Itinerant Air-Cooled

Let's see, it was Road Warrior cerca 2005 on a fast right hand sweeper on my way to Missoula Montana when the Winston whitewall on the left rear deflated and shredded. Put on the ancient spare that had lived with me for 26 years, and 60 miles later, bought those Michelin Harmony passenger car tires that gave me a good three years and 75,000 miles or so.

Bought Michelin LTX "truck" tires in 2008 outside of Hippiewannabee Hamlet, and found them to be round, like a tire should be. But they did not miraculously change the handling of the car or anything like that.

So BobD put Firestone blahblahblah truck tires on the BobD. I kept the inflation at a factory specified 33/44 or whatever.
This afternoon, I am doing a good 65 on winding CA17 from San Jose to Santa Cruz, extremely dense fast-moving traffic, and I am crabbing at the BobD, can you PLEASE track a little more TIGHTLY, please?

By the time I am in Capitola, the rear is going thumpa thumpa thumpa thumpa thumpa. I pull into a . . . laundromat what else? and jack up the rear of the car to the fascination of a homeless citizen camping at the side of the building. "NEW YORK?".
Look at this tire! It was throwing steel cords out of the rubber!


This picture was taken with the left margin of the viewfinder parallel with the tire. Look at the contact surface!:


Truck tire. Yeah right. Every Firestone I have ever had the displeasure of having to live with has attempted to asassinate me, Firestone 500s in 1979, Firestone 721s, now these crapforanexcuse "truck" tires, all of them separated belts and went square.

A crap truck tire is far more dangerous than a high quality passenger car tire in my experience. Firestone. NEVER AGAIN. Lucky to not have had a slewing multicar accident out there . . .

I am running a spare that looks like it came from the factory maybe? A 185 R14 Metzener (sic) made in Germany? Had a funny little exchange with a jerk at the air pump. I pull in and get out with the pressure gauge. Jerk pulls up next to me from the gas pumps.
"ExCUUSE the f**k out of ME," says Jerk, "they gave me free air!"

"Oh not at all," I sez back, "excuse the f*** out of MEEEEE."

That made him laugh. Turns out I had paid a dollar for the pump while he was getting the cashier to turn it on for him, a gasoline purchasing customer gets free air as required by California law, and I did not see him inside the store asking to turn on the air while I was busy paying my stupid dollar and he thought the pump was running down his FREE AIR while I know damn well it was EXPENSIVE AIR of of my hard-earned dollar. And you thought hostage release negotiations were difficult . . .


Below was just into California from Oregon on 199.


Tall trees, those redwoods:

Oh, man! That's one of the scariest (and most fun in a Porsche) highways in California. Not the place to shred a tire. Glad you made it over the hill okay.

Amazing...drowning in crap....

100 deg plus heat, humidity, and a few rolling thunder showers today in soCal. Barb might have seen a gully washer. Rained 30 minutes at my house, very unusual.

the 17 is both extremely fun and terrifying at the same time, usually in alternating turns and depending on what your driving.

that tire is utter BS, there's no way around it. ive never seen tread come out of a tire before it was worn all the way to the cords before, and I bought only mismatched used tires for my old winter beats for YEARS...



busses and redwoods look very cool together.

I recall filling the BobD's front passenger tire in June. Hopefully, you'll get squared away with something more reliable.

Amskeptic wrote:

Do you use the hubcaps as wheel chocks?

Vredestein makes a nice correct tire in 185R14.

Michelin no longer does.

Choose wisely please.

Randy in Maine wrote:Vredestein makes a nice correct tire in 185R14.

Michelin no longer does.

Choose wisely please.

I have a three-legged set of Michelin LTX 195-75-14s waiting for me in Colorado. I need find but one more (the left front one was stabbed to death by a Mitsubishi).

Have you ever seen such a thing, steel wire just deciding to leave a tire carcass? You'd think I was doing 125 mph in 125* heat in a fully loaded Ferrari . . . (that's one passenger and a set of golf clubs).
Colin

Amskeptic wrote:

Randy in Maine wrote:Vredestein makes a nice correct tire in 185R14.

Michelin no longer does.

Choose wisely please.

I have a three-legged set of Michelin LTX 195-75-14s waiting for me in Colorado. I need find but one more (the left front one was stabbed to death by a Mitsubishi).

Have you ever seen such a thing, steel wire just deciding to leave a tire carcass? You'd think I was doing 125 mph in 125* heat in a fully loaded Ferrari . . . (that's one passenger and a set of golf clubs).
Colin

Never knew you played golf! We'll tee 'em up next time your by here!

poptop tom wrote: Never knew you played golf! We'll tee 'em up next time your by here!

When the caddy irritated me one last time, I did an entire 9 hole course with a putter. 162 on a Par 33 course . . . not bad.
Colin

Yes I have seen that happen in a tire before. It happens just before the tread leaves the tire. Not good and it may mean that the rest of them are not far behind.

Actually I use that same Michelin as my spare (although it has never been on the ground it is likely 5 years old). I will be driving to Iowa in a couple of weeks, but that probably won't help you much.

I just bought 4 Hancook RAO8s in 195R14 for $400 locally mounted and balanced though. Decent good deal.

17 is a tire killer and accident prone fun little road.

It's the only road I know with a permanent (light-up) sign saying "Accident Ahead".

Yikes! That looks like a design defect. Wires shooting out, sheesh.
I guess I'll look at the Hankcooks when the tire purchasing time comes around.

Glad to hear you are safe Colin.

Amskeptic wrote: Every Firestone I have ever had the displeasure of having to live with has attempted to assassinate me..

In 36 years of driving, I have gone at least 500,000 miles, on just about every brand of tire. Perhaps 10% of those miles were on Firestones. I have had exactly four blowouts, and every one was a Firestone. Never again.