Why do GY Marathons have such a bad reputation?

[Atlee]

I don't want to start another tire war, but I'm still trying to wrap my hands and head around a vexing, to me, question.

First some background information. I've had 3 TT's in my life, and they were bought used, but the 1st 2 were keep only 1 year each. All three came with GY Marathons. The 1st had Canadian built Marathons. They were several years old, when I got the trailer, and I had no problems with them the year I owned the trailer.

The 2nd trailer was a 2009 model HiLo. Two of the Marathons that were on the ground were American made, and two were Chinese made. Again, I had no trouble with any of the tires. I did several Richmond, VA to Orlando runs down I-95 with the trailer.

I just traded the HiLo in on a 2012 Koala in my sig. The Koala also came with Marathons, all built in China. These tires were built in late 2010. The reason I want to change out tires now is in the next year, I will be putting about 14-15 thousand miles on the tires, and I'd like to have brand new tires when I start the grand adventure. The grand adventure including 8 or more college football games this fall (including a trip to Atlanta in two weeks), and a cross country trek beginning February 2014.

Now the question. Why would Goodyear, a well known and long established tire company here in the US, ruin its reputation by intentionally putting garbage Chinese junk on the American market.

With the proper quality control, I believe a good tire can be built in China. Wouldn't GY provide the proper quality control?

All this said, I have a little more than 1 week to get 4 new TT tires installed. My first choice would be Maxxis, but it will take nearly that long just to order and get the tires and then I'd still have to find a local tire dealer to install them. My 2nd choice would be Kumho 857 Radial in 195R14 size, if any local Kumho dealer has them in stock.

It seems as if the Marathons are my 3rd choice now, also assuming any local tire dealer actually has relatively new Marathons in stock.

Another question on the GY Marathons. Do Marathons have the extra nylon cap that Maxxis have, and the new style Carlisle have. I know TowMax have started using the nylon cap, but only for 15 & 16 inch tires. They don't use them for 14" tires yet.

I do know the stock 205/75R14 LR-C tires that are on my trailer give me plenty of margin since the combined weight rating of this size tire is over 7k pounds, and my trailer, even with max weight load is 4950#.

[wmoses]

Atlee wrote:
The Maxxis were about $50 less than the Marathons he had quoted a couple of days before.

Probably means they are not as good quality ... :W

[Atlee]

Definitely. I'm not such a koolaid drinker that I wouldn't report on Maxxis, should they fail.

I decided on the Maxxis for 2 reasons.

1) All the forums I visited, almost everyone had good things to say about Maxxis. So I'm presuming they are pretty good tires. However, even the best product can come up snake eyes sometimes.

2) Price. I had decided to put Marathons on the trailer since they could be done now. I didn't want to risk waiting on Maxxis or any other tire to be shipped here. For sure and for certain, a week from today, we are supposed to be on the road to Atlanta. When I called the tire guy back yesterday to arrange for the Marathons, I did ask him if he could get Maxxis. Turns out he could, was even able to get them by yesterday afternoon. Took the trailer over this morning and he put them on.

The Maxxis were about $50 less than the Marathons he had quoted a couple of days before.

wmoses wrote:

Atlee wrote:
What will be ironic, and just my luck, within a year, one of the Maxxis will throw a tread, while the Marathons of varying nationalities never did within in the time I had them. :E

I hope not, but if it does would you come back and report it here? 😉

[wmoses]

Atlee wrote:
What will be ironic, and just my luck, within a year, one of the Maxxis will throw a tread, while the Marathons of varying nationalities never did within in the time I had them. :E

I hope not, but if it does would you come back and report it here? 😉

[Atlee]

To dort of finish off this thread, which I started, I'm going to get 4 Maxxis later today.

The current tires are 3 years old. I have to replace one due to a small nail getting stuck in the sidewall. That tire has a slow leak now.

I'd been thinking about replacing the 4 on the ground since if everything goes according to plan we are leaving for a 10K cross country trip early next year anyway.

The auto and tire store is going to put 4 Maxxis on for a smaller OTD price than they quoted for 4 Marathons.

If they have a tire pressure monitoring system that will not break the bank, I may add that also.

What will be ironic, and just my luck, within a year, one of the Maxxis will throw a tread, while the Marathons of varying nationalities never did within in the time I had them. :E

[EldIr]

SprinklerMan wrote:
Well I had a pair of marathons on the rear axel of my car trailer , they were 4 years old , properly inflated , and the trailer had a small kubota tractor on it (1700 lbs ) Trailers gross is 7000 lbs . The goodyear marrathon threw the tread off at 35 mph driving on neighborhood roads , no heat build up ( only a 10 minute ride ) . When it happned I just started laughing . The tires came off a friends TT he gave them to me after he went to 16 in LT tires . I figured that since I would always be under weight by a large margin , and I was running local to cut the grass at my rentals I would have no problem . Wrong

You can't just go and blame the tires when you got them used. You have no idea what happened with them in their previous life.

Back to the original question. One thing not mentioned in this thread yet that I found in my research was Goodyear at one point temporarily moving production from China back to the US. They realized they had a problem in China, stopped making tires there for a while, and fixed the problem before moving production back. My 1994 had the original Canadian Marathons on it when I bought it in 2011. They showed some cracking, but I still used them the remainder of that summer (about 1000 miles including getting it home from where I bought it). I replaced them with new Marathons after my research left me confident they no long have issues.

