Save Yourself from Emergency Tire Purchases

I love it that I have friends that blog. Strange though it seems that none of my long-distance friends get blogging. But my local friends are into it and though I see them often their blogs help me keep up with what's happening.

This week Becky had this bit of news:

I noticed a large bolt/nail in the tread surface of my car's passenger tire. We thought "oh, crap, but at least it can be patched!" Nope, instead we needed all 4 tires replaced. Why you ask? Well, turns out that tires can rot! Did you know this, cause I had no idea. Guess after a few years, especially in dry climes or coastal climes (hmm, like San Diego or Colorado, ...yeah) the tires can rot and be unstable. So while we dropped a cool grand before noon on Sat on nothing fun.

photo by idreamofdaylight

Wow! No I had no idea that tires can rot right there on the wheel. Well, technically it's not rot, because that's a fungus. But you can probably picture Becky's rotten tires dry and cracking. Definitely not something you want to be speeding down the road on.

We don't often think about our tires. At least I don't. There just kinda there. But according to the Car Talk forum this can all be avoided with regular tire maintenance.

"Good tire maintenance will slow it down. So the first question is did you do a good job of maintaining your tires? Inflation pressure checks every month? Rotation every 5K to 8K? If not, then it's hard to assess how much contribution is the tire and how much is just plain neglect. Because many folks only think of tires in terms of miles, tire manufacturers and car manufacturers have been issuing bulletins saying that tires should be removed from service when they reach a certain age. There's a bit of spread on the time, but it seems to boil down to heat. If you live in a hot state (AZ, CA, TX, NV, NM, and FL) 6 years is the limit for a properly maintained tire. In cold weather states (MN, WI, MI, ND, MT, etc.) then the limit is 10 years. States in between are .... uh ......in between."

It stinks that Becky and Kyle had that unexpected expense. I know that they were planning something more fun for their Saturday. But I am so glad that the bolt caused them to buy some safer tires.