Change a Tire - Replacing Flat Tire With a Spare

Chuck Herring: Hi, my name is Chuck Herring, I am from Mr. Tire, home of On The Rim & Out The Door and BRAKES FOREVER. This is my Automotive Expert, Gary Goldstein. Were showing you how to change a spare tire today. We have already staged the vehicle, we have raised it up, we have loosened the lug nuts. Gary is now going to loosen the lug nuts completely so the wheel can be removed. Gary is going to start doing that for us now. Fortunately by loosening them before we raise the vehicle will make this part of the job much easier for you. There is no special order as far as taking the lug nuts off. Occasionally when youre trying to take your wheel off it may feel like its not coming off, you might have to take your tire iron and smack the tire lightly around the side, because rust spills up between the wheel and the hub, and thats what might keep it from being able to pull it off. Fortunately with us this wheel is ready to come off, it actually wants to jump off itself. Gary is going to take the wheel off. Now remember, you want to try to roll the tire as much as you can because it is heavy. What do you think a tire usually weighs, about 40 pounds?

Gary Goldstein: Yeah, steel wheels.

Chuck Herring: Yeah, steel wheel, tire weighs about 40 pounds. Fortunately the spare tire weighs usually about half of that. Gary is going to put the spare tire one now for you. Thank you Gary. You want to make sure that it fits snug against the hub. Now, he will take it and put the lug nuts on. Again, you want to put them all, one hand tight at first, making them all nice and snug. He is going to take the lug wrench and tighten them up a little bit more just to be sure that the wheel is seated against the hub. He is not going to tighten them up permanently yet, he is going to do that after the vehicle has been lowered. Right now, if you notice what he is doing, he is doing a crisscross, like star pattern, when he is tightening them up. The reason why he is doing that now is so that he doesnt morph the wheel. The next thing were going to do is we will be lowering the vehicle so that we can tighten the lug nuts off completely. Gary has tightened the lug nuts to the wheel, so thats against the hub. He is now going to lower the vehicle. Again, he wants to be sure his arms and legs and everything else is out from underneath the vehicle when he lowers it. Again, there is no rush to get it lowered down, just takes a couple of minutes for it to come down. He hasnt removed the jack yet because he wants to make sure that the lug nuts are all tightened, in case we have to raise the vehicle again, if there is a problem. We dont anticipate any problems because we have the Automotive Expert.

Again, were going to do a star pattern. Now, in our stores we use air guns with torque sticks to put the proper amount of foot pounds on it, but as you see Gary is just making sure its tight. Cross pattern, opposite lug nuts. Once he has done that he can lower the vehicle completely and removes the jack. Once he has done this its important that he puts the jack, the lug wrench, any wheel chocks, and the tire thats got the hole in it, back into the trunk. Many times we find that customers leave the wheels on the side of the road, thinking that theyre going to get a whole new assembly when they get to their Mr. Tire Store, but that is not true. Thats how you change your spare tire.