No spare wheel

I've changed a wheel three or four times in the last decade. Maybe it's down to the crap lanes full of potholes.

Our Touran has the space for one but came with the squirty gunk thing. I keep meaning to buy a spacesaver, must actually get around to it. I don't buy the argument about not having a spare to keep the weight down on a lumbering barge like the Touran, can only be a cost thing.
Our other car is a tiny and very basic Peugeot 107 but that comes with a full size spare, though the wheels are not much larger than space savers anyway

 

As someone who worked in the auto industry for 20 years.

It's about money. Nothing else. They are absolutely obsessed with saving much smaller sums of money when building a car than just not fitting a spare wheel. Period.

 

Screws left on the road seem to cause my issues, I have had several in the last few years, all avoidable

 

Yes, that's what always gets me, too. It gets stuck in the tread and then slowly works its way in. Usually it is a very slow puncture.

 

If yours is the 3.0si, it uses an N52 engine which I'm almost 100% sure it's a wet sump engine.

If it's a Z4M, the S54 is a wet sump with scavenging system. Some folks refer to it as "semi-dry" (because of the scavenger) but that's a red herring.

 

I've had that a couple of times and in both cases the tyre pressure monitor picked it up before it became a stop and change the wheel issue. One was just out of the dealer when new. The side wall was damaged too, so needed a new tyre in the first 10 miles

 

Screws are a big part of the problem because they are everywhere. Every construction job uses them because with a power driver you are nearly as quick as a nail and much more reliable. It's all debris though, the last I had was some kind of steel reinforcement wire, I recognize d what it had come from even though I can't now remember. I do remember that near the last place I worked there was a scrapyard and the locals went the long way round to avoid it because they were tired of all the metal debris that was ruining their tyres.

 

Avoid roads where a house is being re-roofed…those pesky galvanised nails stab your tyres. Usually I’m wise after the event. Such punctures are typically slow so as with screws a spare wheel usually doesn’t need to be fitted (fortunately).

 

The former. N32 3.0Si

 

I understood that all modern engines had a scavenging system, rather than the oil just splashing onto the big ends and main bearings, with the oil pump picking up the oil from the sump and squirting it where needed. But I may be wrong...Maybe the the N52 engine has an oil level sensor that measures where the level is when the pump is scavenging, rather than when the engine is stopped and all the oil has trickled down. I have a 1999 528i which I believe has the same engine (a lovely, lovely engine, by the way!) and the manual says to turn off the engine, wait 10 minutes and then measure the level. But nothing about measuring it while running.

 

The sensor is in the sump, so needs to have oil moving around in order to get a 'true' level.





The E39 has the M52 engine fitted, probably a later on with VANOS. That engine is two generations older than the N52. A good engine, only let down in the early years when they used Nikasil as bore liners, not Alusil.

 

Kids car had a puncture yesterday, I blame this thread.

It’s a Fiesta, thankfully came with a Spacesaver.

Cheers BB

 

Should have gone to Spacesavers.

 

Mine is a Mk7.5. The cable for the sub is quite short on this one too, it only fits one way, and you have to separate the molex connector to get it all back together. I haven't tested mine on the front axle, but have just assumed that I would also have to swap things around if I had a front puncture. I've had one rear puncture since installing the spare, so the Chinese tire has about six miles of tread wear.

Did you have to change the rear trim panel to get the tire to fit?

 

Yes, I do know I have a "double Vanos," which apparently varies the working of the camshafts. And of course there is an oil temperature sensor. But I have a DIPSTICK!

 

Ha, circumstances sometimes force you to choose between potholes and oncoming traffic.

 

Destroyed an ally as well as the tyre hitting a mineshaft in the road that was full of water so couldn't be seen in the wet ,and more than 1 tyre alone in the last 2 or 3 years ,motor just had a gookit when it was bought - soon put a full size spare in even if it did lift the boot carpet about 15mm.

 

Yup, it was an experience like that, with friends in their car en route to a concert, that decided me the gloop can is not a viable option. Much more likely to get a puncture from pothole damage (3 now that I’ve been involved with) than from a nail or similar, where gloop might have helped. We missed the start of the concert, having pissed the gloop all over the car park of a nearby pub and then been obliged to wait for a taxi.

 

Old engine, see.

 

On the 7.5 the space saver is good for the front and back as long as you've got the correct sized one.
In Europe I think all 8 and 7.5's come with the rear panel that accommodates the tyre but I'm not so sure that's the case in America and possibly other parts of the world.