2005-10-18 11:09 ☼ post
There’s nothing quite like a flat tire to start your work week off right. In this case it wasn’t one of my Element’s nice manageable tires though, it was one of the behemoths on Mary’s Expedition. I noticed the rear driver’s side tire looked pretty low while I was moving Eawyn’s car seat and initially figured it just needed some air added at a nearby gas station. Then I checked it with my handy digital pressure gauge and discovered that it’s pressure was 10 psi– or just over a quarter of what it should have been! Definitely time to put on the spare.
One of the few upsides to a fullsize SUV (besides their superior hauling capacity) is that they usually have a full size spare. This was the case with Mary’s Expedition and after confirming that the spare’s tire pressure was high enough for a short drive to the local Les Schwab I began the oh so fun task of changing two large and heavy tires. The whole process would have been a perfect success except I managed to tweak a muscle in my upper back while loosening a lug nut. It’s not incapacitating by any means, but it’s sore and irritating enough that I just know it’s going to bug me the rest of the week.
The good news is that Mary’s dad was able to take care of fixing things the rest of the way after I went into work. The problem turned out to just be an easily repaired leaky valve and was a free warranty repair. It was a pain to deal with, but in the end I’m glad I caught it in our garage so Mary didn’t end up stranded somewhere with a completely flat tire that she probably couldn’t have changed easily on her own. Now that I think about it though, I should probably walk her through the process of changing one of her tires just in case she’s ever in a situation where she has to do it herself.