Tires Expire

violentvintagecycles wrote:

RonKZ650 wrote:

Overexagerated news hype as always. I remember when the same type thing happened back around 1982 when they "proved" any motorcycle with more than 20hp was certain death, "no way to control them", certain death even for expert riders. Had all the film, just like this time. Or the rediculous Ford van/truck recall where the cruise control wiring could get hot and ignite the brake fluid. Oh yea they had film of a truck with flames 95 ft in the air from brake fluid burning. Something to really fear there. I wonder what percentage of road deaths are tire explosions, 1 in 1000 maybe? How many of those due to "expired tires", 1 in 1000? again. 999 out of 1000 tire failures are because idiots never check there tire pressures and are driving around with 8 psi in the tire until it heats up and fails. See I got all these "facts" just like the news did, out of the blue sky as a guess. Sure nothing to worry about in the least, that's for sure.

Worked for a company that used ford vans, excluse like.. All three caught fire..

Wow.... same thing happened to our company van. Turns out it's not safe to smoke crack near a leaky propane tank.
:laugh:

RetroRiceRocketRider wrote:

steell wrote:

I bet they would really flip out if they discovered that large truck tires are recapped 3-5 times before being trashed

Pfffft! EVERYBODY knows that. :laugh:
Which also explains why every stretch of highway/freeway in this country is littered from those retreads seperating.

Want to bet?

The TMC (Truck Maintenance Council, a division of the ATA) actually did a massive research program on recapped tires and tread separation. They picked up every single cap along a 10 mile stretch of I-80 near Chicago, and discovered that the majority of the caps that were lost due to tread separation were "new" tires, not caps.

Ryder (a "huge" truck rental and leasing company) has also done a huge amount of research into recapped truck tires, and they discovered the same thing. Any Ryder truck (the large trucks) that does not have the original OEM tires on it has recaps on the rear. It's actually legal to run recapped tires on the front on large trucks in the US, but it's seldomly done as they wear out to fast on the front.

Low air pressure causing the tire to overheat and fail is the reason for all the caps laying on the road, recapped or new.

I have somewhere around a couple of million miles (10 years at 200k miles per year average) of experience driving Ryder trucks with recapped tires on the rear, and never experienced a tread separation. But I always fueled at Ryder terminals and they checked the tire pressures every time I fueled (every day or two). The following ten years was spent as an owner/operator of a big truck and trailer, and since it cost me a "bunch" of money to replace 18 tires, I did a lot of research on ways to minimize that expense, that's when I discovered the TMC research. Before and after my driving years, I spent a lot of time working as a truck mechanic changing tires, and my experience there showed the same thing, low air pressure was the tire killer, new or recapped.

It's a common misconception that all the caps you see along the road are from recapped tires, but in actuality most are not.

I don't care if they are recaps or the originals, some lazy trucker almost killed my little brother and never even knew/cared.

My brother was driving home from VA beach to upstate NY and around DC a trucker he was following, (I guess the DC area is pretty packed with rigs at 2am....) had a tire come apart. It ran up his hood and about came through the windshields right in front of his face... When he called home to tell us why he was late (gettin new glass in the car...) we did not believe him. But he had the evidence, a skid mark all the way up his hood...

Check your air pressure folks... maybe someone else lil brother wont be so lucky.

Also it doesn't always have to be laziness, it's very possible to get a flat tire while driving and not even realize it until it blows out. I remember driving my truck going right along at 75mph and I hear and feel something that "wasn't right". I kept driving thinking it was just a rough road surface and whithin a half mile had a blowout. That tire rubber must have been 350 degrees. I know darn well I was not driving on low air pressure. So I have two choices:
A. There was 65lbs air in the tire but it was "old, expired"
B. I hit something on the road and lost most or all of the air, the tire heated and blew.

I'll pick B, and I'd bet anything that's what happened to the tire on the van in the video they claim failed from age too.

Anyone ever seen the 30 year old Bonneville tires that they run up to 450 MPH on, treadless too with 80 lbs of air in them ? Ive seen a fully loaded Gold Wing in Yellowstone Park with 3 plys showing on the rear tire. When I pointed it out to him he said it should make it back to Chicago Ok. I wouldnt have ridden it to the corner 7/11

RonKZ650 wrote:

Or the rediculous Ford van/truck recall where the cruise control wiring could get hot and ignite the brake fluid.

