Blown tire on new TH

JBJ2003 · 06-23-2012, 07:22 PM

Took delivery of our new 2013 thunderbolt XLR today. PDI went ok, more on that later. So the dealership is about 40 miles from our house and TV and TH pulled just fine. Even stopped and weighed the TV with full gas and the TH empty. Went to drop the TH of at storage and had to return home for some paperwork, a 20 mile round trip. Pulled in to the sub-division and stopped to go get the paper and seen that I had a blow out on the drivers middle axle. Doesn't seem right to me to have a blow out with less than 100 miles on these tires. Guess I will find out tomorrow when I go back to the rv dealer tomorrow with the blow out. Should they look at the axels, leaf springs, or assume I was the unlucky one with a blow out and no spare???

amxpress · 06-23-2012, 08:51 PM

See where your tire was made. Probably China at which I would say that's to be expected. Someone who knows tires should be able to determine what caused the tire to go. Tread separation? Hitting something in the road? A nail? If it's a bad tire, get the dealer to replace all of them. You might also want to check the build date on the tire. Google how to find & decipher that. If it is a bad tire and it is made in China, don't replace it with another China bomb.

**Herk7769** · 06-23-2012, 09:56 PM

Odd that it was the middle one on a triple axle.

Fire Instructor · 06-23-2012, 10:00 PM

Most blow-outs are caused by low air pressure. Did you see someone actually check the air-pressure during the PDI, or did they just tell you that you were all set? Think of the $$$ investment that you just made on your new TH. Think of the value of the toys that you'll be hauling in that new TH. Then compare those values to the cost of a decent Tire Pressure Monitoring System.... ST tires are a lot less dependable than LT tires, so if you are going to do long miles, you really should consider a TPMS. Either that, or check the tire pressures before EVERY trip!

donn · 06-23-2012, 10:06 PM

IMHO you were lucky to make a hundred miles on the cheap Chinese junk that factories are putting under these trailer now days. Count your blessings, and despite the noise I will hear, go get yourself some quality tires. If you have 16 inch wheels, get Michenin XPS Rib or BF Goodrich Commercial TA

JBJ2003 · 06-27-2012, 10:39 PM

:UPDATE: I dropped the TH off at the dealer today. I was told by the service manager that he had to send pictures to FR to get authorization to replace the tire and the rim. Seems a little odd but ok. I would have suspected that the dealer could make this call. I'll post as this process rolls along, smoothly and quick I hope.

JBJ2003 · 07-27-2012, 09:27 PM

Finally got the toy hauler back with "new" tire. They took it off another TH with same tire/wheel combo. They first told me that they would get me a tire with the same rating but would most likely be different brand. After demanding that I would not settle for anything less than a tire that matched the others and they had less than a week before I would be picking up the TH they took the other tire. Maiden Voyage was this past weekend with a 600+ mile round trip with no hiccups. TH was perfect, LED lights looked great. I did have a concern that the garage area wouldn't cool in the Texas sun and bought a 9000 BTU portable ac which I hooked up the the pedestal next door(friend was on that site) and kept the garage very cool as well as the 2 labs and 5 people. Made a quick mod from the cardboard box and vented the ac out the front garage ram vent. All in all was a perfect weekend at the Gulf Coast.

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