Compact Spare for Two Eco

Will a donut from Gen II or III work for 2016 Prius?

 

I was wondering why dynamite. Spellcheck run amok again.......

Many years ago I drove about 30 miles on a twisty road (California Highway 1 near Big Sur) in a TR4 with a case of dynamite (25 sticks?) in the trunk. I was helping with a blasting job and it took more dynamite than expected. I can't recall if we had blasting caps in the car as well, but I vividly remember the lecture about how dynamite is quite safe as long as you keep blasting caps separate from it, so if we had some they would have been in the front of the car.

I kept telling myself not to worry. It didn't help that the guy in the passenger seat, "Freddie the Blaster", stuttered badly.

 

Could someone please post a couple of high res pictures of the fasteners ?
Maybe a closeup of the business end ?

I've order my spare + plastic screw from ebay. My 4 is gonna get a spare.

 

Please post here after you install a spare on 4! Very interested to see how it goes. I am still debating 3 vs 4 because of the spare

 

The fasteners that hold the form tray do not need to be stripped.

They are a captive nut to the foam. When you put the foam in they will ratchet down.
To un-do pull gently on the foam, and unscrew the fastener.
You need to keep the up pressure while un-screwing, the slightest down pressure will allow the nut to ratchet down.



Merged

My ebay spare donut + retaining nut came in.

Spent some time installing the donut on the car to make sure it works. What a wempy jack.
The base surface of the jack looks to me to be 4 - 6 inches square total, good for hard pavement only.
Looks like I'm going to Wallyworld for a new scissor jack.

So, I pulled out the foam in my 4, and found the well.

Notice the sound padding on the well floor.

I measured the center of the tire to the hatch latch. Center of the tire to a "feature" on the right of the car.
This would allow me to find the center once the foam is replaced.

I replaced the foam, and then laid the tire on top.
The I centered the tire based on the measurements I made relative to the car.

Then I took my 8 inch buck knife and cut an outline around the tire.
The foam is way too tough to use a knife.
But, it left an outline that I could use a keyhole saw on

 

A view from top. I gave every thing a good shake, no squeaks or rattles.

Does it fit ? In this picture, all three corners of the square are on the original foam.

And for the other side.





Merged

TODO, get a real jack, and some plastic sheet and some expansion foam to fill the center of the spare.

 

excellent work.

 

I did the spare tire mod on my Prius 4T today. Worked the same as the two previous Prius 2 mods.

Pretty straight forward to remove the foam. The four white hold downs are just push on/off retainers. Not recommended for multi-use.


I did use sound damping pads.



Used a sheetrock hand saw to cut the foam to size. Took a little work but I did not have a power saw. Tire was a never run Gen 3 from Ebay. Hold down is a Toyota Gen 3 part.


Tools installed, the package in the center of the wheel is the Gen 4 compressor and tire sealant. Will probably remove that later. Also a couple of spare umbrellas


The spare tire came out a little higher that the surrounding foam, most likely caused by the sound deadening mats. It's very minor so I am not concerned about it at this point.

Took the car out on the freeway to test the sound deadening but found it very difficult to tell if it made the tire noise any less. No rattles when going over bumps.

 

Double up on the sound dampening outside the radii of the tire ? Or is that recommended ?

I'm asking, because I'm thinking of doing the same.

 

That might help but keep in mind that working the sound deadening mats under the side panels is very difficult. My wife also has a Gen 4T and when I do that one I may not put sound deadening under the tire.

 

Great job.

How did you confirm the 4T uses the same temporary tire size/spec as the 4?

 

There's virtually no reason it wouldn't.

 

Many thanks to l'mjp and dalea for posting Four (T) pics! As well as krousdb for starting this thread. It will help enormously those of us who want to follow. Overall what do you think - was it worth the effort? Did it change the noise level? Did it effect in any way cargo area? Any other considerations? I am still torn between 3T + HomeLink and 4 (4T) with the spare tire modification.

 

While doing some errands while working on this, I had a opportunity to drive around with everything removed from the cargo area.
I could no perceive any sound increase. While working with the black foam, I noticed that it could squeak very loudly if rubbed together or on bare metal. Toyota did a pretty good job of keeping it from squeaking.

The hardest part for me was locating the tire center on the foam.
It could have been easier if I had made a paper outline of the tire, and used that as a template.
The keyhole saw ripped through the foam. It would have been easier if there were someone to help hold it while I was cutting.
Cutting it made a big mess with foamdust.

I live in Massachusetts, I have family in Arkansas, and my wife and I go to Florida for a few weeks in the winter.
Plus I'm into road trips.

I'm not driving around without a spare.

 

Did you

Nice post, but, my 2012 pip has different lug arrangement than my 2005. Did you try it ?




Merged




Any body wants a free doughnut (spare) and in the Sacto area, contact me on line. Come and get it.

 

For support under the center portion of the tire, I'm trying foam. The spray kind that you can get from Home Depot.
I had some black foam chunks left from the parts I cut out.
So I set up the tire on a bucket, so that the nut would sit just as it would in the car.
Then I cut some sheet plastic to fit in the wheel, put in the black foam, and did some spray foam.



Then the foam started to expand, so I added some more plastic on top, some wood and some rocks to hold it down



When it dried, it looked awfull, but it was pretty ridged.




I think that I'll go pick me up some 1/4 inch plywood, and cut a circle out that would fit in the metal rim instead.

 

All that foam junk is just a space waster. I took mine out and replaced it with a piece of thin plywood. Now I have room for all my emergency stuff.

In ref. To a 2013 Prius C

 

I went to Wallyworld and got me a real jack. $24.00 Yaa Wallyworld !

It has a ground contact area many times that of the jack provided.

I was able to cut out a section in the foam next to the tire to hold the new jack.
I'm also gonna cut a spot for some plain old fix-a-flat, and get rid of the compressor.