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China made GoodYear bombs????


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Personally, I believe country of origin is secondary.  Goodyear is a major player, and would likely have some pretty serious quality control standards in place.  I have Sailun tires on two vehicles and after 5 years on one and two years on the other, would by them again.

That said, there are Chinese brands I wouldn't touch.  And we always try to buy American, if possible.

KW T-680, POPEMOBILE
Newmar X-Aire, VATICAN
Lots of old motorcycles, Moto Guzzi Griso and Spyder F3 currently in the front row
Young enough to play in the dirt as a retired farmer.
contact me at rickeieio1@comcast.net

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11 hours ago, rickeieio said:

Personally, I believe country of origin is secondary.  Goodyear is a major player, and would likely have some pretty serious quality control standards in place.  I have Sailun tires on two vehicles and after 5 years on one and two years on the other, would by them again.

That said, there are Chinese brands I wouldn't touch.  And we always try to buy American, if possible.

This^^ they can do good work ,but the temptation to shortcut/substute is everywhere.

Trust but verify

2005 volvo 670 freedomline singled
Newmar Torrey Pine 34rsks
woot woot

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I know two people who went to China looking to have things made several years ago.  Both reported that the Chinese were thrilled to be asked to produce high quality rather than cheap price.  They wanted to prove what they could do, rather than be the Wal-Mart providers.

But, I will go out of my way, and pay more, for American made goods.  And by American, I mean any of the three countries that make up North America.  Them other folks can make good stuff too.

KW T-680, POPEMOBILE
Newmar X-Aire, VATICAN
Lots of old motorcycles, Moto Guzzi Griso and Spyder F3 currently in the front row
Young enough to play in the dirt as a retired farmer.
contact me at rickeieio1@comcast.net

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Does Walmart buy some of their products from China? Or does Walmart buy some of their products from American distributors that source their products from China? Not all Walmart products come from China of course. We just bought a Lodge cast iron frying pan from Walmart that was made in Tennessee...

Dutch
2001 GBM Landau 34' Class A
F-53 Chassis, Triton V10, TST TPMS
2011 Toyota RAV4 4WD/Remco pump
ReadyBrute Elite tow bar/brake system

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For years GY Marathon Tires were made in the USA.......however their reputation was worse than bad.  GY moved Marathon mfgr to China.  Reputation remained the same.

Trailer tires are a "niche" market.  Often a "secondary" line (under various names) for the major mfgrs, which opened up that market for other companies (with excellent products).

(GY began mfg tires in China in 1994)

Most  major tire companies have multiple plants around the world. "2013 - Michelin opened it's $1.5 Billion plant complex in Shenyang that will eventually produce more than 12 million passenger, light truck and medium truck and bus tires a year.

Sometimes you can find the tires you want, mfg in the USA - sometimes not.

However, China *is* very capable of producing quality tires - to desired specs.

Roll on.

Edited by Pappy Yokum
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SOAP BOX TIME

Golly, if I had a nickle for every tire discussion I have had over the years I would have enough money to buy a brand new set of Michelins.  BTW - the Goodyear Marathons had a manufacturing site in Canada before moving to China.  As consumers in the USA we must consider rules by the EPA, Unions, wages, facility taxes, OSHA, unemployment insurance, and availability of environmentally unfriendly materials that add to the price of the tire that may not be present overseas.  Our own need for a living wage, benefits and protections have driven tire manufacturing to countries where rules and needs are more lax.  If you remember, the big tire debacle that was back around 1996 with tires made in the USA by Firestore/Bridgestone and used on Ford Explorers was over "Made in the USA" tires.  In the RV towable industry manufacturers do everything they can to save a buck and keep the price of their trailers at or lower priced than the competition. For example, trailer A has "C" load rated tires rated for 2,623 pounds at 50 psi.  These tires will end up on a trailer using 5,200 pound axles with a total maximum weight rating of 10,200 pounds.  Let's see, 4 tires properly inflated = 10,492 pounds.  Two 5,200 pound axles = 10,400 pounds.  Yep, should be OK since the tires are rated for more than the maximum allowed weight of the trailer - right!  Next, the "C" rated tires come from the lowest cost supplier, maybe KungPo in the smog district of an Asian city mounted on a spec wheel with lug nuts and center caps at a cost of only $35 US (including shipping and duty tax) per tire when bought by the container load.  Most ( not US!) don't look at the tires, check pressures or avoid tight turns, potholes, speed ratings or weight to see if they are over the rated load - then BOOM - the tire fails and it is named a China Bomb.  The RV industry sets up the consumer and it makes me mad!  YES, there are bad tires made with recycled and inferior materials, insufficient adhesive under the tread and poor quality control.  But, Michelin could make the same tire it makes in the USA in China, Japan, Canada, Mexico or anywhere as long as the same quality standards were met.  Where a tire is built is not as important as how it is built.  You get bad tires made in the USA and with 65 million tires coming out of China (compared to less than 4 million in the USA) every year you are bound to have China Bombs.  BTW - what percentage of USA consumers buy tires by quality, reputation and place built rather than a lower price for a tire that looks the same?  We want living wages and benefits but also the lowest possible price.  Think about this:  When the Coleman-Powermate plant that made portable generators closed  in 2008 (Kearney, Nebraska - 200 employees) it was learned that of those employees that owned portable generators few were Coleman-Powermate.  Most of the ownership was of lower cost Chinese built generators that were hundreds of dollars less than their product.  Go figure?

