Day 6 Challenge: Change a Tire

Day 6 Challenge- Stranded with a Flat Tire.

I couldn't get this done on Sunday, so Monday morning I forced myself to change a tire on my car. Wayne stood by and gave directions, but the rules said that he couldn't do any of the work.

First, I had to find the spare tire and jack under the floor of the trunk. I got out the spare (it wasn't too heavy for me), also an outdoor blanket to sit on.

I tried to take off the hubcaps but they were really tricky. Wayne had to show me how to do that or I may not have figured it out.

Then I had to take off the lugnuts. They had been tightened by the auto shop using a torque wrench, so they were on much too tight. The regular wrench that came with the car was no good, I couldn't get any torque with it.

Luckily, we had a star wrench. Turning it by hand didn't work.



The only way I got the lugnuts to budge was by stepping on one handle while I pulled up on another handle with all my might, as you can see in the second photo. I nearly gave up, it was so difficult. But I finally succeeded in loosening them all.





Then we looked at the owner's manual to find out where to put the jack. I had to lay on the blanket on the ground to find where to attach it.

Then I raised the car up on the jack until I could see light under the tire.

I took the lugnuts off and put them inside the center cap of the hubcap. (See example in photo.) When you change a tire on the side of the road, you can easily lose the lugnuts in the grass if you don't put them inside the hubcap. Another thing you can see in this photo is the wrench that comes with the jack. That wrench was worthless to get the lugnuts off, remember ladies, you HAVE to buy a star wrench.




I knelt on the blanket while lifting off the very heavy tire.

I put on spare, and had to learn which way the lugnuts went on. I had to tighten them up in a star pattern.

Then when I went to put the old tire into the trunk, it was too heavy, so I had to wrap it in the blanket and lift it up against my body, to load it into the trunk. The whole thing took about 45 minutes. (Of course, then I had to do everything in reverse to put the tire back onto the car.)

THINGS I LEARNED:

Pay AAA to change your tires. But if you can't do that....

Keep an old blanket in your trunk. I used it throughout the whole ordeal, to sit on, kneel on, lay on, and wrap the tire for picking it up. At one point I even wrapped it around the star wrench handle for padding because the metal hurt my hand when I was pulling so hard.

Women aren't strong enough to use the wrench that comes with the car. Buy a star wrench, you can get better torque by stepping on one handle while you push up with your hands on the other handle. There is no way I could have loosened the lugnuts without this.