Budget tires - false economy

[jasongray5]

Going to work on saturday morning, on the road I drive on every day, taking it fairly steady, turned a lovely sweeping left hander, felt the rear squirm (wierd as the front usualy has a little slide when pushing it) next thing I know, the rear of the car has stepped round 90 degree's, I didnt put any opposite lock on, as there was another car coming from the other way and i didnt really want to take anyone with me, front left wheel touched the verge and dragged me into the hedge, with 3 concrete pillars, car coming the other way, (my only witness to it all) drove strait on:mad:
Anywho, I have always used decent michelins, but because Ive been trying to sell my little red rocket, I put some buget ones on the rear, (on thursday)
Any who, here's a picture.
So im off to phone the insurance people now, and please please please, if you have to use budget tires, take it very steady.

http://locostbuilders.co.uk/upload/end of the citroen.jpg

[HandyAndy]

Blimey :eek: :eek:

Hope you are ok Jas?

andy

[gingea1pom]

Jason,

I assume from your chipper’ness you are OK.

Sorry to hear and see (first picture I have been able to see at work) your unfortunate news.

Good luck with the insurance company.

Cheers Ginge

[jasongray5]

Managed to give myself a nasty bit of whiplash, and my head went through the side window so abit cut up and whatever, but i still managed to play rugby on sunday!
Just want to make everyone abit aware of the dangers, and dont be shy of paying a few quid extra for decent rubber

[Coozer]

Yes, my friends budget tyres are a tricky act if you every go over 40mph.

Here's mine with Halfords finest on.

http://i303.photobucket.com/albums/nn126/ridler123/General/P8170008-1.jpg

Put decent tyres on, they don't have to cost an arm and leg but....

Steve

[Bonzo]

Holey Moley Jas :eek:

Pleased to hear you managed to escape unscathed & even managed to get a game of rugby in :)

I guess you can't beat a bit of decent rubber on your wheels.

Steve

You must have been gutted when that happened :(

At least you have the MNR back to it's full glory .... It was looking great at Stoneleigh :cool:

[les g]

Steve
i remember that post on locostbuilders...
you were devastated and going to give up on the car etc..
bet your glad you didn,t yours is a cracking build..
Jason glad you are ok thats a bit of misfortune you didn,t need
hard way to learn about crap tyres though
just glad you are ok
cheers les g

[tkpm]

Glad to here your okay Jason.

Terry

[Jimmyd]

Glad you're ok!! and just on the new tyre subject a few years ago I picked up a brand new car which had the rims upgraded from 15" to 17" and on the way home went into a full four wheel drift. No great speed or anything I just wanted to change direction and the car decided to do it's own thing. It had no grip at all. After I stopped shaking I turned and went back to have the tyres changed. The tyre manufacturer then had a report done which basically said there was to much release agent on the mould and hence still on the tyre. What if I had wiped myself or someone else out?

J

[twinturbo]

I have used budget tyres on everythign from a 1.3 Lada to 250BHP T5 estates and al sorts of stuff inbetween ( front/Read and AWD). Never had a problem.

If the tyres were fresh on thursday then they were probably not scrubbed, and may well have been inflated incorerctly.

TT

[twinturbo]

P.S.

Worst pair of tyres I ever had as some continentals which were on my sapph when I got it in 1994..

TT

[Big Vern]

With all due respect jason, "no s*#t sherlock":)
It never ceases to amaze me how many people put this budget crap on there cars - tyres are the most important component on your car after all - as they connect it to the road. Budget tyres don't brake or steer properly and as you've found out they don't handle either, thats why there budget!
Where tyres (and therefore safety) are concerned budget doesn't mean bargain it means accident. :eek:

Sorry if this sounds like a rant - it is -not at you though just everyone that uses crap tyres :mad:

[Davey]

Tyres and brakes fall into the same category, the one where corners shouldn't be cut to save a few quid. Many years ago, when I was an apprentice and running my first (legal) car, a 1969 MkII Austin A40 I had a leaking front wheel cylinder. I used to have to top the fluid reservoir up once a week, one week I forgot and ran out of brakes on a very steep, very long hill:eek: :eek: . thankfully I survived, as did the car. Next day I was replacing the rubbers in the wheel cylinder during my lunch break when one of the wiser mechanics said to me "is that the value you put on your family's lives?" "What?" says I. £3 for a set of wheel cylinder rubbers is the value you are putting on your family, and every other road user you come near to when it would only cost £7 to replace both wheel cylinders and the shoes on that axle"! Bearing in mind my weekly wage was about £45 at the time and I was married with a child £7 was a substantial portion of my income!

