How to Change Your Own Tires!

Summary:

This instructable guide is to teach someone with zero automotive experience on how to change their own tires. This can also be applied to switching out your flat tire for a spare tire. We will go through step-by-step on how to safely remove your tires and replace them with new ones. It's not that difficult, and anyone can do it!

1. Tires

- Tires can be purchased at your local tire dealer.

2. Torque Wrench OR Lug Wrench

- Torque wrenches will give the appropriate torque for reapplying the lug nuts to secure your tire.

3. Sockets for Torque Wrench

- If you are using a torque wrench, you will need different sized sockets. Lug nut sizes vary depending on the vehicle.

4. Jack

- You can use either a scissor jack (usually found included in spare tire kits) or a floor jack.

NOTE: If you don’t know where to obtain your tools, I use AutoZone ( https://www.autozone.com ) as my one stop shop for all my auto part needs. They have a system where you can type in your vehicle information, and when you shop for parts, it’ll tell you if your vehicle is compatible with the searched parts.

Amazon is also a useful resource as well.

USEFUL LINKS:

Lug Wrench - https://www.autozone.com/shop-and-garage-tools/lug...

Torque Wrench - https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01M1D17AW/ref=p...

Wrench Sockets - https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B071JG4BNN/ref=p...

Scissor Jack - https://www.autozone.com/engine-and-vehicle-lift/j...

Floor Jack - https://www.autozone.com/engine-and-vehicle-lift/j...

IMPORTANT: When changing tires or replacing a flat tire with a spare, your vehicle should be resting on a flat level surface.

1) Loosen the lug nuts on your tire (counter-clockwise), but not all the way. Do this in a star pattern.

2) They may be difficult to loosen initially. This is usually the result of someone over torquing the lug nuts with an electric torque wrench.

3) Loosening up the lug nuts will help prevent the tire from spinning when the vehicle is lifted off the ground.

* In this image, I use the torque wrench to help me loosen the lug nuts with a 19mm socket. Size of lug nuts will vary from vehicle to vehicle. *

1) Once the lug nuts are loosened, take your jack and find the lift point on your vehicle. The lift point on my vehicle is circled in white in the image above. Refer to your vehicle's owner's manual to find the appropriate lift point on your vehicle.

2) DO NOT raise your vehicle from any other location. Other parts of the vehicle won't be able to withstand the weight and may potentially hurt you and damage your vehicle.

3) Place your jack underneath the lift point and raise the jack so that the lift point is rested in between the ridges of the head of the jack.

4) Once you find this point, start raising up your vehicle with the jack. The wheel should be at least 1/2 inch to 1 inch off the ground.

1) Once the vehicle is lifted and the wheel is off the ground, you can now remove the lug nuts from the tire.

2) Make sure you don’t lose these, otherwise you won't be able to get your tire back on!

3) Remove your tire and set that aside.

1) Next, lift and mount your new tire onto the threads of the wheel hub assembly making sure the threads go through the holes where the lug nuts came from.

2) If you find this difficult to do, some people find it to use their feet to help raise and stabilize the tire to get it back onto the hub assembly. Be sure to not accidently kick your jack when doing this!

* The image above to the left shows the wheel hub assembly with its five threads sticking out. *

1) Once you have your new tire on, you can now screw the lug nuts back on the threads and hand tighten them if you can. It doesn't matter which thread the lug nuts originally came from, they are all the same!

2) After that, SLOWLY lower your vehicle to the ground. You could cause damage to your vehicle if you lower it too fast.

1) Now that we have the lug nuts on, we need to tighten them to the appropriate torque. We are going to tighten them in a star pattern on the wheel.

2) Torque is just the amount of twisting force we need to apply to appropriately tighten the lug nuts. On my vehicle (2008 Honda CR-V), the lug nuts should be tightened at 80 lbf of torque. It may be different for your vehicle, so check your owners manual under tire or maintenance. In my case, I found it under "changing a flat tire." If you are like most people who have lost theirs, do a quick google search to find out how much torque your wheels require.

3) I use a torque wrench to apply the right amount of torque. The torque wrench has a handle that, when twisted to the right number, will give you the labeled amount of torque.

NOTE: If you are NOT using a torque wrench, tighten the lug nuts as much as you can. Better to be safe than sorry, because vibrations (when driving) can lead loose lug nuts to fall off.

You now know how to change your own tire! Do the same steps for the other three wheels if you are changing out your whole set. Otherwise, you are now done!