Four And One Half Hours
I come back from lunch at work last Saturday and notice my right rear tire is extremely low. WTF! So I head over to the Mobil on Sepulveda by work. The air machine takes quarters. I have none. Inside I go to get change for the ma-cheen, but the guy inside says no worries, pushes a button under the counter and sends me back outside to a now pumping air machine. Woohoo! I fill up with air and head back to work to finish my shift.
I come back out a couple hours later and it doesn't look much different. I had no tire guage in the car as I hadn't yet transferred my crap from the old Camry into the new Civic Si, 200HP Coupe. Anyway it looked good enough to drive home with so I did. By the way I had noticed a screw in the tread, but didn't have the time really to get it fixed on Saturday since that night was ROLLER DERBY. Nothing happened with it on Sunday seeing as it was day of recovery and all. Fast forward to this morning.
I had wanted to get an early start since I had laundry to do as well as having the tire repaired or replaced. 9:00AM rolls around and I'm still in bed reading Girl Genius Volume 6: Agatha Heterodyne And The Golden Trilobite. I start bitching at myself to be productive and by 10:00AM I'm finally up and out the door to Sears who seemed to be the only store carrying the Michelin tire I wanted.
I roll up and tell the guy my story. Screw in tire. Not sure how long I drove on a really flat tire, blah, blah, blah. Please hook me up with a new tire. He tells me no, no we can fix it. Pull it around back. Half hour later and "Nope that tire is shot. You're gonna need a new one." I looked at the inside and sure enough while the screw hole could easily be patched the damage done to the side wall by my driving on it is terminal. So we go inside to look up the tire I had already looked up at home. Not in stock. They'll have to get it from the warehouse. Ok sure. No problem. How long? "You'll have your car back by noon." Great carry on.
Noon rolls around and sure enough my car rolls out of the garage bay and is parked on the side. Everyones busy so I go check on my new tire.
!!!! Not the same tire. WTF!
So I go back inside and patiently wait for the guys to finish up with the people they're currently handling. For 30 minutes. Bleh. My turn comes up and I take the guy outside and show him that the tires don't match. He agrees and goes to get his manager. Fifteen minutes later the manager shows up and agrees the tires are not the same. He goes back inside to figure it out. After talking with Michelin apparently they are no longer making my exact style, the car is a 2007 with the factory tires, and what they put on there is the replacement. Eww! He suggested that I call the dealer and see if they have the right tire. I politely suggested that he call the dealer for me and let me know. He came back about ten minutes later and told me that yes the dealer did have some. Was I sure I didn't want the tire they had already put on? Yup I'm sure. The car has less than 3000 miles on it and I don't want some mismatched, ugly tire. To his credit he told me that since the dealer had the tire I wanted he was willing to take the new tire off and install my spare for me. Which they did. Actually I think the manager is actually the one that did it too. No charge for anything including disposing of my "old", fucked up tire.
So 10:00AM to 1:30PM. No new tire. No lunch. No laundry done. Heading off to the dealer. I got to the dealer about quarter to two. Pulled up. No waiting. The service manager came right out, heard my story and got the ball rolling. No estimate on time. He did ask me what Sears had quoted me for the work. I told him. $283.00 out the door, they're not cheap tires dammit. And I have to use Premium gas, but I digress. He said he'd see if they could come in cheaper. I was out the door at 2:40 with a new tire. Total bill, $250.
Total time at Sears: 3 1/2 hours
Potential out of pocket: $283
Total time at the dealer: < 1 hour
Out of pocket: $250
Over $30 less and less than 1/3 the time. I know the dealers get a bad wrap for high prices for average work, but I was totally satisfied today with them. I'll be heading back when I need service that's for sure. So I spent most of my day off getting a new tire. No laundry done and I couldn't take Mrs. LK to the airport. Pbbbbt!
I did get to clean the litterbox though when I got home. Woohoo bonus!
ps flickr pics on the right
I come back out a couple hours later and it doesn't look much different. I had no tire guage in the car as I hadn't yet transferred my crap from the old Camry into the new Civic Si, 200HP Coupe. Anyway it looked good enough to drive home with so I did. By the way I had noticed a screw in the tread, but didn't have the time really to get it fixed on Saturday since that night was ROLLER DERBY. Nothing happened with it on Sunday seeing as it was day of recovery and all. Fast forward to this morning.
I had wanted to get an early start since I had laundry to do as well as having the tire repaired or replaced. 9:00AM rolls around and I'm still in bed reading Girl Genius Volume 6: Agatha Heterodyne And The Golden Trilobite. I start bitching at myself to be productive and by 10:00AM I'm finally up and out the door to Sears who seemed to be the only store carrying the Michelin tire I wanted.
