Grit dog wrote:I had two sets of Marathons. The OE. LRC in which all 4 had slipped belts. And that last set of 15" LRE In between I had too many sets to remember them all. I even tried a set of Bias ply STs. None of them made it to their second birthday At some point one needs to find a solution, or give up on towable RVs. I am not a quitter. I found a solution that works. It may not be easy or cheap.....But it would have been a LOT cheaper had I not wasted all that money on STs.
What’s coincidental is I can relate to Huntindog and ST tires popping like popcorn in Phoenix in the summer and a few years later in Colorado. There was one constant among all of them. They were the early-mid 2000s GY Marathins.
I suppose I have an equal distaste for those as he does for trailer tires in general.
Although of the half dozen or so “blowouts” I know for sure 3 of them were due to low pressure and one of them, the 3rd one of the day lol and only went like 70 miles round trip to the lake, was a box of nails in the road pulling back into our subdivision after 3 fun filled hours of tire swapping at the lake and going to Walmart on a Sat afternoon for anything that would fit on the rims.
The other common theme was all of the suspect Marathons had spent about 4 years sitting out in the Phx/Vegas sun basically year round.
The low pressure issues was the guy who was towing our new boat up to us and “forgot” to fill the tires. When I brought him a spare 100miles from our house after 400miles on the road, 1 was at zero and in pieces and the other three were at 30-35psi on a hot sunny day.
So, I never bought Marathons, I haven’t run sun baked tires and I continue to make sure they are not running low on air.
Still, the recommendation to do whatever necessary even if impractical to get LT tires on basically any trailer in any conditions is just over the top.
StonedPanther wrote:Huntindog wrote:CapriRacer wrote:I am on a few forums. One thing has not changed over my 30+ years of towing RVs.
As a tire engineer, I find these discussions very interesting. It's hard to sort out the experiences some had recently against someone who remembers the way it used to be long ago.
There was a time where LT tires didn't perform very well - which is why the government tests were changed. What we don't have is reliable information about current tires. This is partially because things have improved to the point where actual failures are fairly rare.
Tire problems were, and still are easily the most common topic
That's because 95+% of folks on forums know as much about towing and trailer tires as they do when it comes to determining what end is the business end of a screwdriver.
My tire BLEW OUT LOL. That happened sometime after Joe Blowout took a long trip and stopped to pee every 60 miles by pulling off and riding down debris filled road shoulders to make the pee stop, maybe clipping a curb a few times too.
How many times since RV forums have been in existence have you seen someone admit they had a tire failure of some sort and it was their fault. I don't think I've ever seen one.
Huntindog wrote:CapriRacer wrote:I am on a few forums. One thing has not changed over my 30+ years of towing RVs.
As a tire engineer, I find these discussions very interesting. It's hard to sort out the experiences some had recently against someone who remembers the way it used to be long ago.
There was a time where LT tires didn't perform very well - which is why the government tests were changed. What we don't have is reliable information about current tires. This is partially because things have improved to the point where actual failures are fairly rare.
Tire problems were, and still are easily the most common topic
CapriRacer wrote:I am on a few forums. One thing has not changed over my 30+ years of towing RVs.
As a tire engineer, I find these discussions very interesting. It's hard to sort out the experiences some had recently against someone who remembers the way it used to be long ago.
There was a time where LT tires didn't perform very well - which is why the government tests were changed. What we don't have is reliable information about current tires. This is partially because things have improved to the point where actual failures are fairly rare.
Grit dog wrote:You should notice I am the one that posted the facts abooot govt. tire test standards. I am serious abooot my dismal record with STs. And my perfect record with LTs.My tire usage is admittadly HARD on tires. As a hardcore boondocker my trips always include Off pavement miles, in Arizona heat...A lot of it not good roads. Probably my fault for expecting those poor ST tires to hang in there with the LT tires on my truck.
^Meh…
To be fair, you’re kinda the same way….jumping straight into the must have LTs, many times without regard for the actual camper and weight that the person is asking abooot.
