Even in the modern family car, even if some may say it is just a Hyundai, is it strange that I am saddened by the removal of the spare. A spare that has been in there all along ready for that moment to be the knight in shining armour and save you from being stranded. You first remove the styrefoam piece that stops the jack and various tools from rattling round the paint bares not even a finger print. Pull out the matching mag wheel with tread never to have turned an inch with the original printed lines in red and blue and the tyre size all the way around the tread. Not a single speck of brake dust on the inside of the rim, the paint is fresh and new.

Well thankfully I was able to change it on level ground in a well lit shopping centre car park and not on the side of the main highway and that Erin and Madison are safe.

Don't be sad mate - it's job in life is fulfilled.

Yeah Nephew, be happy that it is a Hyundai, and you get 5 road wheels. Not a dodgy odd steely, or a dangerous "space saver", or worse, a tin of goop.

A story was related in the Herald once, of a road tester who took a quarter million dollar Porsche up thr Hunter Valley for the weekend. Saturday arvo he gets a busted tyre, like sidewall split. He goes to the boot and finds no styrofoam, no jack, no tools, just the goop. It didn't work. He had to be tilt trayed to Maitland & stay the night. Nobody has Porsche tyres on Sunday, so he has to leave the quarter of a million on the side of the road, and get the train back to Sydney. Monday morning, he finds no tyre service in Sydney holds the right spec tyre, and neither does Porsche!
Dealer has to send a tilt tray to maitland to recover the poor thing.
Weekend riuned, girlfriend very unhappy, wallet much lighter, the reviewer concluded he wouldn't have one as a gift.

You know the sad thing? You don't get a spare with a Holden ute, unless you ask. Then you get a wheelbarrow wheel, for a ute! You can get a full sized spare, for $300 extra! And they wonder why they can't sell them. Even Great Wall give you a spare. Rant, rant, rant!

Glad you got it fixed easy,
Cheers, Matt.

Its worse than that, my 2010 top of the range VE-SS Redline Comm Ute had no spare nor anyplace to put it. ie the under floor mounting brackets etc is just not there. I don't have the Ute anymore and still don't have a spare wheel in my replacement car. Its sad what penny pinching does.

not a fan of the "no spare" in the new cars, we get a few through work that have been towed in because the can of slime in the car wont repair sidewall damage or big holes! and then there's the cost of the replacement tyres! give me a full size spare any time!

the other one that surprises me is the amount of cars with the original spare still in place, have had anything from xb falcons to magnas with original spares!

possibly another reason companies "justify" it

One thing I didn't check when we bought the Forester was the type of wheel for the spare. (I knew it to be full size.)It had styled steel road wheels, but a crappy Falcon type spare. The handbook says to rotate the spare to keep wear constant and avoid busting the centre viscous coupling. So you have to wear the odd wheel to maintain waranty! Dumb. And cheap. I had to go buy a used road wheel, because Subaru charges $1000 for one!!
Hey Subaru, all Hyundais - 5 road wheels!
Holden-made for Australia.......as if. Not even a holder!

Santa fe is the best modern we've owned, BTW. 215,000 ks and zero oil consumption, roomier, smoother, much quieter, more power and lower fuel consumption, and 5 ROAD WHEELS. Makes the Sube seem a clunky rattly noise box.
Dirt roads adjust priorities. We get punctures pretty often. Tracy can change them in about 10 minutes.

Cheers, Matt.

Nice Ranting Matt. But true, it was one of the positives of moving to the city after having at least 6 punctures a year in the bush (if not more). So you soon learnt to be prepared. The work ute ended up with 2 rimmed spares, a shovel, and a 2 tonne trolley jack with some wood blocks in the back for quick and easy fix. When you got a flatty it was often uneven or unusual ground clearance.

One thing in the city tho !! If some asshole puts a tech screw under your rear tyre in a car park, happened to me twice in 2 weeks. Both were slow leaks and could attend to them at home. I hear tyre joints near shopping centres do this to drum up buisness....hope i never catch one in the act or they will be subject to the wrath of $&@ with a tyre lever.

Hey, I bet Tracy can also change a Bellett head gasket in 10 minutes off the side of the road !?

B.

We see a nice Tradies Ute parked not far from us here, always on the street. Late SS Commodore Ute with the usual Tradies trailer and tool boxes.

talk of no spare, yesterday we saw it again, this time up on blocks and NO wheels. Some damm thief decided he needed them all.

Well, she probably could..........but she probably wouldn't!

No spare is a deal breaker for us. The car can't be considered.
I got to go "brochure shopping" last week, and thought the PHEV Outlander was worth a look. Alas, no spare. Why not? I ask the dealer. Oh, the batteries take up the space, he says. So I look underneath - the battery is where the 3rd row normally goes. The spare position is taken up by....a muffler! The spare is left out to save weight, and make the economy figure look better.
Cheers, Matt.

Well, she probably could..........but she probably wouldn't!

No spare is a deal breaker for us. The car can't be considered.
I got to go "brochure shopping" last week, and thought the PHEV Outlander was worth a look. Alas, no spare. Why not? I ask the dealer. Oh, the batteries take up the space, he says. So I look underneath - the battery is where the 3rd row normally goes. The spare position is taken up by....a muffler! The spare is left out to save weight, and make the economy figure look better.
Cheers, Matt.

OK Matt, she would be handing you the spanners tho

Wheels and tyres ARE a target for quick cash conversion. The Forestry Nissan Patrol has an exterior mounted spare on the tray. This has been stolen twice over the years. Once in a Govt. parking lot under security servaillance. I was in the offices for 1 hour, came back to the car and it was gone. More recently stolen under my older sons window in the front drive way. Stealth as no one heard a thing. Replacing it cost us tax payers $850 a piece with standard rim and tyre. The spare is now chained and padlocked on

B.

Hate to say it but ,chain and lock make no difference . If the want it they will get it . Gricey

Not wrong Gricey!! But rheems of H/T chain and phatt padlocks make theft harded than just the spare screwed on to a thread and plate. Not everyone carries a big set of bolt cutters or an angle grinder, besides the noise might wake up the neighbourhood.

B.

Thieves is thieves. Sad.

Hey, maybe thats it! Car companies are saving us the trauma of having them ripped off by not giving us one in the first place! Nice. $300 extra for a spare, thats like $800 extra for metallic paint! (Cause its such a new innovation!) Thieves!
Ranty-rant.
At least we can say, "In some ways Belletts are better equipped than many new cars...."

Cheers, Matt.

..

You is such a latteral Ranter.....I mean thinker, Matt. Hard to find anything that doesn't smack of ripp off these days.

B.