I suppose, if you are doing mostly local trips, then you might take a chance on doing away with a spare and relying on a can of gunge. However I can strongly recommend that you fully investigate how to use it. The pre-pressurized cans are easy but the bottle of goo which screws to an electric inflation pump can be a little more difficult to use and you don't want to be messing about learning about it in the dark and rain on a lonely road or worse still a very busy main road.
Talking about main roads/dual carriageways/motorways. You really don't want to be trying to do something with a punctured wheel anywhere near fast moving traffic. Much better to slowly drive the vehicle into a side road, layby, or other safe place. Then carry out remedial action. Of course by doing this you risk the tyre being ruined beyond repair or coming off the rim. If you have a spare this isn't a problem though. So, for me, it's very important I can carry a spare.
It was one of the things on my list when I was recently looking for a replacement for our Ibiza (Twinkle) and, although not the only reason, it was one of the, less important, reasons I ended up buying a Skoda Scala. The Scala has a full size spare but it's the wheel and tyre from the basic "S" trim version - which I don't think is available here in the UK. The wheel is a 16" steel with a 195/65R16 tyre - this is a "normal" tyre, not one of the typical "skinny" space savers but because it's not the same size as the standard 205/55R16 on my car it is subject to the same 50 mph restriction as a "skinny" space saver. However, because this is a standard 195/65R16 it has a normal tread with a depth of around 7mm - not the almost "bald" tread you commonly get on a space saver so it would be possible to complete even quite long journeys on it, albeit at reduced speed.
when I was looking the car over in the showroom I measured the spare diameter and the road wheel and they were very very close so I knew the wheel well would be large enough to accommodate the diameter of a standard road wheel. What I didn't know for sure was whether the slightly wider 205 section tyre would tuck under the plastic trim at the rear of the wheel well. So, today, I decide to check it out. I took the N/S/F alloy wheel off, removed the steel spare from the wheel well and dropped the alloy into the wheel well:
You can see how it has to tuck under the trim piece to the left of the image - this is actually the rear of the vehicle, the picture is on it's side - There's actually only about 2mm clearance between the bottom of the plastic trim and the tyre sidewall but it fits and the boot floor, which rests on the lip which is just above the tyre, drops back into place perfectly. Yippee!
Here's the two tyres side by side with my long spirit level over the top of them:
Lovely sunny day today as you can see. The full size alloy is on the left and the steel spare on the right, there's 10mm between them - ie, the 205 is, unsurprisingly, 10mm wider than the 195 with both tyres fitted to their respective rims and inflated to normal pressure. My car is an SE spec (SE Technology actually) with the 16 inch rims although, being the "Technology" version the wheel style is an upgrade on the standard SE rim - still 16" with 205/55R 16 tyres though. I didn't know this version had this upgrade and I rather like the wheels on the technology version compare to the rather more plain, in my view, wheels on the standard SE. What do you think:
I was also mildly surprised to find it on Good Year tyres. Most of the new/newish Skodas I've seen seem to be on Continental. I got in a right nasty old mess doing this because the sidewall of the alloy was still covered in tyre dressing from the pre sale valeting!
I took some more pictures today and I'm going to do an "introducing Bluey" post soon - Granddaughter has decided it's to be called Bluey, funnily enough it's blue, energy blue to be exact!