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Randy, Nancy and Oscar

"The Great White" - 2004 Volvo VNL670, D12, 10-speed, converted to single axle pulling a Keystone Cambridge 5th wheel, 40', 4 slides and about 19,000# with empty tanks.

ARS - WB4BZX, Electrical Engineer, Master Electrician, D.Ed., Professor Emeritus - Happily Retired!

 

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I think these should be called Goodyear Bombs.  Goodyear tires have a history of failures.  We had all 4 Goodyear Wranglers blow the tread on one trip.  Turns out Goodyear had a problem with these tires.  When the RV repair shop saw our mangled RV they said they had a number of people with the same problem.  The tires were only 2 years old and Goodyear did cover the repairs but they put us in danger.  If it is a Goodyear tire then Goodyear is responsible and if they want to trust China it is on them.

Randy

2001 Volvo VNL 42 Cummins ISX Autoshift

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We have a few (too many) tires on the farm.  I ran out of fingers, took off my shoes, and still fumbled about, but came up with about 170 inflatable tires around here.  More if you count spares and such. 

In my 50+ years of driving legally, I've had some tire failures, from blow-outs to shifting belts causing out of roundness.  Probably in the neighborhood of 10-15. I believe ALL of those failures have been either Firestone or Goodyear.  To be fair, we used to be Firestone affiliated, so when I was a pup, it was Firestone only.  But, I've had a bunch of Michelin, some Continentals, Toyo, Metzler, Avon, and many of the second tier brands.  None of those have failed to live a full life.

All of which proves nothing, but I'll go with a premium tire most times, no matter where it's made.

KW T-680, POPEMOBILE
Newmar X-Aire, VATICAN
Lots of old motorcycles, Moto Guzzi Griso and Spyder F3 currently in the front row
Young enough to play in the dirt as a retired farmer.
contact me at rickeieio1@comcast.net

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  • 2 weeks later...

Sure, I'll jump in, why not.

China build does not automatically equal low quality.  The Chinese manufacturers build their products to the specs required by their customers here in the U.S.  If I as a U.S. based distributor want to source the absolute cheapest piece of junk that will technically meet dot standards so I can sell them as cheaply as possible, China will happily build those for me.  If I want to source the absolute best quality product in the industry and I and my customers are willing to pay for that, China will happily build those for me.  China is not just about cheap junk, (at least in modern times) they build exactly the products spec'd buy the buyers here in the U.S.  Don't like that cheap piece of Chinese made junk you bought at your local hardware store that we all like to stereotypically complain about?  Don't bitch about China, bitch about your local hardware store that went out to find that cheap piece of junk to sell you.  They could just as easily purchase top quality products built anywhere in the world, but they make that decision based on what they think you the customer will be willing to pay, and what level of quality you are willing to pay for.  It is NOT China's fault.  Maybe in the old days when China first got into manufacturing on a world scale, but certainly not now.

I speak to this with a little experience, in our business of custom aluminum wheels we have sold both USA and China wheels. We started with the one (the only one) US manufacturer of custom wheels, American Eagle wheels.  Sold their product exclusively for many years.  We just assumed that poor quality control was what existed in the wheel business.  We literally had to open and inspect each and every wheel before we sold it to the customer to avoid returns for scratches, poor polishing, chips, paint issues, chrome peeling, you name it.  I kept polishing material and a power buffer in the shipping department to fix the issues we could, and returned things we could not like paint flaws.  Dealt with a regular number of pinhole leaks (under warranty) in the wheels.  AND THEN we tried another brand, made in China.  Eagle kept having supply issues, being out of important part numbers when we needed them, so it was either sell some China wheels or have nothing to sell at all at times.   Funny thing was, no more quality control issues.  No more pinholes.  Almost zero chrome warranty issues.  Supply issues went away.  We sold both for many years, being kinda loyal to that one US manufacturer, and the China stuff was consistently much better.  Eventually American Eagle went out of business.  I think mainly due to third generation ownership running it into the ground, quality and supply being just the most obvious problems, but the point is in my personal experience was the quality on the US made product was just not there.  And my wheel  customers are still moaning that there are no US made wheels to buy, they are all China.  And they generally don't believe me that the China stuff was better, they think I'm just being a salesman.

