tire question

[turbotyla]

Hey i was in our trusty tech section and i was looking through all of the links came across this one http://www.treadwright.com

 

Its high tech retreaded light truck tires.

Did some research online and apperently they use retreaded tires on anything from ambulances to military aircraft.

 

Read a lot of reveiws that were not on the web site. so they are not bias. and i think that for the price they would be worth it.

 

But i want to know what you guys think. personal exp. all that jazz. i would like to know if they would be ok for a daily driver. i rarely use a freeway. so not worried about high speeds.

 

Let me know what you guys think.or have experienced. thanks

[djag12]

I have them on my MJ. They are fine. I don't drive it daily but my nephew has them on his ZJ with no issues. I have the OTR 31's. We had an issue with one and they sent a new tire no questions asked. Didn't even have o end the bad one back. Great customer service. If you buy them just make sure you ask for the same brand carcass. I do have some road humming but nothing bad (I also was driving with a big hole in my floor and no carpeting so maybe you won't hear any humming)

[BLHTAZ]

I have heard that they are OK, but they don't make anything big enough or aggressive enough for me. I like Swamper type tires...even for my DD vehicles. All they show on that site is strreet tires. :cheers:

[89eliminator]

rjontzen on here had retreads on the back of his truck the last 2 times i was wheeling with him. he said they were great on road, and they surprised the heck out of me off road.

[Eagle]

Read a lot of reveiws that were not on the web site. so they are not bias. and i think that for the price they would be worth it.

 

But i want to know what you guys think. personal exp. all that jazz. i would like to know if they would be ok for a daily driver. i rarely use a freeway. so not worried about high speeds.

 

Let me know what you guys think.or have experienced. thanks

There are retreads, and there are retreads. Do not think that the retreads you can buy at Joe's Tire and Whiffle Ball Emporium are anywhere near the quality they use on aircraft.

 

Whether or not they make sense for you depends on how you will use the vehicle, how much money you'll really save, and how much of a gambler you are. I don't drive fast -- I never go more than about 2 MPH over the speed limit, and I rarely carry heavy loads. I will not put retreads on a daily driver. I might put retreads on a trailer queen, because a flat on a trail may delay things but it probably won't kill me. On pavement, all bets are off.

 

Ever been through a real, honest-to-God blowout? I have -- it was like driving over an IED. Not fun. A good many years ago, when I finished up graduate school, I took off around the middle of September on a cross-country camping trip. I mention September so you'll know it wasn't freezing, but it also wasn't the hottest part of the summer. Somewhere in the mid-west, probably on the Kansas turnpike, I was loafing along at about the speed limit and a fairly late-model Mustang went zooming by me. Yeah, fine, the car I was driving then probably could have sucked his doors off, but I wasn't in race mode I was in vacation mode. I let him go.

 

A few miles down the road I pulled into a Stuckey's for a pit stop, and found the Mustang ... up on a jack. It was a guy about my age and his bride. They were on their honeymoon. And they had just SHREDDED a tire. Sure enough, it was a recap -- except that there was nothing left of the recap. Just the bare tire carcass, with al the cords showing since they shave them before they cap them. You know when you're driving down the highway and you see those long strips of black rubber the truckers call "alligators"? That's because the big trucks run recaps, too ... and they shed from time to time. And I'm pretty sure that since big trucks are under D.O.T. inspection and safety rules, the recaps they get are better than the recaps you're likely to find.

 

Trail only, IMHO. And if you run recaps, be certain your spare is a viable spare.

[turbotyla]

i understand all the factors. And most of the reason tires fail retread or not is because of ppl not taking care of them.

 

And i know that there are different qualitys of them. i feel treadwright has a good quality for what i want.

 

I do go fast on occasion BUT not in my comanche. Its not a race car or anything close. I have other cars or bikes for that HAHA JK

 

But i was just wondering for my truck they are small i do not speed or load or tow anything with it.

 

So i am thinking about the OTRs

 

(I also was driving with a big hole in my floor and no carpeting so maybe you won't hear any humming)

 

Will also be driving with that too. until i get gas for my mig :cheers:

[Motion Offroad]

The performance of them offroad in my opinion is greatly based on what carcus they use. I've known some guys to get BFG carcus' and have been happy with them; others have gotten a cheaper tire carcus and not been at all happy with them.

