Three blowouts on one trip!

[johndeerefarmer]

One a 300 mile round trip we had three blowouts on the Westlakes. They are the original tires (2016) that came on it and I know that I should have changed them earlier.
I have the TST tire monitor. On the first blowout, not a peep out of the monitor until after the tire blew, then of course it gave me a low pressure warning. That wiped out my fender flare and bent the sheet metal. I was doing 70 mph.
This was 20 miles from home. Made it the rest of the 120 miles without issue.
On the way back driving 65 I had a second blowout. This wiped out the fender flare on the other side. I had placed aluminum plate underneath the wheel wheels back in '16 when I bought it. Glad I did. One piece got bend and halfway ripped out. Once again, no indication from the TPMS until after the blowout. This was on a Sunday afternoon at 2:30. We found a tire shop open and took both tires. He only had two used tires in that size so we bought them. Headed out again this time at 60 mph. 20 minutes later a third Westlake blew! I installed my last spare and we continued on at 55 mph. 4 hours later made it home.

All three of those Westlakes failed the same. A complete failure. They blew like a bomb. In all three instances the tpms system didn't do me any good. None were losing pressures or getting hot. I also have a 2017 Alumna flatbed with Westlakes. Coming home three months ago one of those blew the same way. I was also monitoring with the tpms. Same thing happened- no warning. That blow out completely destroyed my aluminum fender.

I put GY Endurance on the Alumna trailer and wonder if I should do the same for the 29RS? Thoughts?

So what I learned from this is:
1. TPMS doesn't do much good unless you have a slow leak- not sure I will buy another
2. Change tires after 5-6 years. Tires had less than 6000 miles and were kept in the barn or covered up with covers.
3. Never buy Westlakes as what's the chance of three blowing on one short 300 mile trip??? It's like they had a built in expiration and were rigged to blow after a certain time. LOL

 

[huntindog]

One a 300 mile round trip we had three blowouts on the Westlakes. They are the original tires (2016) that came on it and I know that I should have changed them earlier.
I have the TST tire monitor. On the first blowout, not a peep out of the monitor until after the tire blew, then of course it gave me a low pressure warning. That wiped out my fender flare and bent the sheet metal. I was doing 70 mph.
This was 20 miles from home. Made it the rest of the 120 miles without issue.
On the way back driving 65 I had a second blowout. This wiped out the fender flare on the other side. I had placed aluminum plate underneath the wheel wheels back in '16 when I bought it. Glad I did. One piece got bend and halfway ripped out. Once again, no indication from the TPMS until after the blowout. This was on a Sunday afternoon at 2:30. We found a tire shop open and took both tires. He only had two used tires in that size so we bought them. Headed out again this time at 60 mph. 20 minutes later a third Westlake blew! I installed my last spare and we continued on at 55 mph. 4 hours later made it home.

All three of those Westlakes failed the same. A complete failure. They blew like a bomb. In all three instances the tpms system didn't do me any good. None were losing pressures or getting hot. I also have a 2017 Alumna flatbed with Westlakes. Coming home three months ago one of those blew the same way. I was also monitoring with the tpms. Same thing happened- no warning. That blow out completely destroyed my aluminum fender.

I put GY Endurance on the Alumna trailer and wonder if I should do the same for the 29RS? Thoughts?

So what I learned from this is:
1. TPMS doesn't do much good unless you have a slow leak- not sure I will buy another
2. Change tires after 5-6 years. Tires had less than 6000 miles and were kept in the barn or covered up with covers.
3. Never buy Westlakes as what's the chance of three blowing on one short 300 mile trip??? It's like they had a built in expiration and were rigged to blow after a certain time. LOL

When I had TTs I had MANY ST tire failures. Then I made the jump to LT tires, and never looked back. From 2006 to 2021 I ran Michelin XPS RIBS. Not a single issue in 15 years.

 

[Soundsailor]

Pretty sad story [MENTION=1328]johndeerefarmer[/MENTION], just glad you were able to get home safe and no one was hurt.

 

[Second Chance]

For those who read this thread hereafter, the Westlake load range E tires on [MENTION=1328]johndeerefarmer[/MENTION]'s 2016 29RS are a different animal from the Westlake load range G tires coming on the newer Solitudes and Momentums. The LREs had (and still have, as far as I know) a reputation for failure. The LRGs are building a better track record.

