We were talking on the air last
Saturday about all the loose rubber you see on the road these days. I
suggested much of the problem is underinflated tires. As
many of you head out on the highway for the holidays, taking a few minutes to
verify you have the proper tire pressure can save you a breakdown and possibly
your life.
Back in 2000, I was Chairman of
the Ford National Dealer Council at the time when Explorers were rolling over.
I was in hundreds of hours of meetings on the subject and did over 150 TV and
media interviews. The burning question was whether it was the vehicle or the
Firestone tires. It seemed pretty obvious to me…most of the rollovers were in
Texas, Arizona and Florida, the states with the hottest weather.
I
recall the day that Ford figured out the source of the problem, which was that
the bad tires were coming out of a particular plant in Ohio. Most people don’t
know this, but Firestone refused to do anything in spite of the fact that the
evidence was indisputable. Ford stepped up and paid for the entire recall
itself. Millions of people got brand new tires, although at my dealership, over
100 customers never took advantage of their free new tires in spite of the fact
that they could get seriously hurt.
Although it never made big news
later, the government ruled that is was in fact the tires. Through all this, I
got a real education on tires and I wanted to share that with you.
I did not realize until this
issue that the belts in a tire were glued to the sidewall. That was the problem
Firestone had…poor glue that once it got hot, the glue melted and the tires
came apart. Hence, worse problems in the hot
weather states. We also learned that the age of tires was a huge
problem AND as you know from listening to the Car
Pro Show, under
inflation is a huge issue and something I talk about often.
The studies done at the time showed
that at over 5 years of age, a tire begins to deteriorate regardless of the
miles on the tire. I also learned that it’s not uncommon for people to buy
brand new tires that have been on the shelf for MORE than five years. Luckily,
each tire has a stamp on it that you can read for yourself and it is really
quite simple to determine the age of any tire.
Each tire has a Department of
Transportation number on the sidewall that you can identify because it starts
out with DOT followed by 10, 11, or 12 letters or numbers. The last four
numbers are the ones to pay attention to. These four numbers indicate the week
and year the tire was made. As an example, if the last four numbers of the DOT
code were 1510, this would signal the tire was made in the 15th week of 2010
and you’d know not to buy that tire
because it is over 5 years old. You should check this on your
current vehicle AND when you buy new tires.
One other important note: the
identification number on a tire is not unique to that tire like your VIN is to
a car. The numbers on your tire are intended to identify batches of tires, like
in the case of the Explorers above. The entire number on a tire tells NHTSA
which factory made the tire in question. Never buy a tire that is not
stamped DOT, those have not been deemed safe by the Department of Transportation. There
is pending legislation now to identify every single tire with a
unique number, and would be registered to you so you can be identified in the
case of a recall.
One last thing, nobody can
eyeball a tire and tell if it is 20% low on air. Go to a tire shop or get
yourself a good tire gauge. Tire pressure should be checked
monthly and certainly before any trip.
