Cooper Tires!!! Huge Problems!!!

Well this should ruin someones day.

ABC15News , local TV news for Phoenix, did a story to night on how Cooper Tires have been failing in any State that has hot weather. It seams Cooper left out a rubber wedge that will cause the tread to come off, mostly during hot weather.

Cooper is the only tire mfg that does not have this rubber wedge that cost penny's to include in the manufacturing process and has known this to cause 218 deaths and 300 serious accidents since 1996 but refuses to include the wedge.

The news stated Cooper has been having the court files sealed upon settlement to prevent the news meadia from finding out the results.

You might wanna check your off brand tire names for the Cooper Tire mfg codes as they make a huge number of tires for different companys. You can get the codes from the link above.

I now have 14 Cooper tires mounted .

All I can say is some tire shop in gonna fall in love with my check book this next week.

T_Bone

• Cooper Tire Article

Keith

Well I didn't expect this to generate all the comments it has.

I too don't trust the news media too far, one being the exploding gas tank that they couldn't get to explode so they exploded it on purpous, and the general common sense that's lacking of the what they call news into today's world.

For the ones that didn't pick-up on the most important info I wanted to convey that this appears to be a tire problem in the hot weather in the Southern States, AZ, TX, S.Cal, NM, OK, FL from what I remember the map showing. Any body that's lived in one of these areas, knows that the heat and UV's can really damage a tire and is a concern to us more the South than in the Northern States just like frost heave and froozen pipes would not be a big deal in the South. They stated Cooper declined comment as the news media was not fare in there assements. That I agree with.

The written article was not very well presented like the TV coverage. The news media expert was guy that gave expert testiomony in the court cases of why Cooper had a blowout problems with there tires. Alot of questions he refused to answer as he stated the court would not let him comment. He did point out that any tire that did not have this rubber wedge that ran down the center of the tread would surely have a blowout with excessive heat build up.

I too have ran a tire low in tread depth and had a blowout and didn't have a problem one controlling my vehicle to a stop and it sure didn't flip my truck over like the accidents showed on the TV news. Makes me wonder just how many roll overs were severe driver error to a simple problem.

I've also went thru the 50's and 60's with Firebomb problems that my parents had and will never run a Fireblooper on any of my rigs. If you research Firekabooms track record, it's just about every 10yrs that they had the continious blowout problems.

I ran a set of Coopers in the 70's and 80's that I got great service from, 60k miles (4wd) and still looked good, but due to "my" abuse seperated the tread inbetween the ribs. Had I'd been able to find a Cooper dealer, I would have used them thru to today.

In any event I'm going to change my Cooper steer axle tires and since I have a 4wd, that requires a 6 tire replacement on my dualley. For $1400 it's just not worth the risk to me. I'll keep the tries on my trailer and use the take off tires for trailer replacement tires as the risk of accident or vehicle damage from a blowout is very low on my trailer duals.

T_Bone

PS.I still have ALL of them (Cooper tires) stacked behind shed, so any takers. I'll ship!!..:-):>)

Keith in NE Oregon

And Mastercraft is one of Cooper's cheapest line of tires.

There isn't even an investigation on the tires. Now maybe if you duct taped fireworks to the tires and sent them careening into another vehicle, maybe then the gas tank, I mean, tires might explode.

If a company like Firstone couldn't keep their problem under wraps, I'm pretty sure Cooper wouldn't be able to do it either.

I take it you live in Arizona. I might be worried about it then, but I would probably do like most people do now that the Firestone problem has ran its course. I would check my tires from time to time for delamination.

If it truly is a problem, I would imagine there would at least be an investigation.

You really think that if people run their tires low on air pressure that the manufacturer should be found at fault?

Firestone was totally railroaded out of business on that deal. Smacked of the Salem witch hunts from day one.

Allan

I had the Wilderness tires on my truck and never had any problems. I replaced them when they had close to 50,000 miles on them. I know they weren't the affected size, but I still checked them. For an "Off Road" tire, they weren't very good for off road. I like my Bridgestone Revos a lot better.

On the other hand, my dad had an explorer with the Wilderness tires in the 235 size. His were delaminating and were replaced under the recall. To me it looked like they were just old and getting dry rotted.

Yep, I've been trying to train myself to stay outta these "firey" topics. Darnit, I slipped. :>)

Allan

Robert

Now general tires, that's a problem. I have had 2 sets of the Ameri 550 and a friend had a set on his truck. The problem is the belts get streched and then the tread starts coming apart. They don't balance good either. I don't drive fast either, in fact people complain I drive to slow. Tires is an item that, you get what you pay for.

Keith

3 cyl

Media is all about ratings these days, just another business, just another big corporation. They can be lumped in with the big bad corporations everyone is talking about - same big bad evil. I do not trust them at all. Exploding trucks, Food Lyon, and so on. I don't want them silenced, but they are all about selling commercial time with hype, not at all about informing people. Yuk.

--->Paul

Keith

Your concerns about the media are totally valid. The media's "objective" reporting is one of the biggest problems we have in this country today. Too many people think that if Rather or Brokaw or Jennings said it, then it just has to be true! People have lost their ability to analyze and think for themselves.