Take Care...(of your tires...)

moose · Jun 26, 2009

Any of you expeditors had a blow out lately ?

See more tire caps on the side of the roads ?

when was the last time you checked your tire psi ?

I did ,3 days ago ,first thing in the morning ,all 6 of them ,( the trailers have AirGo... ),
I checked again an hour ago ,just as i stopped after an 8 hours ride , was just about 10+ psi more !!!

Be safe.

DannyD · Jun 26, 2009

Out of curiousity, what's the price range for new tires on a truck & also, about how long do they last? Meaning miles, not amount of years. =)

Dakota · Jun 26, 2009

DannyD said:
Out of curiousity, what's the price range for new tires on a truck & also, about how long do they last? Meaning miles, not amount of years. =)

The straight trucks at my former job got about 75,000 to 100,000 out of the tires

probably coulda gone longer but it helps to have new tread for winter time.

Doggie Daddy · Jun 26, 2009

Dakota said:
The straight trucks at my former job got about 75,000 to 100,000 out of the tires

probably coulda gone longer but it helps to have new tread for winter time.

That's not very many miles for a set of truck tires. We purchased a set of Michelins for our truck last Nov.,they have 75,000 miles on them now and have lots of tread left.

We are expecting well over 200,000 miles from them,unless some abnormal wear pattern sets in.

aileron · Jun 26, 2009

A good idea is to have some kind of visual pressure indicators on the tires. That way you don't have to take the valve caps off and use the gauge every time you want to check the pressure. Just a walk by the tire and you see if it is red, yellow or green. They are not that expensive.
Of course, a wireless tire pressure monitor with a display in the cab would be the best, but that is too much mooola.

layoutshooter · Jun 26, 2009

We have 192,200+ on our drive tires. We have close to 90,000 on the steers. The drives will need replaced before winter, the steers look good for now.

Dakota · Jun 26, 2009

Doggie Daddy said:
That's not very many miles for a set of truck tires. We purchased a set of Michelins for our truck last Nov.,they have 75,000 miles on them now and have lots of tread left.

We are expecting well over 200,000 miles from them,unless some abnormal wear pattern sets in.

I should have pointed out lots of different drivers lots of running over curbs, and that company liked to overload the trucks. But in the ideal life probably 150 to 200
my Hino just got new shoes and it just turned 168,000
Also the trucks were leased from Penske as is mine, they will replace the tire if any tread lugs are missing any abnormal wear or if truck starts to shimmy or shake.

Deville · Jun 27, 2009

I got about 150,000 miles out of a set of Michelin Steers, great tire, I just put Bridgestones all around actually.

I had about 200k on my rear Dunlop Drives.

I got nearly every mile I could off out of those tires.

i'm pretty good about not running over curbs, I try to watch out for the pot holes & road debris.

I run all my tires at 100 psi...you get that extra 5 to 15 PSI after they heat up depending on the road & weather conditions.

redytrk · Jun 27, 2009

aileron said:
A good idea is to have some kind of visual pressure indicators on the tires. That way you don't have to take the valve caps off and use the gauge every time you want to check the pressure. Just a walk by the tire and you see if it is red, yellow or green. They are not that expensive.
Of course, a wireless tire pressure monitor with a display in the cab would be the best, but that is too much mooola.

Be careful with those things. I had a set where an indicator pops up to show red or green. One of them failed and let all of the air out of a tire. lucky I was standing still at the time. Service responder sold me a new tire explaining going completely flat had ruined the side wall. (Did he scam me?)

aileron · Jun 27, 2009

redytrk said:
Be careful with those things. I had a set where an indicator pops up to show red or green. One of them failed and let all of the air out of a tire. lucky I was standing still at the time. Service responder sold me a new tire explaining going completely flat had ruined the side wall. (Did he scam me?)

I guess that can happen. Never thought about it.

Going flat while standing still ruined the sidewall? I guess it can happen, but most likely he wanted to make an extra buck or two.

moose · Jun 27, 2009

layoutshooter said:
We have 192,200+ on our drive tires. We have close to 90,000 on the steers. The drives will need replaced before winter, the steers look good for now.

