Question #1 - Last night my stupid a$$ went to jack up my car to replace the rims and I accidentally placed the jack under a plastic cover/housing in front of the the right rear wheel. As I jacked up the car the housing cracked. I immediately lowered the car and looked at the damage, boy was I pissed. Anyway, I need one of these black plastic covers and would also like to know what it is for. If someone can please help me with this I would appreciate it. Who can I contact for a fair price ??

Question #2 - After I put new 17" oem rims with bridgestone potenza tires I drove the car and noticed I could feel something in the brake pedal as I slow down. The brakes are all brand new and I did not feel this with my 16" rims and Good Year tires. Is this normal or is there a problem ? Also, do the rims specifically go on specific locations on car or did can you just put them on in any location. I do not remember seeing any markings on the rims or tires indicating what locations they were to go ??

Any Help will be greatly appreciated !!!!! Thanks

 

Not sure about Q#1.

Q#2 - you may want to have the 17's balanced and have an alignment done.

 

Rims can be placed on any location. They are not directional, but the high performance tires generally are. If the feeling in the brake pedal was soon after you started to drive it's probably that the tires are flat-spotted from sitting still. As they warm up they will smooth out. High performance tires tend to do this more than stock 16 inchers will.

If you were driving the car long enough for the tires to smooth out and you still get a vibration in the brake pedal your installer probably tightened the lug nuts improperly (around the circle rather than using a star pattern) and your brake disks are being pulled unevenly. Get this fixed asap before your disks take a permanent warp and you have to replace them.

 

The tires are being replaced with all season Bridgestone Turanza's. The Potenza RE030's are crap and I cannot believe I even tried to use them in the snow the other day. I almost ended the life of GS several times. I learned from that experience the hard way. I installed the rims and tires myself and did not have an impact to tighten the lugs. Next week I will have the new tires mounted and installed by a professional since I had no idea the lugs needed to be tightened in any special way. I put the stock 16's back on with the crappy all season GoodYear Invicta's for now. They are better than the RE030's . Thanks for the information.

 

For a 5-lug pattern as we have with the GS you use a star pattern to tighten the lugs.

With the tire on the car lower the car on the jack so the tire barely touches the ground or have someone hold the brake pedal down to keep it from turning.

Picture the lugs with one on top and the other 4 below it so the top lug is the top of the star. #2 is the bottom left, 3 is the top right, 4 is the top left and 5 is the bottom right. (I tried to do a diagram, but failed miserably, so I'm explaining their position as best I can).

First tighten all five lugs following the number order starting with 1 until you finish 5. Tighten until the lug nuts stop turning without much resistance. This will center them in the rim hole with equal pressure on the brake disk from all 5 lugs.

After doing number 5 go back and start at 1 again, this time tighten until it won't turn any more against firm pressure. Don't overtighten - so don't jump on the lug wrench to REALLY tighten them. Just push with firm pressure until they don't want to turn anymore (There's actually a recommended torque amount for the lugs, but I don't know what it is.) Continue with the other 4.

You're done !! Go have a beer.

 

Thanks for the information. I hope the place that mounts the rims this week does this. I will make sure I ask them.