Spacesavers I hate 'em

VanhireBoys

Was up in Newtonabby on Wed nite.. Pi**in the rain.... Got a puncture. On to the spacesaver. What a total boll*x of a wheel. I know I should be thankful I had a wheel but the driving experience was woeful and dangerous. I had to drive 215 miles to Galway. I went by Enniskillen and Manorhamilton ...Right handers were the biggest issue with massive understeer. By the time I got home the spacesaver tyre was red hot and bald - even though it was its first use and the alignment is spot on... :eek:

I have a few spare Zetec rims in the house so I changed it and binned the spacesaver - I now have a "proper" wheel in the boot even though it dosent fit too well but I dont care.

Anybody else got horror spacesaver stories ....?

Berty

I cried the days of Christmas when I could not even put air in my tyre to get to the tyre shop so I had to open the boot and use it spacesaver like it or not.

It was in pristine condition and now it isnt. I had to take a cloth and polish the rim going back into the boot.

I also hated having one black rim with a massive yellow sticker around it screaming out "poor person who cannot afford a new tyre". I only drove around 30km though. It was a 17" rim with a good Bridgestone tyre on it but still had the 80kph sticker on the rim.

furtzy

Should be illegal those things. I have standard 18" alloys and had to put the space saver on the front one time. The angle the car was leaning at due to the size difference was ridiculous. Surely they can't be safe. Binned it and got a cheap alloy and tyre. The 18" fits perfectly in the boot so it wasn't even a space saver!

leninbenjamin

VanhireBoys wrote: »

I have a few spare Zetec rims in the house so I changed it and binned the spacesaver - I now have a "proper" wheel in the boot even though it dosent fit too well but I dont care.

think anyone who's had the misfortune to use a spacesaver does thhis eventually.

nads

aren't they designed to get you to the nearest garage/b&b?
you're as bad for not pre-empting this too - a flat tyre - sure that'd never happen ever ever?

R.O.R

I was looking in the boot of a Toureg we have here. Not only does it have a space saver, but there is no air in the space saver! There is a compressor next to this skinny little thing so you have to pump it up before putting it on. Wouldn't fancy that on a wet Wednesday at the side of the M1, yet alone driving a Toerag with a skinny space saver wheel.

To keep CO2 emissions down there are a few cars not coming with any type of spare wheel, and it's not just BMW's with Runflats. A spare wheel is not standard fit on a Mazda6 - just a can of tyre weld and a compressor in the boot. S-Max and Galaxy's don't get one either and I'm not even sure there is space in them to carry a spare wheel.

Rovi

R.O.R wrote: »

To keep CO2 emissions down there are a few cars not coming with any type of spare wheel, and it's not just BMW's with Runflats. A spare wheel is not standard fit on a Mazda6 - just a can of tyre weld and a compressor in the boot. S-Max and Galaxy's don't get one either and I'm not even sure there is space in them to carry a spare wheel.

I don't know about the new ones, but the old Audi RS6 had no spare wheel, only a can of gloop and a compressor.
At least, that's what was in the European ones with the 19" wheels; U.S. market ones apparently had to have a full size spare, so they got 18" wheels and a proper spare, but the battery then had to move out of the spare wheel well into the boot, taking up a good portion of the boot space.

L1011

Had my mother manage to blow out a space saver by thinking the 80km was a distance limit and doing 130 or so on the motorway with it; luckily it blew at much lower speeds but it was the fast running that destroyed it.

For my own car I'm tempted to get a replacement for a slightly chipped alloy and use it as the spare; never trust the space saver to do its job properly.

green-blood

215km on a spacesaver... I assume you were sticking to the 80k limit too.... madman, you could have killed yourself.

look if you HAVE to use a space saver swap a rear wheel to the front, far safer if it gives up the ghost on the non drive, non steering axle.

our S-max has NO spare at all.... just gunk and compressor

EPM

VanhireBoys wrote: »

I now have a "proper" wheel in the boot even though it dosent fit too well but I dont care.

You can get a little shelf thingy to go around the boot to raise the carpet to cover the spare wheel in the focus (I'm assuming thats what you have). Saves your carpet but eats the boot space

aquascrotum

Utter madness driving that distance on a spacesaver. It's there to get you to the nearest garage, end of.

GB15

nads wrote: »

aren't they designed to get you to the nearest garage/b&b?

