The donut spare on my 2000 TA is pretty much disintegrating. Does anyone know where, or if, new replacements are available? I've asked my local Firestone dealer as well as the local GM dealership and neither one thought they were available. I know I can get them on Ebay, but those are all going to be 20 years old as well, so I'm trading one rotten tire for another that's maybe slightly less rotten. My only option at the moment is a can of fix-a-flat and air pump, which is hardly ideal.

Any suggestions on where to get a new replacement?

 

Was looking around a little. Do an internet search for T125/70D15, which I believe is the spare size but you should probably confirm. I came up with a couple places that might have them, but didn't want to post them here due to sponsor issues. Looks like they might still be available.

 

Just an FYI, the factory size for the spare on the '98-'02 cars should be T135/60/16.

 

 

There are a bunch of spare compact tires from foreign cars that will fit into our factory wheel well compartment......then all you need to do is buy an adapter wheel spacer that converts GM bolt pattern to whatever foreign bolt pattern you're using.

If you ever need it...pull you r tire....pop on the adapter plate....bolt the wheel on and go.

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I do stand corrected then. Just goes to show you shouldn't believe everything on the net. I found that info on NADA website for a 2000 Firebird Trans Am WS6, listed right after the regular 16 inch tires. I just got new spare tire cover retainers for my 98 and didn't feel like messing with those to look till I had to either.

https://www.nadaguides.com/Cars/2000...s-Am-WS6/Specs

 

Interesting that the NADA site has it wrong. I still have the original factory spare, specifically from either my 1999 Z28 or 2000 Trans Am (can't remember which but I bought both of them brand new), sitting in my basement. I doubled checked the tire and it's definitely a 135/60/16. That NADA data might be mistakenly carried over from the earlier 4th gens with smaller brakes (hence the 15" diameter).

 

Went and looked at the spare from my 95 as it's sitting in the shop and it is a T125/70D15, so the carry over error from NADA is probably the answer there.

 

T135/60/16 is correct for my 2000. Well, at least that's what it has now.
A spare from something else and an adapter may be the only option if we can't find a tire to fit the OEM wheel that still fits in the spare tire well. For now I've mounted a "full size" tire on a spare 16" wheel (used a smaller size than stock), but it practically fills the entire trunk. The idea was to take it on road trips and rely on the fix-a-flat around town, but with the full size I have hardly any room for luggage.

Run flats aren't an option in stock WS6 sizes, that I've found.

 

Just as an aside to the conversation, one of my tires exploded the other day and I didn't even think about how old that spare was that I drove on back home. It was in that good of shape that I didn't think to question it, but I know dry rot is an issue with age. I got lucky twice I guess that Saturday.

 

I put a big brake kit on the front of my car. I didn't even think about if the spare would fit over the 14" rotors. I might need to carry a second jack to move the spare to the rear if I ever get a blowout. I wonder if there are any large diameter spares that will fit our cars (hopefully using tire sizes still in production)?

 

i checked the spares on all my 3 cars....rotted and separated.....nothing left but to trash em .....be sure to check YOURS

 

Check three of my f-bodies and spares look brand new, but never used.

 

Still haven't found a permanent solution. I've considered run flat tires, but that means new wheels since I can't get stock WS6 sizes in run flats. Closest I've found is a 245/45-17 Michelin AS3 ZP. If I go with 19" wheels, I could run a 285 or 295 in run-flat. The search continues.

 

Just buy this spare tire and put it on our spare rims......its less than 1 inch larger diameter, no big deal. 135/70/16
https://www.tirerack.com/tires/TireS...earDiameter=17

 

If our ws6 cars have 17'' wheels, how it this 1 inch larger when it is a 16''

 

It's not, they are actually both shorter in overall height than the regular tires, but wheel diameter doesn't really tell you anything about tire height. For example:

135/60/16 factory spare = 22.38" tall
135/70/16 replacement tire = 23.44" tall

The difference above is the aspect ratio, with the 70 series tire being taller (sidewall = 70% of the section width, so a smaller percentage at the same section width would equate to a shorter tire, hence the 60 series is shorter). So the 135/70/16 replacement tire would in fact be ~1" taller than the factory spare tire.

Your factory WS6 tires are 275/40/17, or 25.66" tall. Even though the base V8 cars received a 1" smaller diameter wheel, their overall tire height is nearly identical (245/50/16 = 25.64") because they have a taller sidewall (a product of aspect ratio; 50% of 245mm width is greater than 40% of 275mm width).

So when considering overall tire height, wheel diameter really doesn't tell you anything (other than a theoretical minimum tire height). You can have a 15" diameter wheel with a much taller overall tire than some 18" diameter wheels, it all just depends on section width and aspect ratio.

As for the spare wheel itself, they were all 16" diameter even though your WS6 car came with 17" diameter regular wheels.

 

thank you for explaining this so well. So, i need a spare tire and it sounds like i can use it for either my 17'' front or my 18'' rear as long as i am close to the over all diameter without damaging the rear axle if i needed to put it on the rear. Right now I have 285/35/18 on the rear which are 25.9 diameter and 245/45/17 on the front which are 25.7 diameter. These seem close enough to the 25.64 if I needed to use the spare.

Someone is selling a 125/70/15 spare and saying it can be used up to 02 f bodies, but that would only be 21.9 diameter. The ones you noted above are smaller that the stock tires also, its ok to use those anyway? At 3"' shorter my exhaust will be almost on the ground.

 

I'm not sure if the earlier 15" spare wheel will fit over stock LS1 brakes without a spacer, so that would be a primary concern.

However, the original 16" spare wheel will fit fine if you still have stock brakes (even though your regular wheels are 17", as the brakes are the same on a WS6 model vs. a base V8 car), but the car will definitely sit lower with the factory height spare tire. The taller spare tire mentioned above might help if you have concerns about exhaust clearance but, if it's too tall, it might not fit in the factory storage location.

 

BluebirdLS, as mentioned, the height of the actual tire (not the rim) depends on the % of aspect ratio of the tire. There are tires on 15" rims that are much taller than a tire on a 20" rim.

You can also go walk around a junkyard, you will find a dozen different small spare tires from a variety of different foreign cars that will fit perfectly in our spare tire well.......then just buy a $10 adapter plate so it will fit our bolt pattern to slide on when you are changing to the spare tire.