I roll up and tell the guy my story. Screw in tire. Not sure how long I drove on a really flat tire, blah, blah, blah. Please hook me up with a new tire. He tells me no, no we can fix it. Pull it around back. Half hour later and "Nope that tire is shot. You're gonna need a new one." I looked at the inside and sure enough while the screw hole could easily be patched the damage done to the side wall by my driving on it is terminal. So we go inside to look up the tire I had already looked up at home. Not in stock. They'll have to get it from the warehouse. Ok sure. No problem. How long? "You'll have your car back by noon." Great carry on.
Noon rolls around and sure enough my car rolls out of the garage bay and is parked on the side. Everyones busy so I go check on my new tire.
!!!! Not the same tire. WTF!
So I go back inside and patiently wait for the guys to finish up with the people they're currently handling. For 30 minutes. Bleh. My turn comes up and I take the guy outside and show him that the tires don't match. He agrees and goes to get his manager. Fifteen minutes later the manager shows up and agrees the tires are not the same. He goes back inside to figure it out. After talking with Michelin apparently they are no longer making my exact style, the car is a 2007 with the factory tires, and what they put on there is the replacement. Eww! He suggested that I call the dealer and see if they have the right tire. I politely suggested that he call the dealer for me and let me know. He came back about ten minutes later and told me that yes the dealer did have some. Was I sure I didn't want the tire they had already put on? Yup I'm sure. The car has less than 3000 miles on it and I don't want some mismatched, ugly tire. To his credit he told me that since the dealer had the tire I wanted he was willing to take the new tire off and install my spare for me. Which they did. Actually I think the manager is actually the one that did it too. No charge for anything including disposing of my "old", fucked up tire.
So 10:00AM to 1:30PM. No new tire. No lunch. No laundry done. Heading off to the dealer. I got to the dealer about quarter to two. Pulled up. No waiting. The service manager came right out, heard my story and got the ball rolling. No estimate on time. He did ask me what Sears had quoted me for the work. I told him. $283.00 out the door, they're not cheap tires dammit. And I have to use Premium gas, but I digress. He said he'd see if they could come in cheaper. I was out the door at 2:40 with a new tire. Total bill, $250.
Total time at Sears: 3 1/2 hours
Potential out of pocket: $283
Total time at the dealer: < 1 hour
Out of pocket: $250
Over $30 less and less than 1/3 the time. I know the dealers get a bad wrap for high prices for average work, but I was totally satisfied today with them. I'll be heading back when I need service that's for sure. So I spent most of my day off getting a new tire. No laundry done and I couldn't take Mrs. LK to the airport. Pbbbbt!
I did get to clean the litterbox though when I got home. Woohoo bonus!
ps flickr pics on the right
posted by Little Kenny at 12/10/2007 05:24:00 PM
4 Comments:
Thanks for cleaning the litter. This helps me a lot. I owe you one full body massage.
LUV,
Mrs. LK
No charge sweet thing. Although I won't turn down the massage either.
Not to fuel an already frustrating situation, but I call BS on the "ruined" bead. I had a similar situation on a 225/45R17. Took it down to Discount Tire and they said, "no problem" only to come back out saying the bead had been trashed from driving on it for so long. "Heat damage. See hear?"
Uh Huh. I knew for a FACT that I had been on the flat for about 100 feet as I had heard / felt it go flat about 60 feet out the driveway. Turned right around and parked the car. Checked it out and found a honey of a screw.
So I call BS on the Discount Tire dudes and take it down to the next shop I can find, which is a Firestone that is not doing well from a business standpoint but the old salt behind the deck knew he was not going to sell me a tire (most likely 'cause Firestone doe not sell Pilot Sport 2s in that size). So I ask, "Can you fix it? The guys at DT say no way!". He says yes, and that was $18 and 12,000 miles ago.
- Cheeselover
This wasn't the bead. The tire held air no problem. It was the inside of the sidewall. I watched them take it off and then after some pointing and gesturing they came and got me. I must have been driving on that mostly flat tire for a while. I didn't even notice it when I went to lunch. I just happened to walk around to that side of the car and noticed it was flat. I did drive it an additional 2 blocks after noticing to the gas station, but it must have been at least a couple of days. When that sucker is parked at home it's against a wall so I never go by that side. As a side note I went out on Sunday check the pressure with the guage. It barely read ten. That's after I put air in it on Saturday. I figured that when the guage at the gas station didn't pop out that it was just broken, but when I used my own and compared it to the other tires even mine registered jack shit.
So I drove a couple more blocks to the gas station by the house and filled it up with my guage. I overfilled it to about 30, but as I was filling it I heard a decent pop. At the time I just figured it was the tiring seating back on the rim better, but after seeing the inside of the tire today it may well have been the tire separating. Anyway, that tire was done for. I'll be paying much closer attention to the air pressure now that's for sure.
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