Every cloud...

[Pete C]

Having had a blowout on the motorway, I now find that the tyres on my pick-up are discontinued. As a great believer in all tyres having the same tread/construction, the incident is costing me a stack of several (about 600) hundred pound coins as I need to replace the blown item, as well as the other four (including spare)! That, alongside a wait of four hours in the rain because the Pretend Police wouldn't allow my to change my own wheel in the dark on the hard shoulder, is annoying.

The silver lining? I can now make a tyre stack for parsnips!

You see, sometimes, when you think things are really crappy, there really is a silver lining!

[Nicos]

OMG!!!..and you are OK?????

I don't know why -but I thought it was just remolds which blew????

£600 ??...ahhhhh...hope you get lots of parsnips!!!

[bobleponge]

Altogether now
"Always look on the bright side of life, de do de do, de do de do de do"

Bit of a bummer they dont still make the same ones though.

[dexterdoglancashire]

At least you are still in one piece. As someone who works in a local garage, we only sell decent tyres, not remolds or part worn as some customers who ring up ask for. Its just not worth the risk. The rubber on your tyres is the only thing in contact with the road.
Glad things worked out OK in the end.

[ginger ninger]

I don't know about a silver lining, I think there's someone looking down on you PeteC.

Its a roll-over tomorrow.....get yourself a lucky dip.

[piskieinboots]

What a bummer, but thank goodness you are here to tell the tale!

My tyres are horribly expensive also, I have a Mini Cooper S, the Mini doesn't carry a spare as the tyres are run flats

[SarzWix]

Yup, I agree - the silver lining is undoubtedly that you didn't cause any major damage to yourself or anyone else!
It's a bit of a myth that only re-moulds or 'part-worn' tyres have blow-outs. Running your car/vehicle with a tyre/tyres under inflated is the main culprit:

You will often here of people discussing tyre blow-outs, mainly because this is something that many will fear will happen to them. A tyre blow-out, to give it a definition, is the sudden and total deflation of a tyre caused through the collapse or failure of its structure. There is a tremendous amount of rubbish talked of when it comes to blow-outs and something that is severely misunderstood amongst the motoring population. Blowouts do not just happen, they are caused, and that cause 99.9% of the time is through negligence, in terms of simple maintenance and regular visual chacks, coupled with a lack of awareness.

As mentioned earlier, the air pressure within a tyre is necessary to maintain the integrity of the profile of that tyre and therefore its structure. If you steadily reduce the air pressure within a tyre you will reach a point, long before it becomes flat, where the tyre walls begin to bulge outward. If that car is driven with the soft tyre, the bulging tyre wall, now less rigid due to lost air pressure, will begin to distort and even ripple as the wheel rotates. This rippling effect causes friction within the rubber, and as you know friction causes heat. All the time a car is being driven along the road with a tyre in this condition that tyre is generating heat within itself and the level of heat will be rising for every metre of distance it is allowed to drive over. Eventually there will come a point when the tyre will have had as much heat as it can tolerate, and when that point comes it will suddenly let go with a bang. If you realise what is going on before you get the final failure point, and you try to put your hand on the tyre just after you have come to a stop, you will burn yourself. There is a terrific amount of heat generated here and tyres running on a vehicle whilst under inflated have even been known to ignite.

Let us not get carried away here, but instead ask ourselves why the tyre has gone soft in the first place, after all, that is the cause of the problem and the beginning of this chain of events? The answer is that you have either picked up a nail, or similar, that is stuck into the tyre body and you now have a slow puncture, or it might even be that the pressure has not been checked for so long that the tyre has gradually deflated little by little through age and neglect. It could be that you have been running around for weeks like this, but because you have been the only occupant of the car you have got away with it. Now, when you have got three other people on board and a boot full of luggage, things are very different.

Ride Drive Ltd UK, Advanced Driving, Tyres, Grip Factor

I found this info when my OH was trying to tell me that it was perfectly ok for him to have taken my car to town down a dual-carriageway without checking the tyre pressures first, when we know that it has a slow puncture

Be safe peeps, check your tyre pressures at least once a week, it only takes a 20p and 5 minutes...

[Nicos]

Interesting Sarz- never knew that!

[Pete C]

Damn, I was going to do the myth bit! Beaten to it.

No, my tyres aren't remoulds or old. They're pukka Bridgestones! As the main damage is on the sidewall, there was inevitably some damage caused somewhere, and once the motorway speed heated up the air enough to expand, that weak point would have caused a blister on the damage, which then burst, shredding the tyre.

Luckily the sheer weight of a pick-up means that although the back slews a bit, the front plods on in a straightish line. They also slow down very quickly on three tyres!

Now the bad news; the wheel rim is only 16 inches, which means (according to my books) I'll only get one parsnip plant in there. £600 for one parsnip does seem a bit steep. Anyone know of any other crop that will take to a tyre stack and produce a bit more produce?

[Hazel at the Hill]

Now the bad news; the wheel rim is only 16 inches, which means (according to my books) I'll only get one parsnip plant in there. £600 for one parsnip does seem a bit steep. Anyone know of any other crop that will take to a tyre stack and produce a bit more produce?

Ah, but you've not factored in the longevity of the tyres - they will last a zillion years, so if you grow a parsnip a year for just the next 25 years, that will only work out at £24 per parsnip.

Alternatively, you could grow nice long carrots in there instead - say 15 carrots, 2 crops a year, 25 years, that's only 80p a carrot, which is much more reasonable than your initial calculation would suggest...

[piskieinboots]

he said the P word

[Bigmallly]

Hi Pete, I appreciate it's a personal thing about all tyers being the same brand but if the other tyres are ok, why payout all of that money just before crimbo. Would it be easier to replace them one at a time at intervals.

[Pete C]

Hi Pete, I appreciate it's a personal thing about all tyers being the same brand but if the other tyres are ok, why payout all of that money just before crimbo. Would it be easier to replace them one at a time at intervals.

Sadly, Bridgestone no longer do the same construction/tread pattern in the size I have. The alternatives are similar, but no exactly the same. This has grip issues, and if you've ever driven an unladen pick-up in the wet, you'll understand the bowel loosening feeling when the back starts coming around to meet the front at 70mph!

If I could find the same model tyre in the right size, then it's happy days!

[piskieinboots]

..Would it be easier to replace them one at a time at intervals.

I was always told 'you' should always replace tyres in pairs, but I am a girl (*checks) and they could have been spinning me one

[Pete C]

I was always told 'you' should always replace tyres in pairs, but I am a girl (*checks) and they could have been spinning me one

'Tis the truth.

Few people who drive understand tyres, and often people ignore such advice and get away with it. It's usually when the tyres need to deliver all of their capabilities that you notice any real difference. If there's an incident, you'll soon know that your tyres have given up! That said, for typical driving, you won't notice the difference.

Tyre places won't advise you to mix and match, because they'd be liable if you end up injured. I'd always say change them in pairs and make sure each pair is matched too.

As someone with a penchant for highly powered two-wheelers, you do gain a huge amount of respect for rubber and the rules surrounding it. It focuses the mind when all that is holding you to the track is two spots of rubber about two inches wide!