Replacing Tires on my GMC

parkmanaa wrote:
You won't be sorry for going with the Michelin Defender LTX tires. Have used Michelin for more years than I care to remember, on cars, trucks, motorhomes and have NEVER had one failure. It's the only brand I buy, and insist my family does the same.

Funny how so many people blame the tire when they have a blowout. That poor tire may have been encountering everything the highway can throw at it for many, many thousands of miles, but if it should blow out, albiet years later, it's the manufacturer's fault. Never that piece of steel or 4x4 you hit many miles back, that weakened the tire. Always the manufacturer.

I had three (3) blowouts in one brand and model of tire.

Where there is smoke, there is fire.

One brand AND model of tire.

I still drive on the brand, but not that particular model of tire anymore. Not sure why it took me 3 times to learn my lesson. I guess I felt like you did... had to have been something else... a pressure issue, a valve stem issue, a temperature issue, a road hazard issue... something, but surely, the tire itself could not possibly, barring outside factors, be intrinsically at fault.

So I'd repair the mess and mount another tire, of the identical model and brand, to match the remaining tires, and bam, it happened again.

Just a coincidence.

Bam, it happened again.

Perhaps just a fluke

BAM, it happened again.

Ok now wait a minute, something's wrong here. Why is it in 40 years of driving, I've never had a blow out, but with this particular model and brand of tire, I've had three blow outs? Turns out, I wasn't the only one having the problem. Thousands of people throughout the USA were having the same issues with the same model and brand of tire.

The manufacture of this tire discontinued that model of tire, and replaced it with a different design casing and tread. I haven't had any issues with newer design.

Having this hindsight, I pay very close attention when I both read and personally see similar experiences with the same model and brand of tire.

Back on the topic of this thread, the brand is Michelin, and the model was LTX, and the purchase location was Costco. Personally seeing the aftermath one experience, and then reading the aftermath of another person's identical experience, gets my attention now.

This isn't a matter of "blame the manufacturer", this is a matter of paying attention to trends... something that I wish I had done prior to mounting the same brand and model of tire for the third time, after already experiencing two blow outs, because the third blowout did the most expensive damage that I still haven't fully had repaired yet.

This also isn't a matter of not liking Michelin tires. I run Michelin drive tires on my medium duty truck, as well as on my wife's SUV. Over the decades, I've purchased and run Michelin tires, especially when the car manufacturer issued Michelin tires as OEM equipment. Then I'll endeavor to buy the exact same tire when it comes time for replacement.

The concern that I expressed in this thread was narrowly focused to a specific model of Michelin (the LTX M/S) sold at a particular large retailer (Costco). When several people report the same issues (I've heard of similar stories elsewhere) about that particular tire sold at that particular large volume retailer, it raises the eyebrows.