Moving a dead car around your driveway can be a pain in the ass at the best of times. It quickly gets a whole lot worse if the brakes or transmission are jammed solid, stopping you from rolling the vehicle in the traditional manner. As I recently found out, though, there’s a nifty solution to this problem.
You might remember that David educated us on the magic of Jackwheels when he discovered them last year. They’re a simple invention—a cheap plastic wheel with slotted holes so they can mount to cars with just about any common lug pattern. They’re useful for moving a car around a workshop or parking lot when its original wheels are not available.
As it turns out, there is a yet more advanced version on the market from a competitor called Guni. They’ll let you scoot a car around, even if its transmission or brakes are totally jammed up. If you’re trying to move around a fleet of badly busted hoopties, they’re a very useful tool to have on hand.
The basic Guni Wheel product is largely identical to what Jackwheels offers—an ultra-light solid wheel for temporarily moving vehicles around a parking lot or repair facility. However, it’s the Guni Wheel X where things get really interesting.
Where the traditional Guni Wheel is a solid steel rim, the X model adds a free-spinning outer section. Removing four bolts on the outside of the Guni Wheel X allows the rubber tread to rotate while the center hub remains stationary. This might seem like a frivolous or odd feature, but it’s actually a killer upgrade for difficult situations.
For example, imagine you need to move an EV that has completely dead batteries. There’s no way to shift it out of Park or otherwise unlock the drivetrain. In this case, simply swapping out each wheel for a free-running Guni Wheel X will allow the vehicle to be moved around without issue.
The same applies to a vehicle with jammed brakes or a seized differential or transmission. Since the Guni Wheel X has a freewheel mechanism, it doesn’t matter. The outer wheel rolls freely even if the hubs are stuck fast.
I’ve also learned they’re a bit of a godsend for BMW dealers, too, thanks to reader Danny Zabolotny:
These are the lifeblood of the service department at the BMW dealership I work at, I’m not even kidding. Modern BMW’s with electronic parking brakes and electrically-actuated transmissions are a nightmare to move around when the engine/electrical system is dead (happens very often), so these are a lifesaver.
The wheel is designed to make it easier to move or load cars with jammed transmission or brakes.
One thing to keep in mind is that you can’t really use them for a situation where they seem almost perfect—wheels-down towing an all-wheel drive car. If you try to tow an all-wheel-drive car with one axle sitting on the road, you can easily cause transmission damage. Using freewheels would avoid that, but the Guni Wheel X is unsuitable due to its 5 mph speed limit.
If you’ve already got Guniwheels (or some other similar product) and you want the same functionality, there’s a solution for that too. Guni makes the GuniHub, which is a freewheel you can bolt on to your car’s hub and then bolt another wheel on to the outside. You can see it used in the video below.
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There are a couple of nice extra features, too. The Guni Wheel products have a series of chunky protrusions around the outside which act as speed humps, which tend to prevent a vehicle from rolling quickly on these wheels, which are intended for speeds of no more than 5 mph at an absolute maximum. The wheels are also available with interchangeable hubs to fit a range of vehicles more easily, from four-hub economy cars right up to eight-lug heavies.
The Guni Wheel X does sound kind of perfect if you’re a shadetree with a big fleet of occasionally-borked automobiles. The only problem is that it’s a rather expensive solution. They cost approximately $270 at Summit Racing, and that’s per wheel. In many situations, you might get by with one or two to deal with jammed brakes or a jammed axle, but even then, it’s still pricey. For a lot of use cases, wheel dollies will prove the cheaper solution for the home gamer. These are more for workshops where they’ll be used time and again over the years, amortizing the upfront cost.
Still, it’s neat that someone’s built a nifty freewheeling solution for moving busted cars more easily. They certainly look less fussy and frustrating to use than traditional wheel dollies, especially when moving over gratings or rougher surfaces. They don’t come cheap, but if you’re in the business of regularly wrenching on hoopties, they’re probably more than worthwhile.
Image credits: Guni
I want to see someone slap a set of these on, put them in freewheeling mode, and do a standing “burnout”. See how much wheelspeed they can take before disintegrating. Junkyard Digs is out near me, but this seems well outside what Kevin’s willing to pay. I think most of the cars he buys cost less than a set of these.
What about the issue of steering? Presumably you’re shit out of luck there with a completely dead EV, so hopefully you only have to push it in a straight line.
Each wheel is free to spin in both directions, so you should be able to just tank-turn the car. Probably would need more than one person though.
These startups and their freewheeling ways…
Brought to you by Spinnerz. Man, the noughts really were the peak of culture.
If instead of a “tire,” these had a series of rollers around the perimeter, you could also move the car sideways. Great for pirouetting it around a 2-car garage when you need more room to work on the side facing a wall.
Just need regular old wheel dollIies for that. It’s not great moving a whole car around on tiny casters, though.
Just gonna say it: seems like an easy way to steal a car if someone was inclined. $1k for a set, an impact gun and jack, swap them on the car of choosing and wheel it away…. I hope these don’t get used like that as I very much see the value with needing to legitimately move newer cars with dead batteries that are a serious pain to try and get into neutral.
They dont sell them in Centerlock form….
First it was having a manual trans that stopped the thieves for us enthusiasts, now it’s centerlocks. I am on board with this, though only if someone else funds them for me.
A flatbed or repo truck is faster.
Prank idea: paint a set of these to match your neighbor’s stock wheels, secretly swap them out, and then pull the bolts for freewheeling.
“WHY AM I NOT GOING ANYWHERE????”
Reverse Spinners!
Can’t wait till a prius drives around on them.
These are the lifeblood of the service department at the BMW dealership I work at, I’m not even kidding. Modern BMW’s with electronic parking brakes and electrically-actuated transmissions are a nightmare to move around when the engine/electrical system is dead (happens very often), so these are a lifesaver.
Ah, now that’s great insight.
Wouldn’t it be a lot less effort to just use the wheel dollies with the integrated jacks? No need to jack the vehicle and swap the wheels that way.
If you’re only moving cars around in a shop with perfectly smooth floors, sure. The shop can only fit about 30-40 cars in it at a time without getting too crowded, so as soon as a car isn’t being worked on, it’s driven or pushed outside into the big parking lot. Dollies would not roll easily on the uneven asphalt outside. Plus with these wheels you can lock them and slowly drive the car on them, super handy for when people blow up their wheels on curbs and we have to wait weeks for new ones to come from Germany.
I love this idea. $269 for a set of 4 from Summit doesn’t even seem that bad for a home mechanic.
I think those JackWheels were quite a bit more expensive for a similar set.
My bad $269 each… These are probably going to be pro-only until Harbor Freight comes out with their version.
(I selected a set of 4 from the guni website and followed the link to Summit assuming it would bring me to the set of 4 on Summit. It did not. I am embarrassed and ashamed).
Alright but when am I going to see an altima driving with one 30 mph over the speed limit?
NO!
Long distance police chase!
I can just see the fail videos of people who forget that there’s a decline between initial and final locations, or who overestimate their ability to push back against the slope when they get to the bottom.
Yeah, freewheel does come with some risks.
Wheelie neat.
I should have known that these puns would be rolling in