I took his advice and replaced the wheel cylinders and brake shoes on the axle and never had a problem with the brakes from then on. Sometimes we have to step back to see what is really important, saving a few quid on brakes/tyres or spending a few quid more and living to tell the tale.

D.

[twinturbo]

tyres are the most important component on your car after all


The high level, systems control & co-ordination processor is the most important part in a car. The vast majority of accidents are caused by failuers in this unit to adjust the cars dynamics correctly.



Budget tyres must conform to strict BSI and euro standards


TT

[les g]

Tyres and brakes fall into the same category, the one where corners shouldn't be cut to save a few quid. Many years ago, when I was an apprentice and running my first (legal) car, a 1969 MkII Austin A40 I had a leaking front wheel cylinder. I used to have to top the fluid reservoir up once a week, one week I forgot and ran out of brakes on a very steep, very long hill:eek: :eek: . thankfully I survived, as did the car. Next day I was replacing the rubbers in the wheel cylinder during my lunch break when one of the wiser mechanics said to me "is that the value you put on your family's lives?" "What?" says I. £3 for a set of wheel cylinder rubbers is the value you are putting on your family, and every other road user you come near to when it would only cost £7 to replace both wheel cylinders and the shoes on that axle"! Bearing in mind my weekly wage was about £45 at the time and I was married with a child £7 was a substantial portion of my income!

I took his advice and replaced the wheel cylinders and brake shoes on the axle and never had a problem with the brakes from then on. Sometimes we have to step back to see what is really important, saving a few quid on brakes/tyres or spending a few quid more and living to tell the tale.

D.

blimey never had you done as being that old
cheers les g :eek:

[Davey]

For information it was 1980 and I was the grand old age of 19.

D.

[Bonzo]

That's made me feel years younger Davy :)

My first propper " Road legal " car was an Austin A40 Countryman .... That would be about 1976 :eek:

It got me everywhere I wanted to go .... Did need a bump start every now & then .... Was a joy to wach my wife & Mother in law pushing it :D :D

[deezee]

The high level, systems control & co-ordination processor is the most important part in a car. The vast majority of accidents are caused by failuers in this unit to adjust the cars dynamics correctly.

Budget tyres must conform to strict BSI and euro standards

TT

I guess that's the polite way of saying driver error :rolleyes:

[Big Vern]

As TT basically says, the driver error was to fit crap tyres, then expect them to behave as though they were good tyres - But this is what most people expect 'cos they think tyres are just round and black.....

Also fitting budget tyres to the rear only, made the car unbalanced and the result was inevitable.
From a professional standpoint I would say that mixing tyre types/brands on a vehicle, (which is currently legal - a different one on each corner is not yet illegal), should be outlawed on safety grounds as different tyre types have different levels of performance thus affecting both braking and handling.

As for the so called 'strict' standards they cover mainly manufacturing processes (BSI) and the euro ETRTO covers things like impact and delfation performance and more recently noise and drag. These standards hardly cover road holding and braking performance which is generally left to the vehicle manufacturer.

All the top level tyre manufacturers work with the vehicle OEM's to get their tyres on a model as thats where the money is for them.
Budget tyre manufacturers just disect and then copy a leading brand tyre as cheaply as they can often without understanding fully how the tyre was designed or made.

The best tyres to use are the ones the vehicle manufacturer specifies as they will have been developed to work properly with that particular car.


BV:)

[twinturbo]

The bigest safety scare in recent years was with manufacture fitted tyres which called for a recal by the manufacturer and BIG name supplier.

TT

[Big Vern]

The 'scare' you refer to was because the relatively BIG name tyre manufacturer recalled their tyres for something that half the budget makes deem acceptable!
You don't hear much of the safety issues with unknown budget brands but just check trading standards for hundreds of horror stories. (Small volumes of unknown brand budget tyres arn't the headline that a major brand name selling millions of tyres is).