Not so ridiculous. The issue was with all vehicles built on the same platform as the F series pickups (ie F-150, Econoline vans, explorer) and the van platform (ie Windstar). There are over 200 documented cases of the effects of this recall. Ford finally bowed down and admitted it. My deer blind up north is what is left of my uncle's truck, one of those "flaming F-150s" that half of my family watched burn. I wouldn't be so quick to dismiss warnings.

steell wrote:

the majority of the caps that were lost due to tread separation were "new" tires, not caps.

///

It's a common misconception that all the caps you see along the road are from recapped tires, but in actuality most are not.

Doesn't surprise me. Remember, the firestone tires on the Fords that were losing their treads and coming apart? That's because Ford's explorer was flipping over in the turning tests (it was too top heavy) so they lowered the specified aire pressure in the tires from the 32 psi recommended by Firestone to about 26, to "soften" the suspension a bit and help with the handling.

But, the sidewalls flex too much running underinflated and those suckers treads were coming loose from the tire body.

RonKZ650 wrote:

The polishing a turd line was in Christine for sure for one. I'm still curious about the vans catching fire though, was this the cruise control/brake fluid thing? I've often wondered how brake fluid, which doesn't burn, and is in a mastercylinder with 1/8" thick steel lids can catch fire. Now that I just don't see as a problem. Must be though.

The fire is caused by faulty master cylinders and wiring. Brake fluid overflows and/or leaks onto cruise control wires that are routed below it (bad design). Brake fluid eats through the insulation causing a wiring short and arc (one of those cruise wires is live apparently). This causes a fire by igniting one of the many combustibles present on an automobile. Unless you are really luck and the wires just arc away until it kills your battery without igniting anything. The best part is ford classified this as a "low risk", "no danger imminent" recall when they finally issued it.

P.S. The turd line is also in Jeff Dunham's "Peanut" skit.

I've got the recall notice like 5 times now for the 1993 E350 van and I just dismissed it as bullsheet. Their temporary "fix" is to disable the cruise control until parts are available to properly repair which could be several months. Thanks explanation of what happens too. The way I always read the problem, the brake fluid is what actually starts on fire. Brake fluid has a flamability rating of 1 by the data sheets which is low as they go except zero, and I didn't realize brake fluid had much effect on PVC wiring.

When I changed the tires on my 500,I asked the man if he knew how old they were, cos they looked ancient, front was 9 yrs back was 13. The back was kind of more grey than black. A guy I know who's been riding mostly Goldwings for years took one look and said "no way", change em!

I didn't realise that brake fluid did that to pvc either Ron,but I was amazed to see that the leak from my master cylinder when I first got this money pit had ran down the tank and onto the frame downpipe, removing both the paint from the tank AND the powder coating on the frame:ohmy: :ohmy:
I stripped that frame by hand, and its hard as hell, but brake fluid wiped it out, no problem.
This post got a sticky has it?
I would suggest that it should have, any young riders need to know this shit, and all the old buggers too!

One more question if anyone knows as I was looking at tires last night. I see one tire said 247. I would assume this is 24th week of 1997. Another real piece of crap had a number 239 on it. I know it's not 1999, doubt it even 1989, I would guess 1979. There's no way to know the decade on pre 2000 tires?

hardr0ck68 wrote:

I don't care if they are recaps or the originals, some lazy trucker almost killed my little brother and never even knew/cared.

My brother was driving home from VA beach to upstate NY and around DC a trucker he was following, (I guess the DC area is pretty packed with rigs at 2am....) had a tire come apart. It ran up his hood and about came through the windshields right in front of his face... When he called home to tell us why he was late (gettin new glass in the car...) we did not believe him. But he had the evidence, a skid mark all the way up his hood...

Check your air pressure folks... maybe someone else lil brother wont be so lucky.

That's why you never want to tailgate a truck.

During the ten years I was an O/O I checked my tire pressures daily, and had a long air hose that would attach to the air system on my truck to add air to the tires when needed.
And I still blew three tires during that ten year time period. The tire gets a puncture shortly after hitting the road, a few hours later it's lost enough air to overheat and disintegrate, it happens to the best of us.

Never, never, never, tailgate a truck.

Following too closely is likely to get you hurt or killed.


And yes I have tailgated a truck, that flippin hail was killing me