Tire Rotation Done

mileage = 72392mi

I bought a cross-shaped lug wrench from Walmart for $8 and it worked much better than the tool that comes with the car. One of the lugs was still really hard to loosen, but with the lug wrench I did get all the lugs removed within 5 minutes. The next problem was that I struggled with the wheel for about an hour and I couldn't get it off. After kicking it, using silicone spray and trying to pry it off, I gave up. I even tried to remove the center cap on the wheel in case the allen key in the trunk was needed to remove anything. It turns out that there is nothing under the stock wheel's center cap. Having given up on getting the wheel off, I lowered the car off the jack stand and tightened up the lug nuts with the wrench. Then I sat down and started the engine. I felt the car lower a bit and thought something was wrong. After a visual check, I drove it around a little and noticed some uneven spinning of the tire and a slight noise. Something didn't seem right and I was convinced to go to Sears again to get the right socket for my torque wrench. After trying AdvanceAutoParts for a 21mm socket, I bought the Craftsman 12point 21mm 3/8" drive socket that I had returned for $8. I also bought an extension bar set for $11 made by Companion (p/n 30571) that includes a 3", 6" and 10" extension. It has dual positions, fixed and wobble (whatever that means). This is the same price that I paid at Home Depot for the 10" extension, so I'm going to return it since the Companion set already has a 10" extension. Using the 3" extension and the 21mm socket, I torqued all five lug nuts to 80 foot/lbs like the user's manual specifies. The strange tire spinning was now smooth and the problem solved. It's amazing how much easier tasks are with the right tools.

Now that the car was running fine, I took it to a tire center for the tire rotation. It cost me $9 to get the tires rotated and I watched the guy remove the wheel with ease using a right-hand palm strike to the lower right-hand portion of the tire. I felt retarded after he made it look so easy. After all the tires were off, the guy measured the rotors and showed me that the rear rotors were under the specified values, so they would need to be replaced. The front rotors were at the minimum specification and he said you need about 3/10 margin to cut or re-surface the rotors. In the end he recommended four new rotors and brake pad replacements (10% left in front and 30% left in the rear). He also recommended two new tires and a wheel alignment. The quote for all of this work was about $1200. I'm going to have to look into finding a cheaper way to get these done.

As far as the tire rotation goes, the tire center only does front to back and doesn't criss-cross them. On the driver's side the front tire was already in better shape than the rear tire, so that was left alone. The passenger's side, however, needed to be swapped. Using some kind of tread measurement tool, the results are now 6 for the left front, 7 for the right front, 5 for the right rear and 4 for the left rear. The guy at the shop told me that 5 and under is when they recommend new tires, so I'm probably going to have to look into rear tires now. The maintenance on this car is starting to stack up.