Hey, Mr. Tambourine Man,
play a song for me
I'm not sleepy
and there ain't no place I'm goin' to
Hey, Mr. Tambourine Man,
play a song for me
In the jingle jangle morning,
I'll come followin' you
Take me for a trip upon
your magic swirling ship
All my senses have been stripped
And my hands can't feel to grip
And my toes too numb to step
Wait only for my boot heels to be wanderin'
I'm ready to go anywhere,
I'm ready for to fade
Unto my own parade
Cast your dancing spell my way
I promise to go under it
Is there a good place for a flat?
60 miles east of Rapid City on I-90 me and Ed are tooling along about 70 mph at 5pm and I’m driving. Suddenly I see a car tire pass me on the left and keep on going. WTF?
I look in the mirror and no one is behind me as far as the eye can see and there hasn’t been anyone in front of us or in the lanes of the other side of the median for a long time. A barren place. Yet there was that tire. Haulin’ ass like it was trying to get somewhere in a hurry.
Terrified, I slow down and pulled off to the side as that tire disappears in the distance. I get out and look at the space where a tire used to live, but no longer did, and almost collapse. Ed says, “Well I never heard of that happening before.”
It was early March 1980, late in the day, and the cold was rolling in and the sun was vanishing and I had to piss like a russian racehorse with it’s nose on the finish line.
It was a Sunday afternoon in, I dunno, July or August about 9 years ago and my son and I were returning to Phoenix from Tucson where we had been visiting The-Best-Grandkids-on-the-Planet (TM). Officially, the temperature was maybe 113°, but on the freeway it had to have been 120°.
I began to get a little wobble in the steering, not much…just a little bit odd. And so out of an abundance of caution, and because we were approaching a convenient exit off the freeway, I took the exit and pulled over to look things over. Nothing looked out-of-sort, but the right front tire of my truck was radiating heat. I mean, it was hot already, but this was unusually hot.
I decided that I’d limp the thing home by keeping my speed down (read: “drive no more than the speed limit”). We made it down the road maybe 3 miles before “Thwacka-thwacka-thwack”. Again, there was a very convenient exit (lucky me), and I pulled over for the inspection. The interior wall of the right front had blown, and as it was thwacking around, it took out the wheel well liner.
We ripped out what was left of the liner and set out to change the tire. In the middle of the afternoon in the middle of the summer in the middle of Arizona.
Lessons learned from this…..
1. I am convinced that my decreased speed kept that blowout from being a very challenging event.
2. I keep water in my truck….always. I have 4 1-liter bottles in the doors of my back row. Yeah, in the summer that water is hot and gross, but it is waaay better than nothing.
3. You ought to carry gloves. Gloves and Dude Wipes. You can thank me later.
4. Every truck owner knows what a PITA it is to check the air pressure of your spare. But while doing that a couple times a year may be a pain, it doesn’t compare to needing to change your tire only to find that your spare is flat too.
You guys are on a roll tonight–nice work both of you!! 🙂
I lived in Tucson in the ’80s (near where Campbell crosses the Rillito). Local attitude was: “Thank God we don’t live in Phoenix where it gets hot.”
On the other hand, I like Death Valley in July.
Back in my youth doing field service I blew out the back right tire. Entire sidewalls of both sides were chunks blown all over the highway. Got that old Datsun down the exit at 13th street off I35, riding on the wheel. The intact tread was wrapped around the axle. Yes, gloves would have been useful at that point as fragments of the steel belts was sticking out the sides of the tread. I wore cheap suits back then. A couple black dudes drove by and said “Hey white boy, do you know how to change a tire?” I laughed, they laughed and they rode on. I shed the jacket and eventually got the spare on.
Couple more flat tire events then I’m done.
Was driving my wife’s brand new ride for the first time on a “Sunday Drive” and after going through an intersection there was that tell tale “thump thump” sound so I pulled over. There it was, a dam 9/16 & 1/2 open end wrench right through the sidewall of the tire. She didn’t like me breaking her car.
Next.
My brand new S10 in late 1990. My brother was working at Camping World, yanking the engine on a big Winnebago and called and asked if I could give him a hand. Doing 75 on I75 I didn’t notice anything wrong until I slowed down for the exit and there was that thump thump again. Oh dear. Needless to say I was a little bit durty and a little bit late getting to my bro’s work.
About 5 years ago with my 2001 Blazer 4×4. Coming back from the gun range in the rain and the back drivers side hit a drywall screw. These are the big 17″ wheels and 33″ tires. Did I mention they were heavy? And it was raining? Took almost 2 hours to get it done. The hardest part was getting the blown tire up on the outside swing mount. Because of how the mount is designed, you can’t see the bolt holes while holding the tire in place. You have to put the bolts in blind – by feel. I bet those tires-wheels weigh 50-60 lbs and they get heavier the longer you lift em. I ain’t a young buk any more.
The blown tire had 2 plugs in it already. The spare had 3 plugs in it. WTF? I walked around the vehicle and all 5 tires had plugs in them. Never in my life have I heard of such a thing.
So after I got that flat changed out I drove straight to Walmart and had 5 new Goodyear Wranglers installed with “lifetime” warranties and Road Hazard. Haven’t had another flat since.
Westbound I84 just east of Norh Powder, Oregon. Driving a 1970 GMC pickup towing a hay baler my brother and I bought at Twin Falls, Idaho. The dealer had delivered it to Nyssa. We hit the expansion joint on the bridge at North Powder and the right wheel of the baler passed us. Before the dust settled a rancher stopped and offered to help. The baler spindle is held on with 4 bolts. At some time in the past the flange on the axle broke and it was not repaired correctly so that only the top 2 bolts were holding. We were prepared mostly. Heavy duty jack and wrenches to borrow bolts from another part of the baler and we limped in to town and found a shop to fix it the next day.
borrow bolts from another part of the baler
Excellent!