alternate spare tire

Have a 96 taurus wagon with second rotted spare tire t135/70r15 (original tire plus one from junkyard). Looking for a new spare but can't find one. Is there a substitute tire that will fit in the side well of a wagon? Maybe a spacesaver with size that's more readily available in new tire market.

I have the 1998 Taurus wagon and a new spare tire T135/70R15 is no longer available from Ford. The one I had blew up and had never been used. You will have to get this tire from a junkyard.

Strange to hear that someone else had their spare blow up too. I have a 1996 GL wagon and the spare had never been used when it blew. One day I went out to go somewhere and I noticed the side cover for the spare tire compartment was loose. Whe I opened it to investigate there was a HUGE (5 inch diameter) hole blown in the tire. It looked like someone put a M-80 in between the rim and tire and lit it. Very strange for an original equipment, unused, 12 year old spare.
I already had another spare with the same size tire that I got from a parts car. So far it's holding up fine.

Whoa! Never heard of such a thing, but I guess it makes some sense. If you own a car long enough your unused spare can apparently dry rot and become unusable. Maybe you were lucky in the sense that the tire let go when it WASN'T on the car!

Can't believe it! It's happened to me too!

Noticed my rear tire was getting kind of low tonight, but instead of just inflating it I decided to pull the wheel thinking there was a nail or screw in it. Turned out not only was the tread separating on the inside edge of the tire (similar to what happened to the front tires 3 months ago - after which I got an alignment), but my donut spare was useless as well because - you guessed it - it had exploded inside its storage compartment!

So now I have one more tire on this car that will probably suffer the same fate as the other three (fairly soon) - separated tread on the inside edge - and I've got no donut spare. Getting one at the junkyard doesn't seem to make a lot of sense to me because I wouldn't trust it. Any other ideas? Ford MUST have some kind of replacement ... they're still making donut spares for all their current cars, aren't they???

If you get a spare tire T135/70R15 from a Taurus sedan, it may not be so badly damaged as those in the wagons. In the wagon, the spare tire compartment may get more direct sunlight in the summer, which would result in a tire pressure much higher than 60psi.
So, if there were less pressure in the spare tire, then it might not blow up in the summer heat. Just have a tire pump in the car to reinflate the spare to 60psi when it is needed.

I contacted the local Ford dealer here, and sure enough - no listing for a replacement tire. When I asked what they were putting in new cars the guy replied, "no tire - just a compressor (which will be useless if the tire is damaged)". But then he said he knew of one new-car customer who demanded a mini-spare tire and one was (presumably) obtained, but he didn't know from where. He told me to get back to him with ALL the numbers off the side of the tire and he'd see if he could get me a replacement from "American" (I think is what he said).

Next thing I tried was contacting Uniroyal - the manufacturer of my "donut". No help there either - they said they no longer made mini-spare tires. They told me to call Ford at their 1-800 customer service number, so I did.

Ford was no help either. All they did was refer me to their "vintage parts division". This "division" sold no tires whatsoever, so that was a waste of time.

I DID find a brand new 175/80R15 tire on a website called tireseasy.com. I think this works out to be about an inch bigger in diameter than the original factory donut, so it would probably fit in the storage compartment. But it would cost about $90+ delivered. Probably not worth it.

Looks like I'm headed to the junkyard. There are a bunch of these things at every junkyard here and one guy said he'd sell me the donut with the jack for $30. We'll see...

There was once a time when the spare tire was a real tire and the tire compartment was made for a real tire, not an undersized temporary spare tire.

Yeah, but that was a LONG time ago. You're probably talking close to 30 years ago now! I remember when the switch was made to the mini-spare and people really hated it. But in retrospect, I think it was the right thing to do. You really don't need to be lugging around a full-sized spare most of the time. One thing I wish the manufacturers WOULD do, however, is provide a big enough well to hold a full-sized spare IF you wanted to do this. This way, you could carry the mini-spare around most of the time for local travel, but still be able to carry the full-sized spare on the longer trips.

Picked up my replacement junkyard mini-spare. Looks pretty good. Same Uniroyal tire. Also got another Ford scissor jack with it. Paid $25 for both. I think I'm going to let some air out of the tire and store it at a lower pressure - probably around 30 psi. Maybe that'll help to prevent it from exploding again.

