Cheap Chinese tires cause big blowouts
Cheap Chinese tires missing a safety feature are being blamed for numerous traffic accidents in which several people have already died. The safety feature in question is a six-millimeter layer of rubber that is supposed to be placed between the steel belts to strengthen the tire. But Foreign Tire Sales, which imported the tires, says Hangzhou Zhongce Rubber Company removed the safety feature without notifying its U.S. distributors, according to ConsumerAffairs.com.
The tires are manufactured by Hangzhou and imported by Foreign Tires Sales, Inc., of Union, N.J. The tires were sold under brand names Westlake, Telluride, Compass and YKS. This particular safety alert affects light truck tires only. As many as 450,000 tires may have been imported. Great background information can be found by clicking here.
However, a Washington state RV dealer alerted me to a problem he is having with tires sold under the Mastertrack brand. He said the tires were manufacturered in Elkhart and sold exclusively to RV manufacturers. “The sidewalls are cracking and, in some cases, are bulging out which could ultimately create a very serious blowout situation.”
Ironically, as he was typing the e-mail to me about this issue and another affecting the RV industry, a 20-foot Puma trailer was delivered to his dealership with damage caused by a blowout on a Mastertrack tire.
According to Foreign Tire Sales, tires manufactured by Hangzhou were also sold by the following distributors:
- Tireco, Compton, Calif.
- Strategic Import Supply, Wayzata, Minn.
- Omni United USA, Inc., Jacksonville, Fla.
- Orteck International, Inc. of Gaithersburg, Md.
- K&D Tire Wholesalers LLC, Carlsbad, Calif.
- Robinson Tire in Laurel, Miss.
Although the Washington dealer assumed the Mastertrack tires were manufactured in Elkhart, I can’t find any information about the company or brand online or in any RV industry directories. There is some chatter on RV consumer Web sites about tire failures and some messages mention the Mastertrack name. But, if anyone knows anything about this company or its products, please e-mail me at editor@rvtradedigest.com.
It’s cliche to suggest that the RV industry rides on the quality of its tires. What may appear to be low-cost alternatives do not always come with an acceptable quality in terms of safety and performance. This is especially evident when an RV dealer receives units bearing bulging or flat tires following a 2,200-mile trip.
Caveat emptor - Let the buyer beware! But, in this case, the buyers are RV manufacturers and dealers. I agree with the RVer posting a message to a consumer forum who noted that ”tires are a bad place for a manufacturer to cut costs.”
June 29th, 2007 at 5:37 pm
Never a dull day in the RV industry! This is the first time I’ve heard of a China tire issue and hope it’s not another case of manufacturers choosing “low cost” over “customer value” and making sure the consumer has a positive experience with their RV products … all of them.
June 28th, 2007 at 10:33 am
The tire problem is not new and is on going. The worst offender for us has been Carlisle. The worst thing is that our hands are pretty well tied on getting and doing warranty on tires. The customer looks directly at us. The only way that we can respond is to drop a factory that will not resppond and or will not help. We have done this and it did hurt us. However in the long run will it really hurt us. We normally see 3 to 5 units per week for tire blowout damage. We try to have all owners file a report with the NHTSA. However they seem to be totally unresponsive. I am surprised that the insurance companies don’t get more invloved. The cost to them has to be staggering. The only answer is better and heavier rated tires. The factories are running so close to the tires load limits that there is no margin at all.I have seen trailers that you have to subtract the tongue weight to be in limits for the tires by as little as 200# lbs. The factories have to be the ones to stop and control this. Thank you
June 27th, 2007 at 10:00 am
I have been having problems for about ten years.
Started out with some General AmerTrails. One even blew out in the spare position.
Then I went to the Cariles. Some problem. The last ones were made in china.
I changed trailers and blew out one Good Year Marithon tire on a 100 mile trip. Found three more with thread seperation when I got to the camp site.
No the trailer was not over weight.
The tires were only three years old and they were inflated correctly. The trailer is stored under cover with the tires on a 2×12 so they will be on a dry/flat surface.
June 26th, 2007 at 5:08 pm
Yet another tragic example of the lack of control over the quality and safety of goods pouring into this country from China (and the resulting costs associated with them). As a supplier of US manufactured component parts, we have lost several RV OEM accounts because of cheaper (and I do mean cheaper) products being distributed into the RV OEM Market. When (as an industry) will we wake up and smell the quesadillas?
Every time an RV manufacturer in the United States outsources a good to China instead of a US supplier and bases that decision primarily on lower cost, they are are living in a false economy. They are taking business away from the very people they are trying to market their RV’s to. I hope the RV industry is planning to sell lots of RV’s in China because that will soon become their primary market. In addition they unwittingly foster the continuance of the deplorable environmental degradation in China and add to an ever growing US trade deficit which is creating an impending crisis for the US economy. Price and cost are two different things but this lesson has to be contuinually re-learned it seems.
June 26th, 2007 at 3:09 pm
We have several manufacturers that are having sidewalls cracking on tires. Keystone is having a big problem,Starcraft and Crossroads. I have had numerous tire claims. Some of the tire manufacturers are providing tires only and are unwilling to pay for labor to mount and balance them. This seems to be a huge problem. Consumers are growing tired of this very dangerous safety issue and are losing confidence in our industry.
June 26th, 2007 at 2:17 pm
Our blog has the WSJ article and a couple of other links.
http://madeinchinainc.blogspot.com/