While I was shopping for my tt, I looked at many trailers from the 1990's that were still on their original tires and still being used regularly by their owners. MOST people out there have no idea of the time limits on tire life. They figure if the tread is good, the tire is fine. They are "usually" right. Tire failures in general are still a very small percentage.

[SprinklerMan]

Well I had a pair of marathons on the rear axel of my car trailer , they were 4 years old , properly inflated , and the trailer had a small kubota tractor on it (1700 lbs ) Trailers gross is 7000 lbs . The goodyear marrathon threw the tread off at 35 mph driving on neighborhood roads , no heat build up ( only a 10 minute ride ) . When it happned I just started laughing . The tires came off a friends TT he gave them to me after he went to 16 in LT tires . I figured that since I would always be under weight by a large margin , and I was running local to cut the grass at my rentals I would have no problem . Wrong

[PartyMarty]

You gotta love how this was framed .
Just Like :
" Have you stopped beating your wife ? "
Goodyear has probably sold more ST tires than any other manufacturer .
So they have a bigger probability of failure in terms of numbers but not necessarily in percentages .
Goodyear is the third largest tire manufacturer behind Bridgestone and Michelin .
It seems to me that the highest load range in the largest size that fits these steel RV wheels and fits under the trailer is a small premium to pay for excess load capacity at time of replacement .

[atreis]

Why do GY Marathon's have a bad rep? Some thoughts:

1. They're fairly easy to come by and a recognized brand, so many people use them. That makes the likelihood of a (non-statistically-significant) failure being described on here more likely.

2. People exceed their rated speed capacity of 65mph, plus see above.

3. People exceed their rated load capacity, plus see above. (Keep in mind that the weight isn't necessarily distributed evenly to all 4 tires.)

4. People don't air them up properly, plus see above.

5. Sometimes tires fail for reasons that have nothing to do with any of the above, such as being punctured.

BTW - all of this also applies for the other Chinese tires. For nearly all of us, our trailers came with some version of cheap Chinese tire, so the likelihood of someone reporting a failure is high, even if the actual rate of failure is relatively low, and many new trailer owners don't know about the above limits (especially the speed rating).

[FastEagle]

kedanie wrote:

FastEagle wrote:
The regulations for ST tires differ from car and truck tires. The car and truck tires MUST have load capacity reserves. That is a mandated DOT requirement. There is no such reserve requirement for ST tires.
FastEagle

Calvin, it looks like you are finally coming clean on this one. After all these years of denials you are admitting that LT tires carry a reserve capacity and ST tires don't!!!!!

This revelation would explain a whole bunch of tire failures.

Keith

All tire load capacities can be manipulated up and down with air pressure. When a tire has some load capacity reserves above the recommended tire pressure it's called "reserve load capacity".

The DOT requires our automotive vehicles to only use 94% of a tire's load capacity for recommended tire pressures when set at regulatory standards.

FastEagle

[gmw_photos]

JJBIRISH wrote:
I predict the unintended consequence of the TPMS will allow the debate to continue long into the future… as more rely on the monitoring systems more will go visually uninspected for longer durations and allow for more cracked tires or cracked tread rubber to go unchecked until sudden and catastrophic failure… when the TPMS will make little to no difference, or be of much help…

Only the rant will change to it couldn’t be me, I have my TPMS that said everything was ok…

Jack, that is a good point. Folks would do well to remember that all these steps we take, such as TPMS, are just another tool in the arsenal. But we still need to look everything over closely.
In another thread, a poster said they blew a Ford V10 motor up.....because it was very low on oil before they headed out pulling their trailer. I'm sure he is kicking himself now saying, "this is basic, this should never have been overlooked".

[JJBIRISH]

I predict the unintended consequence of the TPMS will allow the debate to continue long into the future… as more rely on the monitoring systems more will go visually uninspected for longer durations and allow for more cracked tires or cracked tread rubber to go unchecked until sudden and catastrophic failure… when the TPMS will make little to no difference, or be of much help…

Only the rant will change to it couldn’t be me, I have my TPMS that said everything was ok…

[gmw_photos]

FastEagle wrote:
.........snip.....

If you want to have any chance at getting a normal life out of your trailer tires you’re just going to have to dig in and learn about the specific ST design. Once you learn all the parameters you’re going to have to practice applying them........snip.....

FastEagle

That's a good point.

Or the consumer can just admit that ST is a design with a lot of limits, and compromises based mostly to favor a cheap price point at retail.

There are other options. And yes they will cost a few more dollars. As the man says....you pays your money and makes your choices....

Me.... I like reserves in everything I do in life. And I don't mind paying a little more money to get those reserves. I have, over my rather long life, found that works so well, that in fact, it "saves" me money in the long run. That means more reserve money in the bank account. What a concept.

[Arcamper]

My Marathons bought in 2006 for my 7k boat trailer where made in New Zealand. They had been well treated and 3 at one time gave up last Friday. Limped to a tire dealer and bought 5 Trailer Kings. Never heard of them before but what else can you do when 3 go at once. And yes I had checked all pressures the night before. Only good thing about the Trailer Kings are they where made mid May of 13 so at least there fresh.

[Atlee]

And just where do you find North Carolina made Marathons? I know of no Marathons that are built in NC. They used to be made in the US, Canada, and New Zealand. However, as far as I know they are only made in China now.

Are the NC made Marathons a very recent development?

NanciL wrote:
I wouldn't have any thing but Good Year Marathons. but just the ones made in the US, (North Carolina)

Jack L