Posted by apb on Wednesday, September 06, 2006 at 11:09AM :
In Reply to: Jim - Your post is my point posted by mikey stone Idaho (aka COTWM) on Wednesday, September 06, 2006 at 10:33AM :
We are not making light of safety practices, nor are we ridiculing your honorable crusade to keep us all alive and well.
However, I have never heard of, nor practiced, the procedure of putting the nuts back on the same lugs, or putting the wheel back in the same position on the lugs.
This seems overly obsessive/compulsive to me, and I have changed, and seen changed, thousands of wheels and tires. I have never seen any professional tire technicians, in the military, the civilian market, or at industrial locations like the phone company or lighting company, do that.
Squatting at the side of a highway, in the rain, changing a tire while 18-wheelers go by at 85 mph, the last thing I am going to obsess over is whether I have carefully marked the lug nuts, and the position of the spare wheel. It's enough of a hassle just to keep the nuts in the upturned hubcap, while the wind tries to fling them under the car.
Your admonition flies in the face of logic. What do you recommend for spare wheels? By definition, they are mounted randomly on every corner of the vehicle. Do I need to carry a diagram in my wallet, for every vehicle that I own? Color-code the nuts?
Ever heard of this field expedient?: You lose all the nuts, while changing the tire in the snow. You then take one nut off the remaining three wheels, to attach the fourth, until you can get new ones. What about the new ones? Do they need to be professionally matched to the old lugs, or do we buy new matched sets of lugs and nuts, and then pay to have the lugs replaced?
What do you recommend for folks who buy 2 used spare wheels at a junk yard so that they can use them for snow tires?
Safety, like beauty, is is the mind of the beholder.
Stay safe, and thanks for reminding us to work safely. It is appreciated by all of us.
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