You drove one hundred thousand miles without a steer axle ?...

Dakota · Jun 27, 2009

moose said:
You drove one hundred thousand miles without a steer axle ?...

Was doing wheelies LOL

guido4475 · Jun 27, 2009

I know that good year x-rays the trade-in tires and can actually tell if a tire was run while flat. They actually call it "run flat" and will not give you any credit for it nor re-cap it.

Dakota · Jun 27, 2009

guido4475 said:
I know that good year x-rays the trade-in tires and can actually tell if a tire was run while flat. They actually call it "run flat" and will not give you any credit for it nor re-cap it.

Nice to know my truck runs goodyear recaps

wellarmed · Jun 28, 2009

I know someone will want to argue or disagree, they always do. The fact is we have gotten any where from 170 to 190 thousand out of our steers and have come real close to 400 thousand out of drives by using a tire gauge on a regular basis. Again it's just my opinion and others may disagree,after over 20 years dealing with trucks I have found that running a slightly lower pressure in the summer will help on tread wear. Take time when traveling in the southwest to check tire pressure and you will find that your tires will gain atleast 15 to 20psi, if you are already running at max pressure this puts you well over pressure and will cause wear on the center of your tires. The guys at Jam Tire in Toledo told me they were glad there weren't to many guys like me out there or they wouldn't sell many tires. It only takes a few minutes to check your tire pressures,and it only takes a few minutes to spend your money on new tires,make your choice,I made mine. I always run at minimum pressure and let tire heat increase it as it may, doing this you would have to commit to checking you pressure regularly.

DougTravels · Jun 28, 2009

Michelins baby! Straight truck 195,000 1st set of steers, I got about that much now on 2nd set lots of tread left but edges are wearing funny, (wavy with dips) I wonder if DOT will hassle me about that, really want to run them some more, they drive fine. Drives got 252,000 on 1st set, 2nd set still looks really good.

wellarmed · Jun 28, 2009

Doug, keep buying the brand name,they have the technology. Some people think your just paying for the name. I had the same wear your getting and the tire guy tells me that when you get to a certain point of wear that the rubber is softer and you can't help but get unusual wear. The 190 we got out of our steers was only brought to an end because we are a team and the other half decided the sleeper was shaking to much going down the road. I told her to suck it up,but we wound up getting new steers. Kind of a give and you shall receive thing,right.

Turtle · Jun 28, 2009

I wonder why hypermilers run their tires over-inflated all the time and get better mileage and longer tread wear out of them.

All I know is, the max stated cold tire tire pressure is one that is designed for up to a 25% increase in tire pressure due to heat, so hot tire pressure is supposed to be considerably higher than the max cold pressure figure on the side of the tires. If you run minimum pressure to "compensate" for increased pressure due to heat, you're compensating twice, since the cold tire pressure as stated is one that already compensates for it, not to mention that the load rating of the tire is directly related to the pressure in the tire. It is well documented that the majority of gators on the road are due to low pressure.

All of this guesswork and pseudo-common knowledge can be eliminated with nitrogen, tho. Tire pressures stay within a very narrow range regardless of tire temperature.

aileron · Jun 28, 2009

Turtle said:
All of this guesswork and pseudo-common knowledge can be eliminated with nitrogen, tho. Tire pressures stay within a very narrow range regardless of tire temperature.

Ahhhh, I remember seeing the green valve caps on your van.

guido4475 · Jun 28, 2009

Dakota said:
Nice to know my truck runs goodyear recaps

Good year runs the unicircle technology for their recaps.Their is no seam on a goodyear recap.Kinda like a rubberband that is stretched over the original tire casing, then snapped onto the glue-covered casing.look at your recap, it should say unicircle on the side of the recap,where it meets the old casing.it is real important to keep the presure at what it says on the side of the tire. check it cold. the less pressure, the more heat buildup,therefore the heat loosens up the glue, creating cap/casing seperation.