 

Last I knew with treadwright you got what they sent you; as you can not specify what carcus you want. They "try" to send you 4 matching one's but I've known guys to get miss-matched carcus' as well.

[djag12]

If you do specify a carcass you may have to wait. I specified BF on my first order they shipped within a day or two and on the second order of 4 I had to wait two weeks. If you are willing to wait I had no issues getting what I wanted.

[WahooSteeler]

Eagle, you are an educated and experienced man, but I have to tell you that you are somewhat off base on your viewpoints with retreads.

 

I ran commerical rental truck fleets for 8 years for a very large and successful company that had never run commercial trucks before. So, when our first trucks (mostly Class 6 straight trucks) were needing their first drive axle tire replacements, I approached the coroporate powers to be about running caps. The company is very conservative and super sensitive to liability exposure. Basically they "commissioned" me to research and prove to them the safety of retreaded tires. To make a long story short, I presented a stack of articles, tests, research and so on that covered every facet of retreaded tires. One of the more interesting studies I presented to them involved the public's misperception that the majority of gators strewn across the highways were from failed retreads. That is incorrect. I don't remember ALL of the details of the study, but it was conducted over an 1100 mile stretch of highway for something like a year or more. In the end, the majority of gators picked up off of the highway were from.................original tires. And the number was even higher for passenger car tires, although that should be logical because the % of passenger cars on the road running caps is very low. And what was determined to be the number one cause of failure? Air pressure. Specifically, underinflation. And, that number soared for passenger car tires. I want to say it was something like 90+ % of passenger tire failures were due to low air pressure vs. simple product failure. Anyway, that little nugget of info was probably the most influential on my corporate liability department to give me the green light on starting a cap and casing program for our fleet. Now, you are definitely correct that the process, equipment, and standards used to produce caps at Joe's tire shop and Bandag or similar companies are drastically different. The biggest difference is the testing done to find potential defects in the casings. So using a reputable company with a tried and true cap process is one of the 2 keys to safe retread use. The other key falls on the end user to keep them properly inflated at all times. In the @6yrs I ran a cap and tire program on two different fleets I oversaw, with a combined total of @400 trucks, I think we had less than 10 failures. Of those I think maybe 2 or 3 were straight failures, the others were long term rentals (6 mos or longer) where the customer failed to keep them properly inflated. From the looks of it, Treadright has a good product. It never hurst to do a little more research in to their history if someone feels the need.

 

Bottom line is, your kids ride on retreads every day on their school bus, your Christmas packages brought to you by UPS are riding on retreads, and your garbage is hauled away on retreads. So they are a great product when used and maintained properly. They reduce operating expense and they help save petroleum by only needing to produce a tread cap and not a whole tire. Oh, which reminds me of another important point to make, we did not run caps on our steer axle. As I recall there are certain rules and regs to be able to run caps on a steer axle having to do with amount of highway use and avg. speed of vehicle etc. That's why the only trucks you see with caps up front are low speed, i.e. buses, pkg delivery, dump trucks, garbage trucks, etc.

[mvusse]

My buddy runs the Treadwright 31x10.5R15 MT on his Dakota. The web site showed only one in stock (if you put in a number larger than 1 it showed out of stock), but he called them on the phone to order 4 with matching sidewalls. I believe they are BFG AT, but not positive on that. He's happy with the so far. I wish they carried those in the 33" flavor.

[garmj]

When I was much younger retreads were readily available for trucks and cars,and I can tell you there good retreaders and bad retreaders. Most depends on the condition of the carcas to be retreaded and its prep before retreading. Maintanance (air pressure) is paramount to the life of any tire especially a recap. Its true most of the gators you see these days are from new tires not recaps.I have personally put over 40k on a few set of recaps but these days new ones are cheap enough to buy new ones for cars and light trucks.

[bigd44889]

not me the 31x10.5x15 i can buy new mt's for anouther $25 a tire

[turbotyla]

wow guys thanks. dropping some info i think i am going with the retreads and might even call myself smart. Or GReen For doing it haha. Thanks for the replys and all the information shared in this post. Keep it up. something that can always be added to. And add some pictures if anybody has any Thanks :cheers: