Hi,
stupid question I know.. we bought the Sharan with the spare in the boot. the ratchet system appears to work and goes up and down, but how far should it come down? I would say its coming to a few inches below the bumper (visible from the back) but how do I get the wheel on it? which way up does it goes? outer wheel face up or down? do I just lift it up and feed the ratchet through the centre of the wheel..
Silly question I know!!
The cable should drop far enough out of the mechanism body for the plastic retainer 'cap' at the end to be able to touch the floor, then the centre 'arm' of said cap can be slid off of the 'spindle' that it locates on and fed through the wheel centre so the wheel can be removed/ fitted. I've always installed the wheel with it's outside facing down (this allows you to access the valve cap easily and check the tyre pressure when installed), though it can be fitted the other way round, though you'll have to wind the mechanism further this way to drop it to ground level or raise it back up again. If your mechanism isn't allowing you to drop the wheel fully onto the ground then unfortunately it sounds like it's not working properly.
The most important thing to remember is to not let the wheel spin/rotate whilst lifting it up or down. Its that twisting motion that causes most of the failures!
The cable is normally long enough to touch the ground and as said outside facing down.
When winding down without the wheel you will need to keep a constant pull on the cable, it may have got twisted so you may need to get right underneath while someone operates the winder for you.
When raising the wheel to the top do not overtighten.
It has to be fitted with the outside facing down or it won't wind up as the mechanism fits inside the wheel when it's up.
As stated once it's at the top DON'T overtighten (just do it enough so it can't slide around against the bottom of the boot) as it has a plastic/nylon work and pinion inside and overtightening will split the pinion.
Unfortunately you may find that the reason it's in the boot is because someone has already overtightened it and broken the mechanism. Symptom is it jumps when you try to wind up with the wheel on, or gets to the top and drops back to the ground (though that may have been me breaking mine!). The mechanism is smple to replace (3 bolts if I recall) and the mechanism from either a MK1 or a MK2 will fit. I used a MK1 mechanism as this is an all metal construction, which I personally believe should be more robust.
It might not seat quite properly when wound up but it certainly is possible to fit the wheel with the outside facing up, I know this because this is how mine was when I bought the car, and the reason it was this way was so that the hole that was in the outside sidewall wasn't visible (the tyre looked ok, it just turned out that there was no air in it- that was why).
Got it back in, I pulled on it while turning the nut and it came down slowly.. :-)
Cheers
[GJ]