Hold on - the spare they sold me is actually a 16" wheel (instead of the factory 15" size)! I missed that! I saw the T135/80 on the sidewall at the junkyard, but didn't notice the 16 instead of 15. I assume this wheel came out of a sedan instead of a wagon??? They told me they pulled it from a wagon. Shame on me for not catching this...

Anyway, here's the deal: the 16" mini-spare won't fit into the fender compartment cleanly. You CAN force the plastic panel back into place, but it's not a good idea. The rivets end up under a lot of stress (meaning they'll probably break on you), and it's just looks bad because the panel pulls away from the window quite a bit.

This oversized mini-spare WILL fit in the floor storage compartment, however(under the the 3rd row seat, if you have that). I presume this is where it is stored in the sedan version of this car. The drawback to storing it here on the wagon is you give up this (lockable) space for storage of other things, AND your third row seat is no longer usable because this storage well serves as legroom for the child using the seat. On the other hand, I always thought using the third row seat was a bad idea anyway. In a rear-end collision, the child is defenseless while sitting directly above the gas tank...

There seems to be a problem with certain junkyards having a no return policy.
Does the T135/80R16 spare tire steel wheel fit on to the hub?
Also, you don't want to buy a temporary spare tire that has worn tread or any other defects.
The real problem with the temporary spare tire is that they are so unsafe, that they blow up being stored. There are those that have no money for a new tire, so they just keep driving on these temporary spare tires.
Perhaps, the tire companies stopped making these tires to avoid legal problems resulting from the misuse of the temporary spare tire.

Looks like it'll fit on the hub. I was going to try it to make sure, but instead just measured the center hole and the distance between the stud holes - everything matched up OK.

As far as the tread, it definitely looks different than my original mini-spare. Mine has a more squareish-looking tread face with a wide channel down the middle and well-defined tread grooves elsewhere. This replacement has a more dome-shaped tread surface with less-defined grooves on the edges. It looks like it might've been used, but it couldn't have been very much - the Ford sticker is still on the hub, and there are still rubber tire "hairs" (for lack of a better term) on it.

It came with a pressure of 20psi and I left it that way, figuring it might last longer at the lower storage pressure.

I think I'm going to call back, though, and see if they have the 15" replacement. I'd really rather have the right tire inside the fender compartment. Right now all I have in there is the jack and some packing materials. Plus I added my 4-way lug wrench to stablize the (straight) factory lug wrench which was shifting back and forth on its hangers without the tire bolted against it...

Tire rack (888-541-1777) has them for $133. Ouch. I'll check my local junkyards first. What years will fit the '97 wagon?

Are you asking what year wheels will fit the '97 wagon, or what years used the same tire sizes? At a minimum, 1996-1999 should all be the same bolt pattern, back spacing, etc. I'm not sure of other years or vehicle models that would be the same. I think I tried my wife's LS wheels on my 1998 Taurus SHO when we still had those cars, but I don't recall for certain.

-Rod

The temporary spare [T135/70R15] in our 1999 Taurus four door sedan recently blew a large hole in itself while in the trunk. It had never been on the road.

Since I could find no ready source for a replacement temporary tire, I examined the options.

A salvage yard would sell another temporary spare for $45, but that may exhibit the same failure as my useless spare if it were inflated to the recommended 65 PSI.

The tire dealer would/could not install a conventional tire on the temporary spare wheel. Neither could I find a wheel and tire combination that would fit the car hubs and fit the spare tire well beneath the trunk floor without elevating the well cover above its original position.

I wound up purchasing a used steel wheel from a salvage yard, having it checked for straightness by the tire dealer, and installing the least expensive full-size [P205/65R15] tire I could buy onto it. Cost was about $145 all told, though some shopping for a used wheel and a used tire would have yielded a lower overall cost. A new steel wheel is available from Advance Auto Parts as part number 22701765, $79.90 (Keystone Crash Parts STL03177U45).

This combination fits the well in the trunk, but raises the well cover by about two inches. It is not very noticeable, however. The full-size wheel and tire provides a more reliable spare should it be needed.

This solution does not work for the station wagon spare tire location, since the spare tire cover will not fit if a full-size wheel and tire are stowed.

Doesn't sound like anyone here uses the spare.
Why not take a tip from G.M ? In most of their new vehicles you'll get a can of fix a flat and instructions.