Bellevue's Evergreen Towing co.

 If you got a flat tire, this is what you need to do next! 

In this article we will help you determine what you need to do after one of your car tires has burst or gone flat. These are step-by-step instructions to get you back on the road as quickly as possible so you can get back to your friends and family. Don’t worry, these instructions are so easy to follow that even my 10-year-old son can do it. 

• Pulling over safely onto the shoulder. 

So you are driving down the road and all of a sudden you hear an explosion from underneath your car and you have no idea what is going on. All of a sudden your car is pulling to one side and you are just trying to stay in your lane and hold onto the steering wheel as best as you can. In a situation like this you need to try to stay in your lane and not swerve into other lanes. Your car going into the other lane without notifying other cars ahead of time around you could end up in a serious injury or even worse, a fatality. Now that you have a managed to keep your car in it’s own lane, turn on your hazard lights and pull over to the shoulder as soon as possible without causing an accident. 

• Looking at the car to find out what happened. 

Now that you are safe on the side of the road, you can start to let loose. The scary part is over and you have succeeded, you have succeeded in not causing a major accident and keeping control of your car and pulling over to a safe area. Now you can safely step out of your car and walk around to see what has happened. I still need to be careful because there is still on coming traffic put in a safe manner walk around your car and determine what is happened and which tire is going flat. Make sure you are at least 3 feet away from the edge of the wind separated shoulder in the outside lane. If you can, keep your car running and make sure all the lights are on including the hazard lights so that oncoming traffic can see your car and you working on it. The more awareness you can bring to yourself, the safer you will be. So now that you know which tire has gone flat, time to open up the trunk and to pull out your tools and the spare wheel and tire.

• Taking off the flat tire and replacing it with the spare wheel and tire. 

First of all, the car should always be in park and the parking brake should always be engaged when taking off any wheel on a car or truck. If your car is a manual, make sure that it is in first gear and that the parking brake is set. Now let’s get to work! Make sure that you have all the necessary tools! You should have a socket and the handle to remove the bolts that hold the wheel in place. You should also have an amber colored safety triangle which brings additional awareness to you from other motorists on the road. And most importantly is that you have a car jack, the car jack will be positioned between the road in your car. The car jack has the most important job which is to raise the car just enough for you to remove the wheel and tire and install the new wheel and tire safely and easily. My advice is to bring out all the tools and line them up right next to your work area which will be next to the flat wheel and tire. The first thing that you want to do is to install the car jack between the ground and the car itself. Look for signs and indications where the car jack should be positioned on the bottom of the car. Spend a few minutes looking around to see where this exact location is before you start lifting the car. It will normally have a grove or weird angle which sits right on the top part of the jack so that the car does non-slip of off the car jack while being raised in the air. As you are raising the car make sure that it is not slipping of offd the jack, stand back a few feet and look at the car jack to make sure it stands 100% vertical. Now that you have the car raised enough so that you are able to remove the wheel you can start unbolting the nuts that hold the wheel in place. If your wheel is moving, set the parking brake so that it locks the wheel and allows you to free up the nuts. This will require some muscle on your part so put your back into it. As you are removing the last nut make sure that the wheel does not slip of off the bolts. Carefully pick up your wheel and tire and remove it away from the car and place it underneath the car right about the middle of the car. Half of the wheel should stick out and the other half should be underneath the car. This way, in case of an accident and the car falling of off the car jack, it will land on the wheel and not your hands. This is a great safety precaution just in case of an accident, and let’s be honest, accidents happen when we least expect them to. Now let’s put on the spare wheel and tire and as soon as we put the wheel on the bolts take one nut tha you removed earlier and hand tighten it. Once you do this, the wheel should sit flat against the rotor and be snug. Now go through tall of the nuts that are left and install every single one of them. Hand tighten every single one and then tighten them all with the socket and handle that came with the tools to change the tire. There is a specific way that the nuts should be tightened, and here is how. Once you have the nut at 12pm fully tightened, the next nut to fully tighten should be the nut at 6pm, then the nut at 9pm and then the nut at 3pm. This way all of the nuts are tightened equally all around the wheel and rotor. Once they are all tightened, you may now pull out the flat wheel and tire from underneath the car and place it in the trunk. Now begin to lower the car jack. Do it slowly and steadily, you’ve done great so far so don’t rush now. Place all of your tools back into the trunk and the amber safety triangle as well. 

• Congratulations! You have just replaced your first spare wheel and tire! It’s time to get back into the traffic. 

Now sit back down in your car, put your seatbelt on, disengage your parking brake and shift your car into “D” drive. Now be patient and wait for the vehicles coming behind you to either slow down or for the traffic to thin down so that you have room to pull out safely onto oncoming traffic. Try to get up to the speed of the traffic, if the other cara are driving 60mph, they try to get up to 60mph as soon as you can. If they are driving 40mph, then try to get up to 40mph as soon as you can. This way the oncoming cars won’t have to slam on their brakes when you pull into their lane at 20mph in a 40mph lane. And there you are, you have just replaced your whee and tire and pulled in and out of traffic like a professional race car driver, you are amazing! I know that it seemed difficult and scary put it ended up being very easy. With the right instructions and a little bit of patience, you have done it. 

• Don’t want to change your spare tire after you have had a flat? No worries! 

Give us a call here at Bellevue’s Evergreen Towing Co. and we will send a qualified tow truck driver to replace your spare tire for you. So don’t stress, you have options.