Martin S.

Shant,

Very pleased you were not injured in this recent fiasco. Many of us know Wheel Enhancement to be a very good shop with an excellent reputation. You tell them about this incident and they will make it right for you if it was their fault.

This tire self destruct example provides me is a very good justification for purchasing the wireless tire pressure devices I had really wanted to buy in the first place.

I read a recent report about them in Consumer Reports, the November edition. It seems the wireless receiver which is inside a LCD display mounted on the dash, gives you tire pressures and tire temperature. The wireless senders are mounted in the valve stems, with access only available if you break down the tire. They weigh approximately 1 oz. so balancing the wheel should not be a problem.

The temps are supposedly accurate to within 1 degree F, and pressures within 3 PSI. "Santa Claus" has already authorized me to purchase the wireless tire temp and pressure neasuring device. I will be mounting it up soon.

DaveWE

What Mr. Ohannessian failed to mention is that this tire was originally purchased in September of 2002. Wheel Enhancement sold this 265/35ZR18 Michelin Pilot Sport tire and a used Porsche Factory Technology hollow spoke wheel at an excellent price ($375.00 for a used wheel with a list price of more than $1,200.00) to replace a bent wheel and worn out tire. Sometime during the last 14 months, the tire suffered a puncture and was repaired (not by Wheel Enhancement) with a plug/patch.

As noted in several previous replies to this thread, all tires are subject to catostrophic failure if run at too low a pressure for any length of time, especially at highway speeds. This is exactly what happened to the tire in this particular instance; the sidewall was completely torn away from the tire's shoulder while bringing the car to a stop. The wheel itself was also bent on the inner lip, not uncommon with a 10x18" wheel with a 65mm offset bearing the load of the rear of this vehicle without the support of the tire.

Once again, we sold Mr. Ohannessian a new Michelin tire at a fair price ($280.00, Tire Rack is $276.00 plus shipping), charged him $15.00 for the mounting and balancing (Hunter GSP9700) and sold him another used Factory Technology hollow-spoke wheel for $375.00. We also gave him his old wheel back as Wheel Enhancement's policy has always been that we will not sell a wheel that is bent or that has been straightened.

We don't normally respond to the web forums as it takes up too much time during the course of the business day. We usually allow the members to state their opinions, our reputation is generally well supported by Rennlist members. In this particular case, there was a lot of speculation as to what may or may not have happened to this particular tire and what should be done to correct the situation. We simply wanted to take the opportunity to clear the air. We welcome your input and can be reached by e-mail at wheelenhancement@msn.com.

Dave Martin
Wheel Enhancement

jw97C2S

I had the same thing happen when I picked up my new 993 300 miles away. By the time I made it home the tire had nearly seperated from the rim and looked similar to yours. How llong ago did they install the new tires?
Jim

Don Magee

I had a similar experience in September. I hit a nail, evidently, and the so3 began to loose a lot of air while I was taking a high speed sweeper at about 110mph. The car was twitchy and I was puckered up but it was controlable. There was an 18 inch rip on the inside sidewall after it blew and a nail dead center in the tire. I'd check carefully for a puntcher because, as Glen said, your situation sure sounds like overheating from too low of pressure.

Martin S.

I too had a tire self destruct...it was at the track, and the tire was nearly worn out. When I got into the pits, the last of the air came forth and the tire was flat. I feel I lost air by going down to the cord, the tire over heated and came apart.

The good news, the Kumho VictoRacer tires have stiff sidewalls and I experienced no lost of control...even through turn 9 at Willow Springs. I had a passenger in the car at the time. She was very surprised that the car was so stable with the shabby tire, especially considering the tire was on the left side of the car, the toughest side of the car for Willow Springs.

Once again, I am going to get that wireless tire pressure/heat device. I don't want to be the last to know when a tire is going flat.

ca993twin

Dave,

I think its great when a supplier will take the time to read this board and respond to questions/complaints/issues/praise. I have had only good experiences when dealing with W.E., and my faith in them is restored. Thanks Dave,

Shant Ohannessian

Soo the wheel was bent? Im at work so i havent seen the new wheel and tire that i bought from you today.