Rob

 

[59 Apache]

My condolences on your bad luck.

I bought a new Prowler tt back in '97. It came with Goodyears. Ran them for 10 years before replacing them with another set of Goodyears. Sold the trailer last year after 14 years with the second set. Not one failure or even a flat in all those years. I tried to order my new 2600RB with Goodyears but was denied. I ran the Westlakes for the first year and replaced them this past May with Goodyears.

I never leave on a trip without checking the air pressure. I usually only have to add air in the spring after winter storage. Hopefully I'll have as good of luck with these as I've had in the past.

John

 

[Ynot4me2]

[MENTION=1328]johndeerefarmer[/MENTION] so sorry for your bad luck on this trip. Glad you were able to make home. You have a good tpms, one of the best. Since it didn't notify you of a leak, I guess you had an instant, total blow out x 3. Not having a tpms you would of only notice something was wrong only later down the road and maybe the damage would have been worse. Another thing that I learned on here is that age of a tire is just as important as mileage and as [MENTION=870]Second Chance[/MENTION] said, those load E Westlakes have a reputation.

 

[NB Canada]

One a 300 mile round trip we had three blowouts on the Westlakes. They are the original tires (2016) that came on it and I know that I should have changed them earlier.
I have the TST tire monitor. On the first blowout, not a peep out of the monitor until after the tire blew, then of course it gave me a low pressure warning. That wiped out my fender flare and bent the sheet metal. I was doing 70 mph.
This was 20 miles from home. Made it the rest of the 120 miles without issue.
On the way back driving 65 I had a second blowout. This wiped out the fender flare on the other side. I had placed aluminum plate underneath the wheel wheels back in '16 when I bought it. Glad I did. One piece got bend and halfway ripped out. Once again, no indication from the TPMS until after the blowout. This was on a Sunday afternoon at 2:30. We found a tire shop open and took both tires. He only had two used tires in that size so we bought them. Headed out again this time at 60 mph. 20 minutes later a third Westlake blew! I installed my last spare and we continued on at 55 mph. 4 hours later made it home.

All three of those Westlakes failed the same. A complete failure. They blew like a bomb. In all three instances the tpms system didn't do me any good. None were losing pressures or getting hot. I also have a 2017 Alumna flatbed with Westlakes. Coming home three months ago one of those blew the same way. I was also monitoring with the tpms. Same thing happened- no warning. That blow out completely destroyed my aluminum fender.

I put GY Endurance on the Alumna trailer and wonder if I should do the same for the 29RS? Thoughts?

So what I learned from this is:
1. TPMS doesn't do much good unless you have a slow leak- not sure I will buy another
2. Change tires after 5-6 years. Tires had less than 6000 miles and were kept in the barn or covered up with covers.
3. Never buy Westlakes as what's the chance of three blowing on one short 300 mile trip??? It's like they had a built in expiration and were rigged to blow after a certain time. LOL

Rigged to blow?

 

[Scott'n'Wendy]

Well the manufacturing tolerances must be pretty tight with those westlakes..lol All giving it up at pretty much the same time! Quality sux but man...the consistency......

Sorry to hear of your troubles jdfarmer.

I go max five years on tires now. Even though it seems like I'm throwing $$ away when I look at the condition of the old tires....

 

[WhittleBurner]

@johndeerefarmer , 3 times the charm right. You shoiuld be safe now. Glad the damage was minimal.

When we got our 303 we wouldn't take it off the lot until they put on 16" tires, still westlakes but we got a few years out of them until a split in the tread was discovered during a pre trip inspection. They were about 4 years old. Been running Sailuns ever since, just replaced with a new set last year

 

[johndeerefarmer]

Rigged to blow?

Making a joke............ LOL but you gotta admit three blowouts on a 300 mile trip is a 1 in a 10,000 chance. Lucky me..

 

[NB Canada]

Making a joke............ LOL but you gotta admit three blowouts on a 300 mile trip is a 1 in a 10,000 chance. Lucky me..

