"Space saver" spare wheel.

[Franco Cozzo]

Just like to air my grievances with new cars these days, they seem to only have "space saver" spare wheels, which is quite annoying, not only does it look stupid, its limited to 80km/h which is a pain in the *** when you live around roads which are all 100/110km/h.

How much harder is it to make the wheel well a bit deeper like they did a few years ago, so you can fit in a full sized spare wheel, which is actually useful?

I punctured the front right tyre on my Focus two days ago, right through the sidewall, about 500m from home, so I just limped it home on the flat tyre and parked it in the driveway.

I've moved the rear tyre to the front, and put the space saver on the rear, but I'm not going to drive on it because I've got another few cars here, just chuck the wheel in the back of the Falcon and go down to the tyre shop.

80km/h is a big inconvenience to other road users, particularly on the rural highways where you're single lane for long distances.

A selling point with new KIA cars is they all come standard with a full sized spare wheel.