Are My Michelin Tires Dry-Rotting?

When you get your new tires and before mounting them, possibly you can trade them at the tire dealership for another brand ? No sense paying to have them mounted and balanced only to have to replace them again in 2 years due to the same issue.

Ask yourself is it worth taking a chance and having a blow out and cause a few thousand dollars damage to your RV. Then you not only have to fix the RV. You still have to buy a tire.Plus the inconveience

So if you think they are dry rotting why don't you go to a tire dealer and ask them to inspect your tires? All the tire expert wannabes aren't going to be able to tell you by looking at the pictures.:S

Look for the 4 digit date code (on my tires it is 1610) which means they were made in the 16th week of 2010. The camper was made in early 2011. I am replacing my tires tomorrow before our weekend trip. They show no dry rot, but ozone and heat can cause the glue that holds the tread to the sidewalls to separate, leading to a major failure.

I learned this first hand when traveling to Md from Fl a few years back with my travel trailer. The tread separated and beat the underbelly of the travel trailer up. No blowout though because I caught it on a walk around at a fuel stop.

Mileage really is not of consideration when you have an rv because much of the time it is parked.

If they are 3-4 years old replace them!

I had the same experience with the Michelins on my 2011 Chevy Dually. The 6 tires on the vehicle had very minor checking, but the spare was bad. The local Michelin dealer had a template with pictures of various degrees of checking. Mine matched the one which said to replace the tire. They did so for free without question. The explanation for my spare being worse is that there are chemicals in the rubber which when "worked" by usage stretch the rubber and keep the anti-aging chemicals active. My spare left sitting motionless was worse than the other 6.

When exploring other forums about tires you will find that Michelin LT tires often suffer early weather and/or ozone checking. Early on - such as this appears - it’s not a problem. As the cracking widens allowing water to enter into the sidewall fabric or metal material damage will occur. Getting them checked by a Michelin tire center is recommended.

FastEagle

I would not like that tire but you've done what you could, keep that in mind as you are looking for a new set of tires, relax and have a cool one, no sense in having a heart attack.

Mine did the same, although I think I only got 50% replacement. What bugs me about this is that I could have bought different tires, say BF Goodrich or whatever, but shelled out the extra $ due to Michelin reputation only to end up with potentially unsafe tires. I was heading out of town with the rig next day and didn't have time to research different brands and essentially overpaid for tires that I'll have to replace prematurely again.

I'll likely go with a different brand next time for my truck, as well as for all my other vehicles.

I would accept the 70% and get replacements. But then get ready to pay for mounting, balancing, disposal fee, tax, etc. So the 70% really comes down to 50% anyway.

But the biggest problem with the 70% bis you are required to replace the bad tires with exactly the same tires that gave you a problem in the first place.

But then again, I have OEM Continentals on my F-350. Only 23,000 miles and almost down to the wear bars. Rotated every 5000 miles. And 10,000 Miles of towing our 5'r. The OEM brake pads are about shot too.

Not complaining. I'll just replace with quality parts. And get on with life.

MPI Mallard good for you. I am watching our Michelin tires also.

chevman