Last Friday was a crazy day for me since I had a flat tire on my car. What's annoying was I noticed the tire was flat just as I was pulling into my driveway to replace bad and worn out motor mount on my Honda Accord. I heard a hissing sound coming from the back of the car and wasn't sure what it was so I got out and walked my car around doing a visual inspection. That was when I saw the flat tire. Here is a picture with the 4-way I used to get the tire off my Accord. (19mm lug nuts in case you were wondering.)
Flat tires are never fun but it's annoying that I got a flat just as I was going to do some DIY auto repair. At least I thought, “Hey, I'm at my house and this could be worse.” This way I had access to the Torin floor jack instead of the crappy scissor jack that I would have used on the side of the road. I would have rather used the Arcan Floor Jack but the Torin is a lot easier to move around and was good for changing out a flat tire. The spare tire was good and I knew I was going to be ok.
Most people don't know how to change a flat tire, so at least I have some skills besides writing. (At least I think so.) I was going to make a video on “How to Change a Flat Tire” as it was a perfect situation being at the house but as usual the camcorder wasn't charged up and I didn't have time. It would have been perfect since I was at the house though. Argh, maybe next time I get a flat tire at my house. What are the chances of that though?
After I got the spare on and was able to move the car, I looked at the flat tire. The culprit? A screw in the tire. I imagine it was there for awhile and on some impact on Baltimore streets, which are basically full of potholes, it must have just released all the air on an impact. Oh well!
I decided to plug the tire since the screw wasn't in the sidewall. Still I thought I should check around at local tire shops about replacing the tire since the wear bar indicators on this were almost at capacity. Check the arrows to see and you can see some uneven wear on the tire which probably means I should get an alignment.
Nobody wanted to accommodate me since it was Friday. I assume they could have but they didn't want any more customers and wanted to go enjoy the weekend. I decided to go over to an auto repair shop I used to work at part-time and plug the tire. Again, I thought I should have made a DIY video but I wanted to get the bad motor mount on my car replaced and not have car issues take up my whole day.
After I got the tire plugged and back on the car, I took out the front motor mount, but the replacement one I had wasn't machined right and wouldn't fit in the Accord. I had to take it mount back to the store today and get a new one which was machined right. The adventures of owning a car.
So my whole Friday was an unproductive mess. Will have to get a new tire or a set of two.