<VV> Re: 5th degree over new tires

[Alan and Clare Wesson]

Mike wrote:

>A couple of months ago, I hit a curb with my Cavalier.  Bought a tire at
> Sam's, paid for installation, put the tire in my trunk.  Bought a wheel
> (bent it) at a junkyard, went back to Sam's, they installed w/no 
> questions.

Trouble is, I suspect that the point of the original Costco email was that 
although there might be places where you can get that done at the moment, 
the rise of political correctness and frivolous legislation means that you 
probably won't be able to do so for much longer - rampant Naderism. All the 
others will see the lead taken by Costco et al and think 'I had better do 
this as well, because if the Big Boys are doing it people might take 
advantage of the fact that I am not, and sue the ass off me.

At the moment, here, you can take any tyre (sic) to any supplier, and they 
will almost always fit it for you for a small fee and after checking it is 
sound. I had some used ones fitted on rims I had just painted last week, and 
I didn't even have to sign a disclaimer. But what worries me is: how many 
lawsuits it will take before little tyre guys like mine take heed and stop 
doing that?

I think the best course of action is probably to buy a set of tyre levers 
(an interesting pair of words, that - one of them is spelt differently in 
American English and the other is pronounced differently, but the one that 
is spelt differently is pronounced the same and vice versa!) and learn to 
fit them yourself.

Since I have been running the Lotus business I have had the services of the 
most brilliant ex-racing mechanic, and he sets up the cars for me now (we 
have a set of alignment gauges, but these are available very cheaply now and 
anyway you can use bits of string etc. if you prefer).

Anyway, this is literally the first time in my life when I have ever had my 
cars set up properly. I have spent literally thousands having my wheels 
'aligned' in the past, with the almost invariable result that the tyres wore 
unevenly, wheels were out of true right from the start, etc. And it really 
p*sses me off, because I am nerdy about things like that, and I HATE to see 
my tyres wearing unevenly - it was in part responsible for the roll-over 
accident we had last year, because I had had the car aligned and they hadn't 
done it properly, so the tyre wore unevenly, and although that isn't what 
made it blow, it might have contributed.

The reason was made clear to me not long ago by a friend of mine who used to 
work in an alignment shop (he worked in the biggest chain in Britain, as far 
as I know). He replied that the reason alignment was so unsatisfactory was 
because no-one ever did it. He said that if the customer went away they were 
instructed just to do nothing, but that if the customer hung around watching 
they used to bang around under the car, do various things (even undo the odd 
bolt if necessary), and then pronounce it aligned.

I asked him how he got away with this, and said that I thought they would 
have just been sued by customers who had crashes because their wheels were 
out of alignment, etc., and he pointed out to me that there is always a 
disclaimer on the check that says the alignment isn't guaranteed once the 
car leaves the shop, because they can blame wear in the suspension of the 
car, say that it was caused by your bad driving, the state of the roads, 
curbs, etc., which mean that the wheels can easily get curbed and go out 
again. His shop used to give a weeks' guarantee if anyone came back and 
complained, but hardly anyone ever did - and when they did he just used to 
go under the car and bang around a bit again. Almost no-one ever came back 
more than twice (although ( have myself), but if they did a third visit was 
always enough to make them give up (which is exactly what I did - just how 
many times *can* you keep going back?).

So despite the fact that arguably the most dangerous thing you can do with 
tyres is to mis-align them, that's the thing that is usually done the most 
badly, and the thing that is the hardest to regulate or improve.

What a joke! I am really glad that I have Mick working with me...

Cheers

Alan