Anybody having trouble with Michelin Steer Tires?

[apextrans]

Just curious because I blew a new Michelin (28,000 miles) about 4 months ago & blew the other side Friday nite. It's really ******* me off because when they let go on a Pete, they take a good portion of the front end with them . The first one cost me $5000.00 to repair all the metal damage & this time it will be about the same from the looks of it. Don't have an estimate yet. I'm usually pretty good about checking the air pressure being a car carrier with the extra steer axle weight (usually run about 13,500 to 14,000lbs up front), but I thought maybe when the first one blew, it could have been air pressure related. But this one was definitely NOT air pressure. Checked it at the fuel stop an hour before it blew.

I've run the same Michelin tires up front for 6 years with no trouble & great wear characteristics. I'm running Michelin ZXA2 Energy 275/70/22.5 16 ply. Small but stout for the Carhauler application. When I turned in the last claim to the insurance co., they almost denied it due to manufacturer defect & told me they had a rash of Michelin tire blow out claims. I had to give them the trashed tire for testing. Never heard anything from that though. I told my agent I hit something in the road to prevent the insurance co. from trying to deny the claim but it was a straight blow out with no warning. That's twice I alomost piled up a loaded car carrier now. Oh, the other thing is I think both blow tires came from the same lot of tires because they went on the truck at the same time.

Anybody else having problems like this with Michelin's??

 

[typ4]

Find out where they were built, I know a trucker that only uses the french built ones,, yea, yea I know, but he get 4 caps from the casing and 2 from all other brands. Michelins are not what they used to be

 

[tonkadoctor]

Ohhhhhhh.....that bites hard.

Every Michelin I ever had on a truck blew out the sidewalls, didn't matter whether they were ****** or caps. These were all company trucks & trailers.

I wouldn't put anything but Bridgestone on my own trucks, didn't have too many problems with Goodyear either except the steers always cupped and were shot in about 80,000 miles.

Don't know if much has changed in the last 7 years I've been off the road because I went back in the military to finish my career after fuel prices in the winter of 2000 put me out of business for the second time, first time happened in '90. Don't know how you guys do it anymore unless rates have gone up drasticly.

 

[apextrans]

Ohhhhhhh.....that bites hard.
I wouldn't put anything but Bridgestone on my own trucks, didn't have too many problems with Goodyear either except the steers always cupped and were shot in about 80,000 miles.

There might be something to that. The '07 has Bridgestone R294's on the front because I couldn't get Michelin's at the time. Didn't want 'em when I speced the truck but I looked them over closely Saturday when the truck was in town here to reload & they look brand new with 48,000 miles logged. I had to put a Bridgestone R250 14 ply ($538.00 for middle of the nite purchase on the side of I-95 in Downtown Richmond VA with almost no shoulder ) on in a pinch Friday to get home but it has to come off in favor of a 16 ply. But I might change both out for Bridgestones.

Don't know how you guys do it anymore unless rates have gone up drasticly.

I've never done any toher kind of big trucking (come straight out of wrecker & rollbacks) but I've been told by other drivers that car hauling pays the most excluding dangerous stuff or military. My trucks average $3.93/mile & I do about 25-30% deadhead. Looking to get it over $4.00/ mile by mid year '07.

 

[apextrans]

Find out where they were built, I know a trucker that only uses the french built ones,, yea, yea I know, but he get 4 caps from the casing and 2 from all other brands. Michelins are not what they used to be

Don't know where they came from but I can assure you it wasn't France. I use a redneck, hillbilly, Flag waving good'ole boy shop in the middle of the corn fields & he only buys american when there's a choice. You're right though, Michelin has gone thru some changes.

 

[apextrans]

A Bit Of Good News....

Turns out the tire I had put on on the side of the road is not a 14 ply, it's an 18 ply. It's load range J, not G. I was too pissed & tired to pay attention to what actually went on the truck after 3.5 hours of sitting stranded. I was told it was a 14 ply on the phone & as long as the truck would roll again I figured I'd deal with it when I got home. So now I'm going to ditch the other Michelin in favor of an other Bridgestone. Hopefully I can get a pro-rated credit from the Michelin. We'll see.