But like i said, i barely drive the car and even though it was purchased in Sept. i havent driven it past 1000miles. So i dont think i failed to mention anything. Everything i stated were facts.

I also had no problem buying a new tire. But i refuse to accept the fact that this was my fault. I check my tire pressure often. I still blame Michelin for this. Thanks Dave for taking your time and letting me know the condition my wheel.

Todd Serota [TracQuest]

Because of the varied opinions expressed in the posts in this thread, I felt I should post because I just happened to walk into the middle of this situation. I was at Wheel Enhancement (WE) when they discovered this thread and I was shown the tire in question. There's no doubt in my mind that the cause of the failure was an initial low pressure situation followed by enough driving on the tire (it doesn't take much - just slowing down from 70 mph on the freeway can be enough) for the rim of the wheel to act like a radial saw and basically cut the tire into two pieces. I know this because it's happened to me and others I know numerous times and the tires always look the same - just like Shant's.

In this case, I honestly don't know how anyone could suggest that WE is at fault. They sold this tire and wheel combo over a year ago. Since that time the tire sustained a flat and was both patched and plugged, not by WE. While it's not possible to say for sure, I'd say it's very likely that the patched/plugged area was the source of the leak/problem, since there was no visible puncture in the tire, but it could be a number of things, none of them having to do with WE.

I have no affiliation with WE, but I've been doing business with them for many years and know them well. They are probably the most knowledgeable Porsche tire and wheel people in the country and are very fair with their customers, as some others on this board have expressed. If the situation was such that they could be at fault in some way I believe they'd make it right, but this isn't one of those situations. I'm very picky about the businesses I patronize and if they hadn't treated me well and fairly over the years, I would no longer be a customer. And fyi, I've posted this last paragraph because I know how damaging negative posts on an Internet forum can be and felt it was the right thing for me to do.

Shant Ohannessian

I never blamed WE for this. And BEFORE i wrote this topic i had already talked to Dave and told him i was going to buy a new tire from him. I got this flat tire last night! So this topic was written AFTER i told Dave i was going to buy a tire from him! I do blame Michelin for this!

I got a nail in my tire a week after i bought a new tire from WE back in Sept. So i went to a local tireshop to patch it up. From Sept, that patch has been good and never did my tire pressure go down unless if the car was sitting for a while which is normal.

DaveWE

Our reply was not to refute what you had noted in your posting, you had mentioned most of the facts. The only omission was the point that the tire previously had suffered a puncture and had been repaired. This allows moisture to seep into the steel belts and the surrounding body plies. Eventually, the belts will come apart. We do not know if the repair was effective in sealing the puncture, you may or may not have been suffering a slow leak and driving the car on a tire that was improperly inflated for quite some time. The outer sidewall (the one still attached to the tire's tread section) shows signs of being run at a low pressure for a while, the tire eventually came apart due to the extreme heat build-up.

No tire dealer or manufacturer will stand behind a tire that has suffered a failure from being run at a low pressure or flat, especially since it has already been repaired for a road hazard, a non warranted condition with almost every tire manufacturer, especially with an ultra-high performance tire such as yours. We still have your old tire, you are more than welcome to contact Michelin Americas Small Tires, we'd be glad to provide contact information if you so desire.


Sincerely,
Dave Martin - Wheel Enhancement

Shant Ohannessian

No need for my old tire. What's done is done. Glad doing business with WE and will continue in the future. Ill check my tire pressure every other hour from now on. Does 45-47psi sound about right?

Martin S.

Shant,

You need wireless tire pressure and temp monitoring. Check out November's Consumer Reports.

As an aside, I had a nail in a Kumho tire. I took it ot Discount Tire. They said they could not fix the flat...the nail hole was too close to the side wall. I had to buy a new tire...now that I read WE explanation of what can go wrong when a tire is repaired, I am glad I didn't fix that tire!!!

It sounds like rock solid Rennlister and general good guy Shant, and another good guy Dave Martin from WE, are on the same wave length.


(No financial interest in this product, in fact, I don't even know the name of the product. I will have to go and look it up. I don't want any flat tires!)

Cy

Hey Shant,

Unfortunately, I don't believe Bibendum frequents Rennlist so I thought I'd voice an opinion on his behalf.

