Got a puncture? Spare wheels need to make a comeback

Excellent request Colin. Whilst punctures are rare so are house fires but we still buy insurance.

Having a viable spare tyre is a practical anticipation of future potential problems. May I make a plea for people to go with the all season tyres introduced over the last couple of years where the rubber remains supple down to zero degrees. This is relevant to the British and northern european climate.

Whilst they cannot be as good as the best summer or winter tyres that is an irrelevance as those are extremes from specialised tyre design. Rather similar argument to saying a family car is not as fast as an F1 nor as capacious as a Transit. People buy sensible compromises.

“The French Sécurité Routière (a road safety organization) estimates that 9% of all road accidents involving fatalities are attributable to tyre under-inflation, and the German DEKRA (a product safety organization) estimated that 41% of accidents with physical injuries are linked to tyre problems.
In the U.S., NHTSA data relate that tyres leak air naturally and over a year a typical new tyre can lose from 20 to 60 kPa (3 to 9 psi), roughly 10%, or more, of its initial pressure.”

Bear in mind that in cold weather your tyre pressure will lessen as the air becomes denser just aggravating the dangers from tyres.

ec.europa.eu/transport/road_safety/sites/roadsafety/files/pdf/vehicles/study_tyres_2014.pdf

Only 193 pages but the most pertinent I have seen so far is this reduction in accidents
Grip accidents on dry road, below zero Summer tyre vs Winter tyre
45.8% / 0.816
GIDAS

The tyres on space-saver wheels are normally inflated to higher pressures than normal tyres and lose pressure more quickly. I check my spare three times a year. I have seen one unused space-saver where the pressure had fallen to around half the correct pressure in storage.

With no spare wheel you need two jacks so you can change the wheels round [unless you leave that to the periodic service].

It would be helpful if Which? could provide a list of new cars that are provided with full-size and space-saver wheels as standard. Maybe @aporter could help us here.

My tyres wear evenly so it’s years since I have switched them around. In fact I have just given away a set of car jacks that have not been used for years. My father acquired them when he had an Austin A35 in the late 50s, and looked old then.

I remember the Austin A35 Wavechangev , a popular car . The website I read the article off was American and they mentioned that the manufacturers had used the excuse that the lighter weight saved on fuel costs and they definitely said that a lot of people now ( in America ) cant change tyres . On the other hand they mentioned that in the USA they are supplied with a full repair kit and small air compressor but said that wont help as many tyres have deep cuts on the side-wall which no repair kit can fix . Looks like another US (unwanted ) import to this country.

The skinny spare wheel for my car looks about right for an A35. 🙁

When I said that my tyres wear evenly, I meant across the width of the tread.

I see you have discovered wc’s Russian past, duncan 🙂 Were you a Which? subscriber you would have received the Autumn 1957 (first one) magazine which has a full test of the Austin A35 (described as a 2+2, and no ashtrays). It recommends putting a little extra pressure in the rear tyres when the boot is full to correct a tendency to oversteer.

Do you mean Russian emigre malcolm ? If you were well off I think there was an Austin A90 as well as a Somerset and I remember ,I think, an Austin 10 , it had the radiator thermometer attached to the bonnet and radiator as well as a starting handle , it sure took a lot of swings in winter to start it . Pre=MIni was the “baby Austin ” . Garages had “Austin Weeks “.

Thanks Adrian. It would be very useful if Which? could do some research because we have had several Convos on spare wheels. When I was buying my present car I made it clear that I was not interested in buying a car without a spare wheel.

It might be easier to find out which cars are available with a spare wheel. According to the RAC, nine out of ten new cars are not: https://www.confused.com/on-the-road/maintenance/death-of-the-spare-tyre

After I had a puncture recently I asked some friends if they had a spare and all but one did. A couple had bought a spare wheel and jack separately from buying the car. Others had fairly old cars, dating from when spare wheels were more common.

The biggest problem is that some manufacturers are selling cars with no provision for storing a spare wheel.