Ok...Im not sure if this is the right place. There is no "tire" board. I have an 87 TA. The "space saver" spare is a piece of crap. The sidewalls are junk. The little air canister is rusty from the hatch leaking, and I was infromed they are outlawed. Is there any alternative for a spare? Ive been gettin nervous lately because I do a lot of long range driving and Im pretty hard on those tires. I would hate to get stuck in a crappy area with a flat. Let me know what you all are doing with your spares...or where I can get new rubber with a can. Thanks.

Justin

 

Get a tire repair kit (the kind where you stick the gooey string into the tire) or some slime stuff, and a small 12v compressor.

 

consider an S10 spare wheel and tire. I dunno, at least they have the same bolt pattern. If you have 15" rims, be sure the S10 rim is a 15 as well. It may not fit in the well though

I carried a spare full size rim and tire for a while but then I got tired of it taking up the whole area back there and just carried a can of tire seal. Hell, if a Z06 comes factory with just a can, it must be good enough for a thirdgen!

 

Actually the solution may have presented itself tonight. See, I cant just plug or seal it. The sidewall is so messed up and rotted. Its a mess. I work at autozone and a guy that comes in all the time has a 95 Camaro. We got to talking about our spares and he actually took his out and I tried to fit it in my compartment. If I take out the little plastic thingy in the bottom which seems useless it fits like a glove! So tomorrow Im off 4th gen spare tire hunting!! The bolt pattern should be the same...and his tires were the same size as mine, so the spare should work. Thanks for the ideas tho! Anymore feel free to add!

Justin

 

From what I've heard, some of the cars had a compact 'dount' spare instead of the 'space-saver' Not sure which ones.....S-10 and 4thGen should fit, tho..

I had to bust out the spare and the compressor when my week-old tires picked up a nail (yay for road-hazzard protection! ) It took about 15 minutes to get the tire all the way expanded and seated, but it works OK. Just not fun on a 90-degree day. The tire is a 195/70-R14, one of the biggest spares i've seen*, which is the same diameter as a 245/50-16, so you can use it on a posi rear axle, without worrying about burning up the clutches.

Folded right back up when I opened the valve, too.

As a side note: Maybe it's just a Hampton Roads thing, but I see an awful lot of people blasting along on the highway with those 50 mph donut spares on their cars. Makes me really nervous. Anyone else notice this, or is it just me? :lala:



*except full-size spares*

 

AAA card

dont leave home without it

 

Well, there IS one other alternative! Some Goodyear Run-flat EMT's! I got 'em on my 87 IROC, and I LOVE them. Also the car will run in the wet, which these cars are not good at. You just have to keep a REALLY close eye on your tire pressure, or get the monitoring system. ($$$ )

 

How much are run-flats going for these days? Ive got 245-50-R16s on my car now...I think thats what it was. GTA rims. Anyway I was thinking about run-flats, but everyone I suggest this to says geez you are gonna spend a fortune. Any idea on how much? I supposed I could look them up... Any one else running run flats?

 

Yeah, start looking on e-bay. If you buy 'em new they will cost about $1000. I found mine on e-bay for $300 for ALL FOUR, including shipping! I couldn't buy REGULAR tires for my car for that price! Be aware, run-flats are about twice the weight of regular tires, and they WILL harshen your ride quality. They are very VERY stiff. So if you are worried about weight/rotating mass, you dont want these. However, if you have a daily driver/trip car like mine, they are great.

 

Just for fun, I tried to fill my space saver with my 30 gallon compressor. Well it took the air and didn't leak at all, but it didn't expand correctly. I had it laying down on the floor and when I filled it, the tire expanded DOWN pushing the rim pretty far off the floor! So when you stood it up, the tread would be to the inside of the wheel well. I even tried standing on the rim while filling it and it lifted me a few inches off the ground. I'm thinking that it will never be able to support the weight of the car that way, and it will probably rub the frame if I actually had to use it.

 

slowTA... Dude, mine did the same thing!!! It wouldnt inflate right for anything. I tried standing on it, two people standing on it, weights, everything. Way too much for me to try to do on the side of the road somewhere...
Run flats are alittle out of my price range then... I think Im gonna stick to grabbing a 4th gen spare and using that. It will atleast get me to a gas station or something.

 

Ive had 2 camaro's both 91RS's one 3.1 one 5.0. Both came with a donut. I thought I heard somthing like if you have a posi rear they gave you the space saver because you would kill the posi using the smaller donut?

 

That's my understanding, as well. Hence, I have a space saver. It's pretty big once it's inflated

Oh, and BTW, if you read the instructions on the space-saver (like any one at Thirdgen.org reads instructions ) You will see that you are supposed to have the tire nounted on the hub, off the ground before you inflate it. I didn't read the instructions either, when I used mine, but I had it standing up, so it worked OK.

 

Even if my spare was standing up right, it wouldn't have inflated correctly. It started to inflate wrong, and from that moment on it was doomed.