I don't believe that Michelin's product is to blame here . . . IMHO, factors mentioned in several threads don't support tire construction as the most likely candidate for this failure . . . esp. in light of the fact it had been mounted for 14 months and performed presumably flawlessly for approx. 1,000 miles. A manufacturing defect should likely have come to fruition in some form before then.

Tire construction may be minimally more suspect if this was the first time you were pushing the tire for an extended period to performance thresholds far beyond those previously achieved, for example if this was the first time you drove the tire at 150 mph for an extended period. But even if this were the case, I think you would have felt and/or heard other symptoms (ex. unbalanced-type ride quality, thumping noises, etc.) prior to the blow out and you wouldn't have "burnt" the rubber.

Burnt rubber = very high temperatures. Very high temperatures in sidewalls = excessive flex in sidewalls. Excessive side wall flex = low pressure. Your pictures show a sidewall failure pretty much where the tire would be overflexed in a low pressure situation.

If you're convinced the tire was OK before you left on your drive then, IMHO, I think the issue is that somehow you lost pressure very quickly . . . you probably didn't loose all pressure otherwise the rim would have been riding on the inside of the tread providing really poor ride quality. Further, being on the interstate you were likely driving fast which caused rapid heat build up. Interstates generally have reasonably smooth surfaces which would also make low pressure harder to detect. Also, interstates tend to have very gentle turns that wouldn't have caused the tire to fold over onto it's side wall, which a tire can do with low pressure. The tire probably performed exceptionally well considering the very low pressure . . . the side walls on low profile tires are strong due to the nature of construction of sports tires. All those factors contributed to the tire not providing detectable issues until the failure.

I absolutely intend no disrespect to you or your opinion . . . after all, it is your car and tires and you were the only one there. If you believe it was a tire issue, most tires come with bar code serial #s to assist tracing production. You could call Michelin with that information and talk to a customer service rep. I'm not sure what if anything they can tell you, but if you talk to the right person they can probably address some of your concerns and if there is a manufacturing issue at least they'll have it logged so they can detect a pattern of failure sooner versus later.

Regards,

Todd Serota [TracQuest]

Hi Shant:

I wasn't suggesting that you were accusing WE. However, some of the posts in the thread leaned in that direction, with a couple pretty much making a direct accusation. A few quotes:

"Seems that either Michelin or the tire shop is liable for that one, but I'm no lawyer."

"Wheel enhacement make a big thing about serving Porsches, pretty much exclusively. They should stand behind the workmanship."

"Wheel Enhancements seems like a relly good place, and should make this right or have an awfully plausable explanation why its not them or the tire manufacuter's fault (in either case, W.E. should take care of everything) . . . Lots of people on this board do business with W.E. or are planning to in the near future because of their excellent reputation. Let us all know how this turns out, so we will know if their reputation is deserved!"

"I just had some tires mounted yesterday from Wheel Enhancement, so I hope everything is okay on my car."

"I think you would have noticed...I notice 2-3 lbs of difference, at least in the front, while driving, let alone the difference that would have been there from a tire THAT low...I'd push harder with W.E..."

I think you get the idea.

Finally, I don't know if you were kidding with your comment about 45-47 psi being just right, but if you weren't, that's way too high. On the street you want to run about 36/38 front/rear cold (70 degrees ambient). If you are going to do some aggressive driving in the twisties you should lower those pressures by about 2 psi to 34/36 front/rear. If you are going to the track, where you start will depend on how much experience you have, which will determine how hard you will drive and consequently how much your tires will heat up. Try 33/35 and measure the pressure when the tires are hottest (after a session). The goal is right around 40 psi hot.

Cy

Hey Todd and Dave,

Quick question, should you need to have a tire patched what do you recommend? I've heard varying reports on patching versus plugging. Unfortunately, when you're in the position of needing this done you rarely have the opportunity to solicit credible opinions, so I figured I'd ask now.

Also, I know generally there are some rules about fixing punctures within close proximity to the sidewall . . . I've generally heard 1" from the sidewall should not be fixed even if it theoretically could be done.

Obviously, your responses are caveated by the fact that each puncture and situation is unique, but if either of you have any general opinions they would be greatly appreciated.

Regards,