...now I know the sick feeling in your guts you all (that have damaged your truck) feel when you 1st asess the damages. Here is what happened:
driving down hwy 99 traveling east bound towards Reno, and I am around downtown Sacramento in lunch hour rush traffic going around 65mph when all I remember hearing was a slight rattle and 1/2 a second after that I hear/feel the left rear tire area under the truck crashing hard, like the sounds that you would here running over a steel garbage can lid that was rolling vertically when you come upon it. Sounds and shakes happen for around 5 seconds and I see something large and black shoot out behind me, and all the traffic around me is getting out of my way. Truck starightens out but is driving w/ an awful wobble and as soon as I pull over to a safe place at the Cal Expo off ramp that is when I get the sick feeling. The LH drivers side rear tire treading "peeled off" and completely crumbled the entire sheetmetal parts surrounding the wheel well area as the peeling hit everything in its way, including my BM tranny fan wiring, leaving me with a tire stripped entirely off of the tread and still intact with air, but visible is the steel belting on the entire circumference of the tire. My once intact, mint condition body is now folded upwards in the wheel well area, and the black trim around the wheel well a-flappin' in the wind as cars drive on by (thanks for the help, people!). I consider myself and others around me lucky.
I limped the truck to a best friends tire shop, and he and his dad see that the manufacture date was 8/02, and he said that failure of this sort is not to happen in 6 years of a tire's life, especially with how much tread the tire had left. By rights, the manufacturer has to pay for the damage due to a fault in the manufacturing. Cross your fingers, guys, and hopefully you all take this as a lesson, especially if it works in my favor. Load D tires peeling off like that, looks like you took a macheti and peeled the tread off like an orange peel.

 

That sucks! I'm sorry to hear that Fix her back up so you have one of the few first gen's with a nice body I had something similar happen about a month ago...

 

WOWWW!!! what the heck??!!

 

good luck man youre gona need it cause tire company is gona come up with all the excuses imginable

 

I guess I shouldn't have said similar, similar being sucky... Some 84 year old lady wanted to see what would happen if she drove her 02 dodge neop into the side of my truck while I was cruising down the road, needless to say, it ripped the front of her car off.

Good luck with the tire company paying you, I think they should!

 

I had my front right tire blow the cap completely off doing 75 mph not fun at all the truck was completely sidways the ladie behind me was freaking out she couldnt believe i didnt roll it .. from the time the cap of the tire blew off it took 389 some feet just to gain control to the point where there were no skid marks and another 368 ft from there to com to a stop The after math was a crunched and riped fender , beach ball sized dent in door , smached Racker pannel ,,, and braken streeing coluim and i didnt even hit anything

 

I went to the tire dealer today, the same dealer that the previous owner used to get the faulty tires. Manager of the store was very helpful. Turns out it was a Cooper tire, and he gave me the 1-800 to make contact with a claims adjustor. Cooper tires wanted the DOT #'s, which showed a manufafture date of 8/02, and he told me that in 7-10 working days I should see a pre-paid return package in the mail. they want me to package the tire to mail back to them, along with 6 pics of the damage and 2 estimates from 2 body shops. turns out the damage was more extensive than I saw, and I will be needing a new bed. Total for the repairs came out to almost $5,000.00 and one body shop was within 2 dollars of the other in the estimate.

On another note, I just realized something weird happening to my Isspro tach. I used to easily cruise at 2,000 rpm and my idle rpm would be around 800 at a stop, in gear w/ the a/c on. Now, since the accident, I idle at 500 rpm's, and my WOT speed won't go over 1,500 rpm. Did the rear tire that exploded mess anything back in the rear end that could fault my tach? Please advise.

 

I hope this all works out for you and I don't want to dis-hearten you just yet; BUT, before you see a nickel, they will pick your tire apart with a fine-tooth comb.

They will most likely not find in your favor.

Also, if anyone has ever used any type of "tire dressing" on the tire, at any time in it's life, then the blame will be on the dressing manufacturer, and not the tire company.

Also, once they have the actual tire in their hands, you no longer have the real evidence.

One point in your favor is that the casing remained under air-pressure, even after shedding it's skin.


Maybe you will do alright and get paid for your troubles; but, I would not spend that check before it cleared the bank.

I see just what you are experiencing, almost every day, but rare for a Cooper made tire to do this; usually it is the flintstones that self-destruct.

 

Kinda lucky, though, I mean with my wife being a deposition reporter who has really good friends in accident(auto) attorneys. She has the "know how" of what to look for, pics, documentation, etc. I appreciate the tips on the dressing though, and I will definately powerspray the "shine" off before sending. The manager for Les Scwabb tires, where the tire originally was purchased from by the PO inspected it closely, and the body shos all agreed that this time of year with 110 degree weather, this is very common, and they have seen tire companies fork out payment to damages. I had 3/8" trad left ontop of the wear bar. Don't worry. I won't spend anything till I have cash in hand.

Any tips on the RPM sudden change as I described at my last post? really weird how this would change after the accident.

 

Back when driving my 1990 F350 SRW Crew with a Knapheide Service body I had two different brand of "lesser" tires go suddenly KAPOW on the rear.

Once we got Michelins on the truck that was the end of my tire troubles.

The Knapheide body got a bit tweaked but that sucker was tough!

 

Can you snap some pictures? If you e-mail them to me I can put them up on the website which might be handy as this things pans out...

jakebeggy@gmail.com

 

I hope everything work out for you, and I hope that your truck is back on the road