Outdoor Writer Report post Posted May 20, 2008 I was sitting in my office Sat. when I heard this loud bang. My lab even started barking. At first I thought my wife had dropped something in another room. BUT..she immediately came in and said, "What was that loud bang?" We both walked about the house, looking to see if something that was hanging on a wall had fallen down. My early concern was that one of my heavy game mounts came crashing down to the floor. We found nothing, so I went out in the backyard to check there. Again, nothing. Then I looked out the living room window and saw my the truck sitting in the driveway with the left front severely out of level. The driver side front tire had literally exploded, blowing the side wall and a very large chunk of the tread. Of course, I knew the Goodrich ATs were due for replacement. Although the 6-yr. old tires still had some miles left, they had become dry-rotted from our heat. I had actually started shopping for new ones a couple weeks ago, but I didn't replace them yet because I had no trips coming up. So the big bang was no longer a mystery. I'm just thankful it happened in the driveway and not while I was tooling down the road at 80 mph. I have both a compressor and impact wrench, so I'm heading out in a few minutes to remove the tire, take it to the tire shop and have a new one mounted. Then I'll bring it home, put it on and take the truck to the shop for the other three tires. That way I won't have to lower my spare from under the back end of the truck, which is a job in itself. The four new ATs will cost me $770 out the door at Big O, which is only a mile from my house. -TONY Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Red Rabbit Report post Posted May 20, 2008 Gotta love how spontaneous degeneration causes an EVOLUTION of new tires. Just think of the changes (lightening) in your genes (sic) due to the disappearance of many generations of Washingtons . Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Outdoor Writer Report post Posted May 20, 2008 Yeah, a lighter gene pool will indeed result. I just returned from dropping off the single tire. Now I'm waiting on them to return it to me so I can take the truck there for the other three. I had a bear of time removing one of the lug nuts. Whoever last put it on must have had the impact wrench set to 300 psi. I had to use a 3' breaker bar on all of them, but also had to add a 2' pipe for the stubborn one. Even at that, I wound up putting a slight bend in the 3/4" diameter breaker bar. -TONY Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Snapshot Report post Posted May 20, 2008 Good thing it happend at your house, those freeway blow outs are scary. Two years ago I was deer hunting and I had just setup the trailer and fired up the portable generator, and I heard a large bang, and I thought the generator blew up, but one of the tires on it had blown from being out in the sun and overheating, blew it right off the rim. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Outdoor Writer Report post Posted May 20, 2008 Yep. I just got home from the tire shop. Pappa has a brand new set of shoes!! I did have an almost-new tire on my boat trailer blow to smithereens on the 101 about a year ago. The steel belt really mangled the boat fender, too. That was the 4th Goodyear Marathon trailer tire to blow. The other three, including two just sitting in the spare carrier, exploded the tread in my driveway just like the truck tire did, and none of them even had the little rubber tits wore off yet. -TONY Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Snapshot Report post Posted May 20, 2008 Yes sir ! Nothing like a brand new set of shoes for the cruiser. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