Or something is wrong with the brakes,bearings or axle alignment

 

[traveldawg]

What were the date codes on the tires. On a 2016 they could have been made in 2015 making them almost 7 years old. That's pushing the limit I think.

I use 6 years from the date code as my guide line. It's really too bad because a lot of times the tires are low mileage and it seems a waste of money.

I remember on my Class A I had to toss out a seemingly good set of 6 year old Micheline's with less than 35k miles on them. And I've seen lucky guys who get over 8 years on a set sometimes.

 

[Jerryr]

I made expensive decision to replace the tires on my 2015 Low mileage Lexus earlier this year. It only had 23000 miles on it but we recently occasionally were using it to travel 125 miles on mostly remote rural roads between house and cabin. When we were using it only locally up the age didn’t bother me.

I decided they were “timed out” and put new tires on the car. The kid that replaced them questioned why I was replacing perfectly good tires.

I now have to make a hard Decision on when to replace $1,000 set of perfect looking 5-6 year old Goodyear G614 tires on our reflection. I’ll probably put on Sailuns.

 

[Harvestmoon]

When I had TTs I had MANY ST tire failures. Then I made the jump to LT tires, and never looked back. From 2006 to 2021 I ran Michelin XPS RIBS. Not a single issue in 15 years.

I never thought of that and would totally steal this idea if I could find LT tires for 14" wheels. I also have a 6000 lb tandem axle boat trailer that happens to run the same 14" tire as my TT. It came with Carlisle ST tires (yes, made in China) which are now hmmm about 15 years old. Always garage stored and probably average less than 500 miles a year. Visually nothing wrong with them but certainly I am pressing my luck and should replace them if I was venturing further than the local lakes. At this point though with all of the recent nightmare stories about bad tires, including the OP's, I'm almost afraid to replace them even with Goodyears. They don't make em like they used to? Almost done for the season so I'll make a decision on that in the spring and hope any quality issues get worked out by then. Our new 2023 TT came with 4 Goodyears from the factory (and a Westlake spare). Fingers crossed the Goodyears will serve us as well as the old Carlisles.

 

[TheHulk]

I had a Westlake tire blow when we had our Flagstaff double axle travel trailer (September 2021). The alarm on my TST TPMS went off immediately but no warning prior to that. I pulled over right away so just minimal damage to the trailer. A tire shop in a nearby town had 5 GY Endurance tires so I replaced all 5 right there. The quality of the tire matters but so does the size of the wheel. I had several blow outs on the pop-ups that we owned. The smaller the wheel, the more rotations, causing more friction and heat. I'm glad that the new owner of our old Flagstaff has 5 new Goodyears.

 

[Bamaman]

Here we go again. Every Chinese tire is junk except for the Sailun tire.

I replaced my Westlakes on Day One with Bridgestone Duravis E rated tires--a ribbed tire. Michelin has a comparable tire that's a little more expensive. These are tires like you see on F350's and F550's with crane and utility bodies.

If going ST tire, the Goodyear Endurance or the Maxxis M8008's are okay.

I got tired of paying big $ for Michelins on my 3/4 ton diesel and ordered two Sailun tires for the front end. They're wearing and performing well.

 

[cfowler55]

I replaced my LRG Westlakes with Sailuns , but ended up with the Vietnam built tires , which were recalled. Two failures in less than a year. Fortunately I caught both before they blew apart and damaged anything. On both , the TPMS showed elevated pressure and temperature on the failing tire after being towed a while. This is what prompted me to pull over and take a close look.
Charlie

 

[Mokulele]

That's a lot of bad luck!
I'm replacing my December 2016 manufacture-date Westlakes this week and had no issues at all-go figure!

 

[Bamaman]

Good luck to those that have not had issues. One big problem with tire failures that at highway tires, the flopping tire tread often does as much as $4,000 damage to the trailers.

My Bridgestone Duravis tires were Tennessee made, and they were freshly built (date wise) when I ordered them thru Costco.

 

[Gronk1]

Had a set of Goodyears on my Arctic Fox 5th a few years back. Blew a right rear (in my Avatar). Put on a set of LT Coopers & had no problem with them till I sold it. Don't think GY are as bullet proof as a lot of people think.
Had WL on my Solitude, put on Sailuns after a year with no problems in the past three. Sold the WL for $200