Tires are exactly the same.   When we talk about "china bombs" remember that the vast majority of campers go to the lake and back twice a year, never get any significant miles on them, and likely never replace the tires in the life of the camper.  They just sit in the driveway and dry rot.  So the trailer manufacturers put on the cheapest piece of junk tire they can get their hands on, all they generally do is hold the camper off the ground for the next 20 years.  And besides, what normal buyer will make the decision to buy/not buy a given camper based on the tires?  Much more likely it is because the wife takes a shine to the nice floral print towel holder in the kitchen and nobody even bends over to look at the tires.  So why should they put expensive tires on them?  Those of us on this forum are FAR from the average camper with the miles we put on and the weight of the rigs.  And most replacement tire buyers are the same way, "we have the Goodyear for $130 each, or the Tow Queen 2000 for $59, which would you like?".  And knowing they only go to the lake twice a year, they buy the Tow Queen 2000's.  I, and most on the forum are a little different.  We tow a lot of miles with heavy loads and know the value of buying the best tires we can find.  I am shopping for a new (cargo) trailer right now, and I know before I even buy the trailer that I will also be buying five (with a spare) new wheels and top quality tires with a higher load rating.  And the brand new wheels and tires off the trailer will go straight to the swap meet to sell to some happy fool that goes to the lake twice a year.

I have blown out more than my fair share of Goodyear Marathons over the years, admittedly running right at the edge of the load rating.  The new Endurance tire seems to be better, at least I haven't had any blow out yet.  And certainly the G614's if your trailer is heavy enough for that is the way to go. 

But the main point is, I'm so tired of the whole "China Bomb" arguments from people that go out of their way to buy the cheapest possible tire when quality (expensive) tires exist.  If you buy the cheapest possible product you can find, no matter what kind of product, the results are predictable.

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  • 2 weeks later...

As an actual Tire Design Engineer w/40 years experience in Passenger, Truck, LT and even Indy tires I can confirm what Hot Rod said about tire quality. One task i had was to get tires made in China from a specific supplier and to run them through the complete battery of tests we would use on our own production. I got the tires out of the warehouse so they were regular production, not "specials". All the tires passed all tests. As I recall there were 20 or so tires from small Passenger to LR-E LT tires.

Check out my Blog www.RVTireSafety.NET

 

I serve on Tech Advisory board of FMCA as their Tire Expert.

Give three different seminars on tires at RV events and I also give three seminars on Genealogy too.

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  • 1 month later...

Interesting thread. I’m needing to buy four tires for my rear duallys on a class C, With a GVWR of 12,500#. It’s on a E-350 chassis. Tires are LT225/75-16. 
 

I’m in a quandary trying to decide what brand to buy, especially After reading Bot Rod,s and Tireman’s input. I have 2 new Coopers on the front, but don’t know if I should also put Coopers on the back, or if there is another brand which would be better. Michelin’s are out due to price. I also do not want cheap tires. 
 

Any recommendations?

2009 Four Winds Chateau - 25' class C          2002 Chevy Tracker

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I've had good luck with Cooper tires on a variety of vehicles over the years. I just ordered 6 Cooper tires for our motorhome, to be installed next Tuesday.

Dutch
2001 GBM Landau 34' Class A
F-53 Chassis, Triton V10, TST TPMS
2011 Toyota RAV4 4WD/Remco pump
ReadyBrute Elite tow bar/brake system

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Let me start by saying I like to buy american, that said, it is not always in my budget sometimes when it is I would rather have a superior product.  on a tow rig I will almost always have Goodyear steer tires, they are mostly made in the us and are a great tire with great quality control, on my daily driver that is what I have as well.  on a dually that I drive a decent amount every tire I have is either a Korean or Japanese tire brand maybe made in China maybe not, but I have found these tires to do well and cost far less and heck there is redundancy in the mix.  on my trailers  I find rim size more important than most factors, I avoid trailers with 15 inch rims, and 16 inch rim size I try to go cooper because they are made in the us and are a bit on the economy side so I can replace them more often.   That said given a preference i would choose a 17.5 Yokohama over everything else on the market, just had better luck I guess.

 

 

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