Dry-rot pics....tell me how bad....

[Ramblin Fever]

or whether they can hold til end of summer.

These tires are roughly 5yrs old with only 30k miles, they have limited tread left - enough for summer. Will be replacing them before winter, but are hoping they'll hold up to 65mph highway drives for 5-6 trips of perhaps 3-400 miles or so for the summer.

Tires are mounted on a 2500 Dodge diesel 4x4 quad cab that carries an overhead camper and tows a 4,000# boat.

If we spend the $1k dollars for new A/T 10-ply 32" tires now, we'll be in a world of hurt....but if we absolutely need too.

I'm not one for chancing life either...so give me your opinions,

 

[Chris142]

They are ready to peel off! When they do they will do more than 1000 in body damage to your pickup.

 

[Mr Nice]

Tough call. But I would replace them, especially if you do highway driving.

Whats the best price on tires you can find at Tire Rack or Discount Tire Direct ?

 

[Steve S]

Replace them it is way cheaper than a problem. Can't afford the tires ? how can you afford the camper and boat use ? That is what my dad would say to me.

 

[wantin150]

I would replace them. Just my .02. I'm sure our resident experts will also chime in with their expert opinions.

 

[Ramblin Fever]

Originally Posted By: Steve S
Can't afford the tires ? how can you afford the camper and boat use ? That is what my dad would say to me.


That's the thing, if I spend money on tires right now, we can forget taking any trips - our boat needs new tires too, and with the cost of gas. We barely have funds set aside as it is...boat's probably only going out once.

But the camper will be on the truck all summer, and I'm pretty sure we can afford to at least do camping trips w/o the boat...boat costs $200 per tank of gas.

I'm not one for chancing life however, we'll start researching for better prices on a good set...my only problem with ordering them from Tirerack is what happens if one is bad, persay, or refuses to balance, we have to wait for another to arrive.

 

[Patman]

The tires on my wife's car were nowhere near as cracked as that, but yet I still ended up replacing them last week. They still had tons of tread left on them too, at least 50-60% for sure, but I just didn't feel safe with the sidewalls starting to crack like that. I bought her four new Goodyear Allegra tires.

 

[eljefino]

Throw a penny in the picture for scale, it looks larger than life on my monitor. Those tires look like the ones on WWII era jeeps with the humungous lugs.

 

[HM12460]

get rid of them tires immediately. not only do you have your priorities all mixed up, you ARE putting life and limb in danger. yours and whoever you share the road with. whats up with being able to afford a boat and a camper, and not being able to afford tires? park the truck until you got money for the tires. screw the boat and camper.

 

[Audi Junkie]

I don't like the lateral cracks. What's the date code anyway? I found tires made in 2000 on my cousin's 2004 Ford Exploder. They are 8 years old now and pretty dry-rotted. Not as bad as yours. I give yours an 8-9 out of 10.

 

[TylerL]

What kind of heat will they be seeing?

 

[Steve S]

How about some non radial[bias ply] truck tires if they are still available for your size ,they may be lower cost and will be fine. It is important to live with in your means.Seems there may be tough times ahead and may not be the time to be wasteful with your$$$. People that have been living beyond their means are getting caught now that times are tough.

 

[Ramblin Fever]

Believe me, we are not living beyond our means, everything we have is paid for, except the Tacoma. The boat is 23yrs old and paid for well over 10yrs ago, and due to overcrowding of lakes in Colorado, that is primarily the reason it doesn't go out anymore.

We decided it for sure needed to go out at least once this year, the camper stays on the truck full time.

I'm not implying that we ARE in fact going to be driving on these tires, thus the reason for my asking you guys, cause according to the guys at 3 different Discount Tires, they feel nothing alarming is wrong with them.

For what it's worth, this truck has been parked since I've seen an increase in the dry-rot, so I'm not putting other peoples lives in danger, nor my own to one persons response to my post...like I said, I wanted to hear what others had to say BEFORE doing any driving as according to Discount, they don't feel anything is wrong.

I'm a paranoid freak when it comes to tires, if we've ever lived beyond our means, it was generally due to buying tires way before needed 85% of the time. I've had family buy used tires off from us and use them for another year, so please don't assume I'm being cheap or trying to do anyone harm.

These dry-rot marks came out of the blue, I mean I had teany tiny ones, then suddenly the big ones appeared 2 weeks ago.

