Re: No AAA member, what if I get a flat tire?

>> It is very easy for a tire change to take two hours if the car is
>> on the shoulder (as far as it will go without ripping down a fence
>> or barricade at the side of the freeway) but YOUR ASS is sticking
>> into the (60+ MPH) traffic lanes while you change the tire, and
>> traffic is heavy enough that you get one 30-second shot at it every
>> 10 minutes, but you have to keep one eye out for more traffic..
>
>Oh, come on; that's ridiculous.  First of all, consider the profile
>of the typical human body in a squatting or kneeling position, as
>when a person is changing a tire.  The width isn't that much greater
>than the width of the vehicle itself.  If cars were whizzing past

When your left mirror is hanging over the boundary of the traffic
lane, and the right mirror is almost scraping the 100-foot wall
making the edge of the freeway, you don't have a lot of choice.
Some freeways don't have much "shoulder".  And occasional bridge
columns reduce that to nearly nil, so trying to drive on the shoulder
for several miles to find a better spot may involve getting back
into traffic.  Just trying to merge into 60MPH traffic from a dead
stop with no entrance lane, 100 ft in front of you before an
obstruction in the shoulder, limited visibility to the rear because
of a curve in the road, heavy traffic, and a flat tire can involve
a lot of waiting just for an opening.  For optimum survivability,
I can see why someone might wait for rush "hour" to be over (e.g.
10PM) before even attempting pull-into-the-traffic-lane-and-pray-
the-traffic-you-can't-see-yet-sees-and-avoids-you.

>so close that the width of your body would put you into harm's way,
>you wouldn't be out there in the first place.  Hell, you probably
>wouldn't even have stopped in that location at all, but continued
>on to a more suitable spot.

Sometimes you want to stop RIGHT NOW to inspect the damage, see
what's making that wierd sound, and see if you have a chance of
continuing.  Is it just a flat tire, or have you also gotten tangled
up in something that's going to make it really difficult to steer?
Or is the engine having problems?  Or did you hit some big chunk
of debris in the road which is now jammed around your tire?  You
may also want to get off the freeway NOW while you're sure you can
do it safely, then worry about fixing the problem after you know
what it is.

>And second, consider the subjective length of a two-hour interval
>of time, and compare it to the straightforward steps that are 
>involved with chnaging a tire.  That's a *hell* of a long time.
>I can understand how a tire change might take longer if you're a
>little skittish about the proximity of traffic, but two hours is
>a hell of an exaggeration.

The "straightforward steps" can sometimes take a lot longer than
you expect if the light is poor, you drop a lug nut and your passenger
insists it's unsafe to drive with one missing, the jack keeps
slipping because you are on gravel, it takes your full weight to
get the lug nuts loose and you need to try several times, etc.  Yes,
two hours is a long time.

>> Believe it or not, I was in that situation where it took half
>> an hour to empty a 1-gallon gas can into the tank (not counting
>> GETTING the gas).
>
>If that's really true, then your problems are psychological, not
>automotive, in nature.  (Did you ever consider sitting on the
>trunk lid and pouring the gas from there?)

Did you know that a Toyota Tercel doesn't HAVE a trunk lid?  It's
a hatchback.  I also tried pouring from the roof, and that might
have worked if my arms had been a little longer or I'd had something
to hold on to.  I also couldn't see from that position when I had
the spout actually in the small hole for gas covered by a spring-loaded
cover, so I couldn't tell whether I was actually getting anything
into the tank.  Oh, yes, the outer cover to get to the gas cap, when
opened, was in the traffic lane.  So if I'm standing there with a
gas can filling the tank, ALL OF ME was in the traffic lane.

                                        Gordon L. Burditt