Big Car Club - MPV and SUV Forums

Has anyone stripped a spare wheel carrier and mended it .the cable on mine does not rewind .I taken have the item off from under car and am now staring at it . How does it dissemble?, as it looks like its riveted together!
Any ideas ? Cheers Mike

Stripped: Yes
Mended: No
It is rivetted together. There is a nylon work and pinion system inside and if it's wound up too hard the pinion gear wheel splits or breaks a tooth.
Try and get a MKI mechanism off ebay, it's all metal and uses exactly the same mounting holes. The wind up bolt even lines up with the hole for the MKII uses. Make sure you de-rust and hammerite/lubricate it well before you fit it.

I have repaired two of mine. In both cases the cable had kinked and wouldn't rewind.  I drilled out the rivets replaced the cable ( ordinary Bowden from a motorcycle) plenty of grease and then used bolts to replace the rivets. Still working fine after 6 and 7 years.  However, if you can find a second hand one in good nick that's so much easier!.

Just an idea... But I decided to get rid of the thing altogether and secured the spare wheel with a long bolt. The left hand bolt hole for the winding box lines up pretty good with the centre of the spare so I drilled this out and put a long bolt through. I welded the bolt head to the boot floor ( discontent the neg from battery first!) so the nut could be more easily tightened/undone from underneath. I lashed grease onto the threads before tightening the nut and considered putting some kind of bàg over the threads to prevent corrosion. I also put a ratchèt strap under the wheel just in case the nut should loosen, but one could also drill a hole through the bolt and put in a split pin.

I understand others have taken the cable out of the MK2 mechanism and fitted a coach bolt through instead to achieve the same effect.

Thanks for all suggestions ( apologies been away ) Cheers Mike