Hey guys, Just wanted to share a great experience I had yesterday. So over the weekend I noticed I had a flat tyre, there was a tear on the tyre wall that looked pretty bad. I think ok no biggy, I will put the spare on. I get the car up on the jack and all the bolts out and the thing won't come off. I called the mate who I bought the car from to check there wasn't anything under the vw cap or have I missed anything. He warns me that when he had the rims refurb he had the same thing and to get a mallet and whack the tyre from the back. I only had a claw hammer in the house and wits the tyre completely flat I didn't want to risk damaging it. So in go back to him and he gives me a couple of YouTube videos involving leaving the bolts on loose and moving the car back and forth wiggling to loosen it. This doesn't go well and the tyre manages to come off the rim with the rim firmly attached to the car! At this point I stop, I'm kinda screwed without the mallet and the car is sat at a weird angle on my drive so no way I can even be towed out to a garage! My dad popped over and suggested we just call a tyre service that come to the house. First guys we call are complete cowboys and essentially I'm paying 150 over the cost of tyre to get it sorted. Then we called hometyre, the guy quotes me 126 for the tyre and fitting. I asked him ok what about the call out charge, he tells me that's included and someone can be there same day. The rough cost of the tyre is 90 so this appears to be a bargain, I go ahead dubious that this is gonna work out. The technician calls to say he is running 15 mins late. When he turns up he is done in less than 30 mins, all of my rims are wiped down everything put back into my boot properly and he has a card machine ready to process payment. (I had even got cash out of the cash point but he told me they prefer card and if I use my debit card there is no surcharge) Electronic receipt follows within an hour. As I said I was really impressed and would highly recommend hometyre. (I have the number please pm me if anyone wants it.) Just wanted to share my experience. Nims
Apparently this is fairly common with VWs - my sister's Golf suffered the same issue with one of the back wheels binding onto the hub. The AA man solved that particular issue with the aid of a large sledgehammer, apparently! He said that it's really quite common for VWs.
The guy said the same to me when he came over. My last car was a merc and in the two years I had that never had to change a tyre. Previous to that I had an Audience S3 for 10 years changed a couple of tyre on it but never had an issue.
Top tip for stuck wheels. Loosen bolts, jack car up, support car, stand with back to wheel, donkey kick wheel at 3 o clock, if still stuck kick again at 6 o clock position, wheel comes free, remove bolts, job jobbed.
I always rub a bit of copper grease or similar on to the contact areas between the wheel and hub as well as the threads on the bolts, whenever I have the wheels off. Saves a lot of aggro down the line!
This, us over here in Coldland who change wheels twice a year (summer/winter wheels) learn that aluminium wheels tend to stick (due to corrosion/salted roads in winter). Copper Paste or ceramic paste solve this But yes, sounds like a good service you received!
Tyresonthedrive.com are an excellent company for coming to your home and fitting new tyres. I recently had all 4 tyres replaced on my Z4M outside the house, balanced and rims polished as part of the service. Cant fault their service one bit.....the fitter called about 20 minutes before arrival to give me chance to get the car ready for him. Very polite guy, knew what he was doing and the job was done in just over an hour and a quarter. Paid with card and off he went to his next customer......brilliant service.
Just had this on sisters new (to her) aygo. Made worse by people not cleaning up the centre bore of the wheel and just pulling the wheel on when doing up the nuts. Happens when the wheels been painted too as the paint is too thick on the centre. Drums were then seized onto hub too and required a puller to remove,
