Changing a flat tyre
By H. Kishie Singh

THIS is a tale of ingenuity, cell phones, internet and how to loosen a jammed wheel nut. It could only happen to Vijay Parmar, who runs a work shop cum service garage and is a man of ideas.

He’s been chatting to a lady in Turkey who runs an art studio. They met accidentally on the Net.

One day Vijay gets a call on his cell phone from the lady in Turkey. She’s on the highway to a sea-side resort and gets a puncture.She has everything necessary to change wheels but cannot loosen the nut holding the punctured tyre, try as she might. The wheel brace, usually supplied by the car manufacturer, is L-shaped and not very effective.

So she calls Vijay on his cell phone. "What should I do? Lamented the lady. "It’s a lonely highway and it’s getting dark!" Swiftly Vijay leapt out of bed and put on his thinking cap and it was a brilliant idea that he had. "Move the car so as to bring the jammed wheel nut at about 8 o’clock", instructed Vijay over the air waves. "Now put the wheel brace over the nut at an angle where it touches the ground. Jam the wheel brace into the ground."

"Now get back into the car, start and reverse just a fraction, only millimetres." It worked! The power of the engine, applied to the wheel brace forced the nut loose!

A very exasperated lady on a Turkish highway was happily on her way. Ingenuity, cell phone, the Internet helped to change a wheel in Turkey.

The moral of this story is that there is never a problem that can’t be resolved. Think. An easier way to help loosen a hard nut (nut you know what it really means!) would be to have a G.I. pipe to fit over the longer leg of the L-shaped wheel brace. This way you can exert more leverage on the wheel brace. It usually works. If not the Vijay Parmar method would surely work.

Keep thinking and happy motoring!

This feature was published on October 16, 1999