PLease Help... This is really weird 2003 Explorer

[kbasham]

I came out this morning and had a flat on my 2003 Explorer. I got out the jack and the spare tire and removed the flat and replaced it with the spare............... Now the weird part. After putting on the spare I decided I would go for a test drive to see how it drove with the spare. After reaching around 15 mph, there is a real heavy jerking coming from the rearend. Feels like it is coming from the side the flat was on. After I slow down to about 10mph is will stop. I took it out of drive to see if it would do it in neutral and it still does. Does anyone have any idea what it could be. The original tire was 235/70/16 and the spare is 215/60/16. Would that make any difference????? Please help

 

[speedracer0626]

I lived in Ky for a little while, i'm in Indiana now. Anywhoo if I remember correctly you have a limited slip and yes the tire size difference can cause thet jerking which in turn can burn your limited slip. Allright X pros chime in and correct me if I am wrong. I didnt know that little of a difference would make a difference.

 

[IZwack]

If this is a 4wd vehicle, then you need to get the original tire back on (get the hole plugged and aired up) because I think the 4wd might be kicking in.

 

[Davex]

You have to go with the most obvious thing first, and assume it's the spare tire. Repair or replace the flat tire and then see what happens.

 

[EasyRhino]

It's your tire mismatch, do not drive it with mismatched tires - that causes your traction control/limited slip to get confused and do weird things that you are feeling.

Your original (flat) at 235/70 has a 165mm sidewall, whereas your spare at 215/60 has a 130mm sidewall, in other words, your spare is much smaller than your tire on the non-flat side. Bad.

If you are going to run larger tires, make sure that your spare matches, or it is useless. Your owner's manaul speaks to this as well.

 

[FordLover]

You have the wrong spare tire. All later year explorers have full size spare tires, to avoid what your talking about. Don't drive it like that, and get the correct spare tire. Ford never provided a P215 sized tire on the explorer, as a spare or otherwise.