How to Prepare a Car to Change the Tire

Series Summary

It's happened to almost all of us: a flat tire on the road. Regardless of where you are when it happens it is a terrible inconvenience and can be an awful experience. So when it does happen, do you know what to do? Do you know how to change a flat tire? This bit of knowledge is essential for drivers to know wherever they are driving. If you don't know how to change a flat tire, it is easy to learn with good instruction. If you would like to learn how to change a flat tire, you can learn for free from one of our experts.

In this free how-to video series, learn how to change a flat tire, from auto repair expert Christopher Fiffie. Christopher will show you how to locate your tire removal equipment, how to loosen lug nuts on your wheel, how to jack up your car, how to install the spare tire on your car, how to tighten lug nuts on your wheel when changing your tire, and how to lower your car on a jack.

Video Transcript

"Hello! My name is Christopher Fiffie and I have 20 plus years as an automotive mechanic. On behalf of Expert Village, we will be talking about how to change a flat tire. Turn off the engine and turn on the hazard lights. To help prevent the vehicle from moving, put the shift lever in P for park, shift the manual transmission to first or reverse. Set the parking brake firmly. We will be changing the tire on this vehicle today. One of the first things you will need to do is make sure that the car is on level ground to ensure that the car doesn't roll while you are trying to change the tire. You can get hurt very badly if the car were to fall off the jack and onto your body or onto someone that was assisting you. To ensure that the car doesn't roll, you can put a block at either front of the car furtherest away from the tire that you are changing which in this case would be the tire toward the front of the vehicle. After finding a level an safe location to change the tire on your vehicle, you might want to go ahead and retrieve the owner's handbook that can be located in the glove box. This will give you the correct procedures and also steps in safety guide lines in changing the tire of your vehicle. "