2001 SE 2.0 16v auto tranny. I jacked the car up one side at a time to rotate the tires. Now both front wheels are locked up tight and won't budge. The engine starts fine and the gearshift lever moves normally. Ugly metallic sound if I step on the gas a little. Don't know what happened. Anybody seen this before? Car was running great.

 

what happens when you put it in gear? Check and make sure there is nothing binding. Take the wheels back off and check things out.

 

The tranny feels like it is going into gear normally because yoiu can feel the bump in either reverse or drive. There is no binding in the gear selection.

 

so you put the back wheels on the front and front wheels on the back??? and now the car won't roll? any chances the rims are different and and the rim from the back, now on the front, is hitting the brake caliper? I've seen this happen many times.

Remove front wheels, inspect back of rim for witness marks to see if it is rubbing/contacting chassis parts.

 

The front rims don't look like the back ones, I did not notice the difference when I was swapping the tires. They appear to contact the caliper. Did the 2001 Neon have different rims front to back? These are factory plain rims with bolt on hubcaps.

 

you must not be the original owner. God only knows who, when or why you don't have 4 identical rims on your car. but sure seems like what I said could be the problem is the problem.

 

You were right on target. Have no idea where the rims came from but I got 2 from the junkyard to replace them. Thanks all!

 

wow, just wow who puts staggered rims on a neon? Glad you got it fixed.

 

someone just might have put an old neon rim on or what ever.

Give you an example. I had a 1996 town and country and a 1996 concorde. both have identical appearning 16" aluminum rims. the rims from the van fit perfectly on the concorde but the rims off the concorde interferred with the brake calipers.

if the guy didn't buy the car new, God only knows what it's been through and why things like this happen!!!

but going back to common sense, if it was fine before you did something and now it's broke, undo what you did and that usually fixes the problem

 

Oh I wasn't blaming him, just the person who put the wheels on the car.