Smart Car Spare Tire Mount

[Old SGM]

If you use a Pure front wheel and go to your local wrecking yard and buy a 15 inch donut spare, it will lay flat on the floor behing the driver or passenger seat, even with the seat all the way back. The tail gate will close. I have made this info available before. Donut spare tires do not have much of a market, some wrecking yards sell these tires in like new condition for as little a $10.00. I did it, works for me.

[Dunerunner]

Any pics!! How did you find one with the right bolt pattern?

[Old SGM]

You buy a Pure Front steel wheel, demount the tire and throw away the wheel that it was mounted on, then mount the tire on the Smart Pure Steel Wheel. If I remember correctly the wheel was about $96, the donut tire and wheel was about $15 then it cost me $20 to get the donut tire mounted on the Smart wheel. I bought a package of 4 tire covers from Harbor Freight for around $10.

Here was my previous thread.
I did exactly that, I bought a front steel wheel from the dealer (Not cheap), then got a like new donut spare (T125/70D15) from the junk yard for $15.00, thew away the wheel and had the tire mounted and balanced. The tire fit the wheel perfectly. With the driver's seat all the way back, the spare lays flat on the floor behind the driver's seat and clears the tail gate. I also go a jack at the junk yard for $7.00 Works for me.

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Last edited by Old SGM; 10-17-2008 at 07:45 PM.

[S-P-D]

If it helps, I have owned and driven plenty of smarts since the original launch in October 1998 when the first came out. I have had 9 of them, and had one flat tyre which was on my own drive, so I just blew it up, and drove down to a tyre repairer - that is in over 10 years of motoring, and more than a quarter of a million miles.
I dont count myself particularly lucky, I know hundreds of smart owners through thesmartclub (based in UK) and nobody (much) even bothered to buy the overpriced smart puncture repair kit (£100+), they just bought the usual aerosol can for about £3, and most had never needed it, ever.
Spare wheel is a mentality. This is a city car, and around town punctures dont occur much, if ever in my experience.

[emanwensor]

that was disturbing

[emanwensor]

yo dawg that was disturbing

[JOHNSTEICHEN]

I keep my spare inside the trunk. I only remove it when I know I will need the cargo space. I have a nice cover over it, and the only problem is that the tire tends to slide around when I corner hard.

[chieftmc]

I keep my spare in my pocket .................cell phone and the "come and get it" number

[imp66ss]

I came up with a design and had a salesman develp a solid modeling file for a segmented spare wheel. I asked a machine shop owner I know how much it would be to fab it, he said $500. No way I'm paying that much.
The design is a wheel, no tire, in two segments that you slide together with a dove tailed slot across the middle. The lug nuts will hold them in place. You can also vulcanize a rubber strip to it for traction if you want. It will store under the seat and be limited to 25 mph and 25 miles. Just enough to get you to a place for a tire replacement in case of a blow-out.
If there is anyone that can assist in fabrication of this - even for an acceptable sum, please let me know.
The way I see it we could have about 40k to produce and sell, just in this country, if it works OK.
My email address is: imp66ss at yahoo dot com.
(This was the only way I could get past the Thread Police.)

[John_H]

Are we even up to 40k smarts on the road yet? Do you think near 100% market penetration is reasonable or are the targets more like 5%? If so, what kind of timeframe are you considering?

And I'm a little unclear what the tire would be made of. Wood? Worked fine for the early cars. Metal? Plastic?

The 25mph limit (while perhaps reasoable in itself) would reduce market penetration. I don't know that local tire stores stock the smart tire sizes and my Smart Center is an hour drive at 25mph, typically on highways.

Nice idea in theory - collapsible spare - but can it translate to practice? I know of no other similar offering and wonder about the liability issues for a marketed product.