Re: 2014 Fiat Linea T-Jet: Initial Ownership Experience Nightmare of an experience, while traveling at night in Kerala:
I would like to share an extremely bad experience I had, while traveling last week, with the hope that it may benefit others.
I had planned the trip the following way: Pondy - Coimbatore - Aluva - Kottayam - Kumily - Dindigul - Trichy - Pondy, starting from Pondy on 17th July (by noon), reaching Aluva by late night and stay there, proceed to Kottayam the next day (Saturday) and return back to Pondy on Sunday.
I left from Pondy by 1:30pm on Friday, driving my Linea T Jet, with my wife along with me. The initial part of the trip was uneventful and we reached Coimbatore by about 7:15pm. I filled by fuel tank immediately after leaving Coimbatore and stopped for Dinner near Palakkad.
It was raining almost continuously since we entered Kerala. By about 9pm, I had crossed Vadakkencherry and was hoping to reach Aluva by 11:30pm or so.
Around 9:15pm, we were at a place called 'Chuvannamannu', driving at a speed of about 70-80km/hour (it was dark and it was drizzling). We were going down a gentle descent, a bug vehicle came in the opposite direction and I moved slightly to the left, but never went out of the road on to the gravel / mud. The car seemed to have entered a large pot hole near the edge of the road (not visible readily in the dark). I did not notice any sound, but immediately after falling into the pot hole, I realized that there was something wrong and the vehicle began deviating to the left significantly. Simultaneously I could make out the sound of metal hitting the road. I stopped the car after moving out of the road to the left side, got out and checked - the front tire was flat!!
This itself was shocking to me, because the tire (and car) was just 9 months old and we run only 13000kms. The T Jet came with Good Year NCT tires (205/55/R16). I was of the impression that those tubeless ones do not burst just like that.
It was 9:15 in the night, it was raining and there were no souls to be seen, other than passing vehicles! I had never changed my car tires myself and I knew that it was going to be tough for me to do it, all alone, on a rainy night.
I looked around and saw light coming from a building about 200 meters ahead on the opposite side and decided to go and explore.
It was a small hotel run by a family. The owner (Mr. Biju) readily agreed to help. The hotel was already closed and there were no customers. Mr. Biju and one of his staff took out the jack of their Mahindra utility vehicle (Maximo Mini van) and accompanied me to the car. I proceeded to the rear, opened the boot to take out the spare tire, while Mr. Biju went around checking out the flat tire. He immediately called out to me and I went to the left side of the car and he pointed out to me - it was not only the front tire, the rear tire too was flat!! I couldn't believe my eyes, but then, there it was!
Now I was in real trouble, because there is only one spare tire! And there was no chance of buying a new tire at 9:30 in the night in the middle of nowhere!
Myself and my wife accompanied Mr. Biju to his hotel. He rang up one of this friends who runs a tire / puncture repair shop for buses / trucks and lives nearby and promised to come and try to help out. The plan was that one tire can be replaced with the spare one, and for the second tire, a tube can be placed inside the tire so that I can make it to Alva / KTYM.
The person came over in about 20 minutes' time. We replaced the front wheel with the spare wheel.
The rear wheel was taken out and we went to the person's shop about a couple of kilometers away in Mr. Biju's van. After the tire was taken out of the rim, we found two large tears on the side wall of the tire - beyond any repair. Unfortunately he did not have any spare tubes suiting 16 inch wheels.
We set out in search of tire / repair shops to try to buy a tube. After travelling about 12kms and passing a couple of closed tire repair shops on the way, we found a shop which was open (it was already about 10:30 -11:00pm). The shop was 'open' because they were slaughtering cattle for the next day (Ramzan) in the shop! Anyway, they had stock of a suitable tube and we bought it and returned. An attempt was made to repair the torn tire by sealing the torn area (from inside) with the material usually used to seal punctured tubes. He also placed a couple of cut pieces of tubes inside for 'support'. Then the new tube was placed inside the tire.
Then the tire was inflated - it was holding the pressure!
We returned to the car to replace the rear tire, but had to wait for about 20 minutes because of heavy rain.
Finally the rear tire was also changed. We were ready to restart our journey by about 12:30am.
Mr. Biju refused to take any money from me, but I paid the other person for his work and also paid him some extra bucks. I took the contact details of Mr. Biju, profusely thanked him and gave him my contact details in Pondy, requesting him to contact him in case he need any help.
Once I started driving I noticed, as expected, that there was wobbling of the left front wheel (in the absence of wheel alignment and a different size tire). I drove at 45 - 50km/hr till I reached my cousin's place at Aluva by about 2:00am.
I decided to get a pair of new tires the same day, once the shops open, because the next day was Sunday and I also had to drive back to Pondy on Sunday - was just impossible with the current tires.
We went to a Bridgestone tire showroom (Tyre clinic, Pulinchode, Aluva) known to my cousin and inquired about availability of tires of the required specs - they had stock.
I was always keen to get Michelin tires, even when I took delivery of the new car, but I was told that Fiat provides only Apollo or Goodyear tires, I didn't bother to change them at that point of time - thought this to be an opportunity.
I insisted on Michelin Primacy 3ST tires, which they had stock in their godown. It cost about Rs 400 extra compared to Bridgestone (Rs 10000/tire for the Michelin ones, Rs 9600/tire for Bridgestone). I decided to go for Michelin.
Also did wheel alignment and balancing - total expense for the tire replacement etc: Rs 21140/-
I drove to Kottayam Saturday afternoon and back to Pondy on Sunday - the trip was uneventful otherwise.
Looking back, I am not sure whether to thank my stars or to be upset.
If this had happened when I was driving faster (average speed 110km/hr on TN highways), it is possible that something worse could have resulted. If this had happened in an isolated stretch of highway in TN / more desolate place, I would have been in real trouble trying to get some help.
How often has this happened to others?
Anyone have had similar experience in the same stretch of road?
Can anything be done to protect from such 'disastrous' events?
(Mods: If this post is not relevant in this thread, please feel free to move to another thread - or please let me know where it will be appropriate. Thanks!)
Last edited by Eddy : 21st July 2015 at 08:46.
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