Not everything needs a tow truck
Four things account for most roadside calls, and none of them are mechanical faults. Keys locked in the car. A battery that has gone flat. A puncture. Running out of fuel further from a station than you thought.
All four have the same shape. The car is fine, you are stuck, and you need one specific thing done in about fifteen minutes so you can carry on with your day.
This is why we run two service vans alongside the four tow trucks. A van comes out for these jobs, which means two things. You are not waiting for a flatbed to finish a tow before somebody can come and jump your battery. And the flatbeds stay free for the calls that genuinely need a flatbed.
We answer 24 hours a day. Roadside calls cluster at the least convenient times, which is exactly when a company with a real overnight operation is worth having the number for.
Our Services
Car lockout service
Keys on the driver’s seat, the door shut, and that particular sinking feeling. It happens to careful people, usually when they are in a hurry. We open the car without damaging it. Modern vehicles have tighter door seals and more electronics packed into the door than older ones, so this is a job for proper tools rather than a coat hanger and optimism. A wedge and a long reach tool, used correctly, gets the door open with nothing to show for it afterwards. Two things to know. If a child or a pet is locked in the car, ring 911 first, then us. Do not wait for us in that situation. And we will ask you to show that the vehicle is yours, which is not us being difficult. Any company that opens cars without asking is a company you should not want opening cars.
Jump start service
Michigan winters take batteries out. A battery that was marginal in November will be dead the first morning it drops below twenty degrees, and the failure is nearly always sudden rather than gradual. We come to you and get the engine running. Boosting a modern car is less straightforward than it used to be, because the electronics do not tolerate a careless connection, so we use proper jump packs rather than clamping cables onto a running vehicle. Worth being honest about what a jump start is. It gets you moving. It does not fix a battery that has failed or an alternator that is not charging. If the car dies again within an hour, the battery is not the whole story, and we will tell you that at the roadside rather than letting you find out on the way home.
Flat tyre change
We fit your spare. That is the service, plainly stated.
If you have a usable spare, whether that is a full-size wheel or a space saver, we swap it and you drive on. If the spare is flat, missing, or the car came with a tyre repair kit instead of a wheel, there is nothing to fit, and the honest answer is a tow to a tyre shop. We will say so on the phone rather than sending a van out for nothing. Two notes. A space saver has a speed limit, usually around 50 mph, and it is a temporary fitting rather than a repair. And if the tyre failed on a highway shoulder, get out of the car and stand behind the barrier while you wait. Changing a wheel on the traffic side of a car on I-94 is not worth it.
Emergency fuel delivery
We bring enough fuel to get you to a station, petrol or diesel. Not a full tank, which is neither practical nor safe to carry, but enough to end the problem. Diesel drivers, tell us on the call. A diesel that has run completely dry sometimes needs the fuel system bleeding before it will start again, and depending on the vehicle that can be beyond a roadside fix. Better to know before the van arrives. If you have put the wrong fuel in, do not start the engine. Not even to move the car. Call us and we will tow it. Running a wrong-fuel engine for thirty seconds is the difference between draining a tank and rebuilding a fuel system.
How the vans change the wait
Most towing companies around here run trucks and nothing else. When you ring about a flat battery, you go into the same queue as everyone who needs a car moved, behind jobs that take an hour each.
Splitting the fleet fixes that. Four flatbeds handle towing and recovery. Two vans handle lockouts, jump starts, tyres and fuel. The two queues do not block each other, so a fifteen minute job stays a fifteen minute job instead of inheriting the wait from a forty-five minute one.
It also means the person arriving has the right equipment already in the vehicle rather than whatever happened to be in the truck.
Common questions
Typical response is 30 to 45 minutes across most of our service area. Roadside calls go to our service vans rather than the tow trucks, so you are not waiting behind a vehicle recovery.
No. We use proper lockout tools, a wedge and a long reach tool, which open the door without marking the paint or the seal. We will ask you to show the vehicle is yours before we open it.
No. A jump start gets you running again but it does not fix the underlying fault. If the car will not hold a charge, either the battery has failed or the alternator is not charging it. Get it tested rather than jump starting it daily.
No. A tyre change means fitting the spare you already have. If the spare is missing or flat, or the vehicle came with a repair kit instead of a wheel, we will tow the car to a tyre shop instead. Tell us on the call and we will send the right vehicle.
Do not start the engine, and do not move the car. Call us and we will tow it. Running the engine circulates the wrong fuel through the system and turns a drain and clean into a much larger repair.
No. We operate 24 hours a day and nights and weekends are ordinary working hours for us. You get a price on the phone before anyone is dispatched.
Where our vans cover
The same twenty communities the trucks work, running about thirty miles out from Ann Arbor.
- Ann Arbor
- Ypsilanti
- Canton
- Novi
- Northville
- Plymouth
- Belleville
- Saline