I'm sure those spacesaver wheels aren't supposed to be driven more than 50km.

Del2005

green-blood wrote: »

look if you HAVE to use a space saver swap a rear wheel to the front, far safer if it gives up the ghost on the non drive, non steering axle.

QFT

Friend of mine got a front wheel puncture on an old Ibiza, I told him to swap with a back. He was lazy and didn't. Nearly crashed a couple times and swapped soon after.

They should really have a warning on then not to use on the front wheels of a car aswell as the keep below 80km/h.

VanhireBoys

green-blood wrote: »

215km on a spacesaver... I assume you were sticking to the 80k limit too.... madman, you could have killed yourself.

Well it was 215 miles which is 345 kms... had no choice in the matter. Every place was closed at 10pm at night. Managed to make it in about 4hrs so yes it was "about" 80km/h average ! No wonder the space saver is shot

Thanks for that as well EPM - I'll definately look into getting one of them mats...!

NewApproach

Had the same problem on New Years Day, had to drive from achill to ennis on a spacesaver, again I got home the tyre had lost nearly all its tread. Front right wheel btw

Voodoomelon

Those wheels are only designed for emergencys, they are not a spare or replacement wheel. You were absolutely bonkers to drive that far on one of them, you could have been in a serious accident. I would have slept in the car over driving that far.

VanhireBoys

Voodoomelon wrote: »

Those wheels are only designed for emergencys, they are not a spare or replacement wheel. You were absolutely bonkers to drive that far on one of them, you could have been in a serious accident. I would have slept in the car over driving that far.

If it was 10 years ago then yes I would have slept in the car but then I would have had a "proper spare wheel"
No way was I going to sleep overnight on my own in the middle of Belfast or any part of the "Wee North" in a southern reg ... In fact theres no way Id park anywhere North or South and sleep overnight.
Id prefer to chance it and be careful rather than get the windows broken, then stabbed, then robbed by some scumbags.

So you would prefer to be robbed and beaten up rather than drive carefully in an understeering car even if its over the manufacturers limit.....?

OK then....

L1011

VanhireBoys wrote: »

If it was 10 years ago then yes I would have slept in the car but then I would have had a "proper spare wheel"
No way was I going to sleep overnight on my own in the middle of Belfast or any part of the "Wee North" in a southern reg ... In fact theres no way Id park anywhere North or South and sleep overnight.
Id prefer to chance it and be careful rather than get the windows broken, then stabbed, then robbed by some scumbags.

So you would prefer to be robbed and beaten up rather than drive carefully in an understeering car even if its over the manufacturers limit.....?

OK then....

In all my years I've never heard of someone sleeping in a car getting attacked (cue people finding links to show it happening) in Ireland; or Northern Ireland. Think you're slightly panicky...

Voodoomelon

VanhireBoys wrote: »

If it was 10 years ago then yes I would have slept in the car but then I would have had a "proper spare wheel"
No way was I going to sleep overnight on my own in the middle of Belfast or any part of the "Wee North" in a southern reg ... In fact theres no way Id park anywhere North or South and sleep overnight.
Id prefer to chance it and be careful rather than get the windows broken, then stabbed, then robbed by some scumbags.

So you would prefer to be robbed and beaten up rather than drive carefully in an understeering car even if its over the manufacturers limit.....?

OK then....

I understand your situation and indeed I wouldn't have liked to be sleeping in such areas either, however I would have at least driven somewhere "safe" and parked up for the night. To be honest i'm suprised you even got so far with that wheel, there is absolutely no way I would have driven that distance on one of those wheels.

Essentially you chose to endanger your car, yourself and others on the road by the worry of getting stabbed by a Northerner.

Okay, okay, i'm going a bit far with this and a lot of people probably would have done the same, but those wheels are an absolute deathtrap, I wouldn't drive 20 miles on one, let alone over 200. I'm glad you got home in one piece anyways.

Hal1

A few years ago I seen a car fitted with two of these spacesaver wheels, it looked totally wrong . They where on the rear btw.

Comer1

You hate specsavers! So what, I'm sure there are many other places you could go!

colm_mcm

R.O.R wrote: »

I was looking in the boot of a Toureg we have here. Not only does it have a space saver, but there is no air in the space saver! There is a compressor next to this skinny little thing so you have to pump it up before putting it on.

Some Tourans just have the pump and a bottle of goo.