, jack is vertical to the ground and supporting the automobile completely.
6. Detach hubcap and loose nuts:
Detach hubcap and loose the nuts by spinning counterclockwise. Then use an appropriate size wrench for nut opening. Commonly, different sizes of wrenches are available in market.
A correct size wrench will easily pull out the nut, though some amount of force may be needed for making lug nuts free. You can stomp the wrench with force to let loose of nuts.
7. Raise jack and lift the car up:
Drive the jack high enough to remove flat wheel and swap it with the new one. Just keep one thing in mind, when you lift the jack, the car should be stable, if you see that car's balance is out, lower the jack and try to resolve the issue before continuing further.
8. Take out nuts from wheel:
Apply jack counter clockwise until the nuts are loose. Repeat the same thing with lug nuts and then take out all nuts from their position.
9. Let's remove the tire now:
Removing tire can be a slightly difficult task because it may not get loose immediately because of rust so you can hit inside of the tire with rubber hammer to loosen tire.
10. Set the spare wheel in position:
After aligning wheel studs completely with holes, put the spare wheel in position, then tighten the nuts with your hands. Don't tight all the nuts completely at one time and check the balance first. After nut tightening, replace the hubcap and keep flat tire in your car and get ready for your destination.
Conclusion:
Changing car tires is not a difficult task, it just needs basic understanding of how things work. It is very important to be ready before an emergency strikes.
So prepare an emergency kit with all car maintenance tools and replace the flat tire with new one immediately after using the spare wheel and keep all things in car.
Whenever you leave the house, always check the kit and spare tire before taking on the wheels.