LT vs ST's - Canadian Tires cries "Illegal!".
I replaced all 4 tires on my 35' horse trailer in the last 2 weeks - Canadian Tire had some excellent LT tires that were on 50% off "end of line liquidation" discount and the price was too hard to resist even though the horse show season is about done and I wasn't planning to replace the tires until spring.
The first 2 I had replaced at a Canadian Tire reasonably local to me. They initially balked at my choice of LT tires with the usual song and dance about how "You can only use ST tires!". Eventually after some frank discussion with the people there they saw my side of the story - you can't use ST tires on a vehicle, but you CAN legally use LT tires on a trailer. I told them that some RV manufacturers are even shipping their trailers with LT's now for example. Eventually, no problem, they installed them, all happy.
Fast forward to yesterday, I drop off some horses and head to another Canadian Tires store local to me at that moment to get the last 2 tires replaced - the stock on these clearance tires was getting low and if I wanted to get in at the 50% off price I had to get them where I could find them, and the store I was near had 2.
So I get there and the service manager advises me that they will NOT install LT tires on a trailer. I politely start my side of the story again with regards to the legality at which point he exclaims "Yeah, we've dealt with the MTO on all this before and it's not legal so we're not doing it". Eventually we come to a middle ground - I remove the tires myself in the parking lot, roll them in, and they'll "see no evil" and mount the new rubber for me. So, I always carry a hydraulic jack and breaker bar with me when hauling horses, so I do exactly that. Needless to say it's a PITA and takes a lot of extra time.
Eventually, I leave with my 2 new tires (now having a nice matched set of 4 brand new LT's) but I look at the receipt as I'm driving off and I see that they notated the bill more or less "instructed that desired use is not legal, customer self installed, warranty void, blah blah blah".
Now that burned my ass, and I want to take it up with Canadian Tire head office as I'm not the only one I know who was pigeonholed into being forced into buying garbage ST's - another friend was also forced to buy ST's when he needed to replace a spare tire, even though there were far better LT alternatives for his smaller trailer. He didn't argue it and ended up with Carlisle ST's, and we all know how that'll end up eventually.
I need a link or some sort of proof in CMVSS laws that using LT tires on a trailer is NOT illegal as so many Canadian Tire stores seem to want to believe. I can find plenty of reference to ST's being "for trailer service only", which is all fine and dandy and is the very point which thereby declares them illegal for vehicle usage, but nothing that specifically indicates LT's are legal for trailers...although arguably the absence of "LT's are illegal for trailer service" should suffice. Heck, even P rated tires are OK with a 9% derate so long as they can legally carry the weight.
At the very least I'd like to get my warranty reinstated, if nothing else.
The first 2 I had replaced at a Canadian Tire reasonably local to me. They initially balked at my choice of LT tires with the usual song and dance about how "You can only use ST tires!". Eventually after some frank discussion with the people there they saw my side of the story - you can't use ST tires on a vehicle, but you CAN legally use LT tires on a trailer. I told them that some RV manufacturers are even shipping their trailers with LT's now for example. Eventually, no problem, they installed them, all happy.
Fast forward to yesterday, I drop off some horses and head to another Canadian Tires store local to me at that moment to get the last 2 tires replaced - the stock on these clearance tires was getting low and if I wanted to get in at the 50% off price I had to get them where I could find them, and the store I was near had 2.
So I get there and the service manager advises me that they will NOT install LT tires on a trailer. I politely start my side of the story again with regards to the legality at which point he exclaims "Yeah, we've dealt with the MTO on all this before and it's not legal so we're not doing it". Eventually we come to a middle ground - I remove the tires myself in the parking lot, roll them in, and they'll "see no evil" and mount the new rubber for me. So, I always carry a hydraulic jack and breaker bar with me when hauling horses, so I do exactly that. Needless to say it's a PITA and takes a lot of extra time.
Eventually, I leave with my 2 new tires (now having a nice matched set of 4 brand new LT's) but I look at the receipt as I'm driving off and I see that they notated the bill more or less "instructed that desired use is not legal, customer self installed, warranty void, blah blah blah".
Now that burned my ass, and I want to take it up with Canadian Tire head office as I'm not the only one I know who was pigeonholed into being forced into buying garbage ST's - another friend was also forced to buy ST's when he needed to replace a spare tire, even though there were far better LT alternatives for his smaller trailer. He didn't argue it and ended up with Carlisle ST's, and we all know how that'll end up eventually.
I need a link or some sort of proof in CMVSS laws that using LT tires on a trailer is NOT illegal as so many Canadian Tire stores seem to want to believe. I can find plenty of reference to ST's being "for trailer service only", which is all fine and dandy and is the very point which thereby declares them illegal for vehicle usage, but nothing that specifically indicates LT's are legal for trailers...although arguably the absence of "LT's are illegal for trailer service" should suffice. Heck, even P rated tires are OK with a 9% derate so long as they can legally carry the weight.
At the very least I'd like to get my warranty reinstated, if nothing else.
