Tires: Tire rotation/jacking problem, 2005 kia spectra, kia spectra

Question
Hi – my girlfriend has a 2005 Kia Spectra which sorely needs a tire rotation. The local service station quoted her $65 to do so. I think the fee is rather pricey and that I can do it myself. My problem is placement of the jack. I have a ½ ton floor jack from Sears but worry that if I place the jack underneath the car at the mid-way point between the front and rear doors the “little round disc” (the top of the jack which will contact the car) will puncture the floorboards. Possibly a block of wood will eliminate this problem?
Rather than find out through trial & error – which could be rather costly – I pose my question here first.
Thanking you in advance.
Jonathan

Answer
Jonathan,

First, check the owners manual for the jacking points on the car.  I'll bet you can't lift the entire side of the car in one lift - at least not without causing other problems.

Second, I'm not a big fan of these ½ ton jacks.  I have 2 of them and one's sort of broke and the other one isn't stable enough for my tastes.  

Here's a couple of suggestions:

Buy a jack stand.  While you are at it, buy 2 - or better yet buy 4!  I have 4 that I bought 2 at a time and I wished they matched!  Use a jack stand to support the one corner while you do the others.  That way you can do a modified X rotation pattern.

Buy a 2 ton jack. Those have large platforms - and I've carved a piece of wood to fit inside.  Like you, I think the wood thing is a good idea, but I would not use the wood in places where they do not suggest jacking.

If you haven't done this before, some shops seem to overtorque all the lug nuts, making them extremely difficult to remove if you don't have an impact wrench.

So if getting a 600 ft pound air driven impact wrench is not in the works, get a breaker bar with a properly sized 6 point socket. Sears sells an 18" breaker bar and even then I sometimes have to use a pipe on the end of the bar to break some nuts loose - which is pretty much why I always use the impact wrench.

Patience is a virtue.  Before I even attempted this, I would see if I could get all the lug nuts loose.  It's easy enough to tighten them up, but if you can't get them all loose, there's no point in even starting.

Get yourself a torque wrench.  Lug nuts should be properly torqued and once done correctly, the next guy will have no problems getting them loose.  DO NOT use the torque wrench as a breaker bar.  It ruins the calibration.


Good Luck