The DOT code is listed as '03 on the tires

I don't consider family time being wasteful on money with such events as going fishing and cheap camping, we never go out to dinner, movies, buy movies, or buy anything for that matter for our personal happiness. Every peice of electronic equipment we own is so outdated, cause we don't believe in the need to upgrade it due to frivulous spending where it's not necessary.

The boat/camper IS our family hobby, this is where we spend our money and always have.

 

[Ramblin Fever]

Forgot to add, the reason we would not have funds for going boating/camping if we bought tires IS because we only allot ourselves so much money for summer use.

That is exactly how we do stay within our means, we only allot so much for things, this includes everything that's not considered life threatening or damaging; i.e if we run out of bread before end of week, too bad, we resort to tortilla's, if we run out of cereal before we've alloted money for it, too bad, we eat frozen fruit or toast for breakfast. The only thing we go to the store for without question or putting a timeframe on it, is milk, meat, veggies, and TP.

But we generally buy meat and TP in massive quantities that it lasts for at least 3-4 mnths.

My point is, I just wanted to make sure that we absolutely DID need tires before telling the kids that summer's out for the year.

I completely appreciate everyone's thoughts, pretty scary that Discount - 3 different stores - would have no problems sending someone down the road on these treads, but I DID have the brain to ask other sources before exposing my family and innocent drivers to the cruel reality of what old tires can do.

I'll have the truck in first thing Tuesday morning, probably have Nitto Duragrabbers mounted.

 

[LexusAussie]

Replace them. You have a responsibility not only to yourself but you have a duty of care to other road users.

The vehicle with the those tyres shouldn't be on the road.

 

[LexusAussie]

Good man!

 

[Ramblin Fever]

Originally Posted By: LexusAussie
Replace them. You have a responsibility not only to yourself but you have a duty of care to other road users.

The vehicle with the those tyres shouldn't be on the road.


This vehicle is NOT on the road and hasn't been for over 2 weeks!

Guys I didn't come here to get criticized, I came here posting this to see how bad these tires were, not to be judged as some idiot who doesn't give a rat about his family or other drivers.

Advice has been taken, truck will be in first thing Tuesday for new tires. As I mentioned, I just wanted to make sure as according to Discount it wasn't necessary, but I didn't feel *comfortable* with their answer.

While we're on the subject, how many drivers here are running around with spares that are 5+yrs old, as a word of caution, this is dangerous as reported on Dateline a few weeks back. If that tire ever needs to be used, it's chances of blowing are quite high.....so please, everyone of you that has the factory spare on a vehicle built in 2003 or prior needs to go purchase a new spare asap before it's chances of being needed should occur.

FWIW - I'm going to contact Yokohama on these tires to see if I can get any prorated benefits for their mileage warranty, as these tires (the tread wear) definitely did NOT make it close to what we were warranted for.

These tires, along with BFG AT KO's will never be used again on this truck, they wear out WAY too soon, tread wise, I'm not talking about dry-rot.

I will also be talking to them about the new Yokohama ATS that I just placed on my Tacoma a few months back, as they too are already showing tiny areas of dry-rot....their DOT code is '07

 

[MGregoir]

What size are they?

Phone around to local tire shops and dealers (depends on the size) and see if they have any takeoffs that fit your truck.

Often you can get tires that are basically brand new for very little money.

My spare in my car dates back to 1998 and looks absolutely brand new, no cracks, still has the release agent on it from when the tread was put on. I inspect it every summer and it is ready to go. On trucks it is a major problem because it is exposed, but on a lot of cars it is not.

 

[Ramblin Fever]

I know a spare tire can *look* perfectly fine but the inside carcass can and usually does deteriorate. They were suggesting that manufactorers need to start putting expiration dates on tires.

Thanks, I'll look into that idea. Size is 265/75 R16 or 285/75 R16 is fine too.

 

[GMGuy]

Given the camper load on the truck + potential highway use, I would lean towards replacement.

One rule of thumb a tire guy game me years ago, if you spread the crack apart, do you see continuous rubber, or do you see something else? If you don't see rubber the tires too far gone.

I just condemned a pair of summer tires for cracks like you have. I'd have used them for the rest of the summer, but given the way I drive, plus the above rule of thumb, I'm not. Unusual for me as, I'm not even going to give them their final farewell burnout. (which usually translates to a couple weeks driving around on them just on frugal principle before their final smokey farewell.)

Anybody else noticing tires are tending to get these cracks much earlier than older tires? I've gone through tires fairly consistently for more than a decade, but recently I've noticed that my tires are showing cracks a lot sooner in their life span than previously.

Alex.