Vim Schrotnock
Well-Known Member
- First Name
- Vim
- Joined
- Oct 20, 2018
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- 25
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- Location
- Cincinnati
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- GTB1 Race Cayman, Taycan Turbo S
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- #1
OK, this is a tough one, and I've reported this to the NHTSA. What you're looking at is 4 pictures, all relating to my summer Goodyear tires. First is my drivers side rear, second my passenger side rear, third is the inspection report when my dealer installed the wheel/tire combination on March 21, and fourth is the alignment measurements taken before I had the car re-aligned.
My car has 30K miles consisting of a combination of my winter wheels/tires and summer wheels/tires. I would guess I have something between 15-20K miles on the summer tires. I figure I put about 3500 miles on the tires after they were installed when I noticed a very slight drop in pressure on the ds rear tire from 41-39psi. I monitored the pressure, and it stayed at 38-39 for a couple weeks, then I had a dramatic drop on July 18 to 22 psi while I was parked downtown. I put as much air in the tire as it would hold (35 psi) and drove it home carefully on backroads with about 20 psi left. I jacked it up, since I didn't want the car sitting on a completely flat tire, and it was 0 psi in the morning. I cranked up the pressure to 40+psi, and was able to make it to the dealership with 20+ psi in the tire. I'm sure the tire took a beating during these drives because of the low pressure.
The pictures show the ds rear tire with what looks like the beginning of separation at the tire bead between the sidewall and the tread, pretty much around the entire diameter. The passenger side (ps) rear tire is shown in the next picture. You can see the same cracking starting on this tire, but only in spots. This tire was not losing any air pressure and the treadwear was not unusual.
I was told by the dealer that this was an 'alignment issue', so I asked the dealer to check the alignment, and to check the treadwear on my winter tires to see if there was a problem. The winter tires were completely normal. I've also attached the inspection report when they swapped the tires March 21, and as I discussed with the advisor, there was no indication of unusual treadwear on the summer tires, and there was probably sufficient tread to last one more season. The alignment measurement shows the driver side rear tire to be within spec, and the ps rear tire slightly out of spec. I asked how the ds rear tire could fail in this potentially catastrophic manner if the alignment was within spec and there was no unusual treadwear. I was told that misalignment of one rear tire could cause severe wear of the other.
I don't buy this argument for a couple reasons. First, the passenger rear tire is showing the same failure mode as the driver rear, but not as severe, and it was out of alignment. Second, the passenger rear shows no signs of unusual treadwear. The driver's side tire has some inner tread damage, probably due to driving on it with a very low pressure.
All the evidence I've been able to collect points to a defect in these tires. I've seen hundreds of tires in my racing, and never seen this kind of failure. I've seen tires worn through to the cords on the inside, but not cracking at the sidewall/tread seam.
I've put 4 new tires on the car (dealer paid for the ds rear), and I've had it re-aligned to spec. I have not pushed this car hard at all - never hit the limits on cornering, and used launch control maybe 10 times. Does anyone else have any experience with something like this?
My car has 30K miles consisting of a combination of my winter wheels/tires and summer wheels/tires. I would guess I have something between 15-20K miles on the summer tires. I figure I put about 3500 miles on the tires after they were installed when I noticed a very slight drop in pressure on the ds rear tire from 41-39psi. I monitored the pressure, and it stayed at 38-39 for a couple weeks, then I had a dramatic drop on July 18 to 22 psi while I was parked downtown. I put as much air in the tire as it would hold (35 psi) and drove it home carefully on backroads with about 20 psi left. I jacked it up, since I didn't want the car sitting on a completely flat tire, and it was 0 psi in the morning. I cranked up the pressure to 40+psi, and was able to make it to the dealership with 20+ psi in the tire. I'm sure the tire took a beating during these drives because of the low pressure.
The pictures show the ds rear tire with what looks like the beginning of separation at the tire bead between the sidewall and the tread, pretty much around the entire diameter. The passenger side (ps) rear tire is shown in the next picture. You can see the same cracking starting on this tire, but only in spots. This tire was not losing any air pressure and the treadwear was not unusual.
I was told by the dealer that this was an 'alignment issue', so I asked the dealer to check the alignment, and to check the treadwear on my winter tires to see if there was a problem. The winter tires were completely normal. I've also attached the inspection report when they swapped the tires March 21, and as I discussed with the advisor, there was no indication of unusual treadwear on the summer tires, and there was probably sufficient tread to last one more season. The alignment measurement shows the driver side rear tire to be within spec, and the ps rear tire slightly out of spec. I asked how the ds rear tire could fail in this potentially catastrophic manner if the alignment was within spec and there was no unusual treadwear. I was told that misalignment of one rear tire could cause severe wear of the other.
I don't buy this argument for a couple reasons. First, the passenger rear tire is showing the same failure mode as the driver rear, but not as severe, and it was out of alignment. Second, the passenger rear shows no signs of unusual treadwear. The driver's side tire has some inner tread damage, probably due to driving on it with a very low pressure.
All the evidence I've been able to collect points to a defect in these tires. I've seen hundreds of tires in my racing, and never seen this kind of failure. I've seen tires worn through to the cords on the inside, but not cracking at the sidewall/tread seam.
I've put 4 new tires on the car (dealer paid for the ds rear), and I've had it re-aligned to spec. I have not pushed this car hard at all - never hit the limits on cornering, and used launch control maybe 10 times. Does anyone else have any experience with something like this?
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. I now drive with Pirelli. Just wait…
