We got home yesterday from an overnight with the fiver (18K combined truck and trailer) that included some rural steep and winding roads. Here's a photo of what I found on the left front this morning. Four "vanes" cracked through. I'd checked the air pressure before we left and didn't notice anything with the wheel at that time. Total mileage after that pressure check: 142. But, I didn't check the wheels at the campground before we left for home. What could go wrong in 71 miles? We didn't hit anything on the way home.


These are Center Line (now defunct as of 2017) 17x9 forged wheels. At the time I bought them I asked: "Are they tested for load ratings?" They said that not all sizes/widths/models are, but that some are. "Testing is Expensive, and all our wheels are forged aluminum..." I probably have 145K miles on these wheels, with maybe 40K of those trailering the fiver. We did hit a monster pot hole on I-5 in central California a number of years back. Perhaps that precipitated this failure? I didn't have a tire failure from the incident and there is no indication of a rim-bead pot-hole collision.

You've all seen that picture of the truck-fiver busted up on the roadside due to a failed wheel. That could have been me, yesterday, into a canyon. The mantra has been to "watch out for Cast Wheels." Well, these were forged in Southern California, not cast, not forged off-shore.

Y'all be careful out there.