So over the weekend I'm walking to my car to go grocery shopping and I notice one of the tires is flat. I had never had to change a flat on my own and I assumed the concept was simple: jack up car, remove bolts, remove wheel, repeat steps in reverse with spare.
I was wrong in almost every aspect. For my vehicle it wasn't that simple. I noticed that 1 of the 5 bolts on the wheel was different from the others. Regardless I jacked up the car anyway and got to work. The wrench included in the back only fit the one bolt that was different. Being an idiot, I tried loosening that one bolt anyway. Wouldn't budge, and on top of that the wheel would move with any sort of motion. Fine, I stuck it in gear and it stopped moving but the whole car would still move, teetering precariously on the tiny jack that was included in the car. I wasn't sure if I was rotating the right direction so I check the manual. First thing the manual said was to loosen the bolts before jacking up the car. Whoops. Lowered the jack. Second "remove the bolt caps". That would explain the other 4 bolts, they still had the cap on. The manual also mentioned using a small tool to remove these caps but it wasn't in the toolset in the car. Fuck. I try prying it with a screwdriver, nothing.
I talk to the garage attendant who says he has an air pump, but my car is on the 3rd level and it's on the ground floor. He suggests to "drive slowly" and so I do. Important thing to note here: if your car is suddenly flat, it's flat for a reason, DO NOT FUCKING TRY TO RE-INFLATE IT! So my car waddles down to the ground floor and he starts pumping air into it. I tell him to please pump it to 36psi since I know that's the pressure for my tires. He tops it off a little bit, looking at the meter and BAM! Sidewall blows up right in his face. This was in a garage so it reverberated throughout. After "mawp"ing for a few seconds until the ringing subsided, I hear him saying "oh shit, oh shit! you said 36 psi!".
At this point I say fuck it and reach out to a tow truck to see if they had the tool to remove these bolts. Find one, said he'll be there in 20 minutes. An hour later he comes, takes a look at the bolts and comes back with a drill. He removes each of the covers and puts them on the ground. I notice immediately that when they hit the ground it didn't have that heft I was expecting. I inspect one of them. Fucking plastic. These silver colored "bolts" were just plastic caps. Needless to say he replaces my whole tire in about 5 minutes and says that it will be $125. I tell him that all I needed were to have those covers removed in the first place and then he agreed to $100 fine ($118 with tax) but it included a much needed lesson in car maintenance.
tl;dr: Forget what you think you know about car maintenance if you've never actually performed it yourself. You don't know jack shit.
I was wrong in almost every aspect. For my vehicle it wasn't that simple. I noticed that 1 of the 5 bolts on the wheel was different from the others. Regardless I jacked up the car anyway and got to work. The wrench included in the back only fit the one bolt that was different. Being an idiot, I tried loosening that one bolt anyway. Wouldn't budge, and on top of that the wheel would move with any sort of motion. Fine, I stuck it in gear and it stopped moving but the whole car would still move, teetering precariously on the tiny jack that was included in the car. I wasn't sure if I was rotating the right direction so I check the manual. First thing the manual said was to loosen the bolts before jacking up the car. Whoops. Lowered the jack. Second "remove the bolt caps". That would explain the other 4 bolts, they still had the cap on. The manual also mentioned using a small tool to remove these caps but it wasn't in the toolset in the car. Fuck. I try prying it with a screwdriver, nothing.
I talk to the garage attendant who says he has an air pump, but my car is on the 3rd level and it's on the ground floor. He suggests to "drive slowly" and so I do. Important thing to note here: if your car is suddenly flat, it's flat for a reason, DO NOT FUCKING TRY TO RE-INFLATE IT! So my car waddles down to the ground floor and he starts pumping air into it. I tell him to please pump it to 36psi since I know that's the pressure for my tires. He tops it off a little bit, looking at the meter and BAM! Sidewall blows up right in his face. This was in a garage so it reverberated throughout. After "mawp"ing for a few seconds until the ringing subsided, I hear him saying "oh shit, oh shit! you said 36 psi!".
At this point I say fuck it and reach out to a tow truck to see if they had the tool to remove these bolts. Find one, said he'll be there in 20 minutes. An hour later he comes, takes a look at the bolts and comes back with a drill. He removes each of the covers and puts them on the ground. I notice immediately that when they hit the ground it didn't have that heft I was expecting. I inspect one of them. Fucking plastic. These silver colored "bolts" were just plastic caps. Needless to say he replaces my whole tire in about 5 minutes and says that it will be $125. I tell him that all I needed were to have those covers removed in the first place and then he agreed to $100 fine ($118 with tax) but it included a much needed lesson in car maintenance.
tl;dr: Forget what you think you know about car maintenance if you've never actually performed it yourself. You don't know jack shit.
