Tires Again!

This  has been an interesting read.  A lot of very informative and useful info here.  It is good to see a discussion on tires that does not start our with "get Goodyear Endurance tires ASAP or both tires will blow and you will have a catastrophic accident". As stated, I believe that most tires issues are caused by low pressure or over loading the trailer.  It is amusing to me to see all the modifications and stuff people add to their trailers.  I suspect that many trailers are traveling down the road over the recommended weight.  Result is blown tires and then the "china bomb" discussion starts all over again.  For me:  205/75/14 Carlisle load range D

I bought a pair of Carlisle load range D tires for my 172.  They were noticeably better in ride and mileage.  I'd consider buying Carlisle again.  But the little country of origin lettering said "Made in China."  I think it's really a function of how serious the company is about quality control, not just the country of origin.  Carlisle and Goodyear are much better about focusing on quality control.  

I think I'm on the same page. At this point, it would be more work to find tires that are 100% domestic, than to just go with the best quality tires you can find. 

Corporations are constantly trying to cut costs wherever they can, it is in their nature to do so. Marketing has the objective of increasing price revenue. Most brand marketing is based on the fear of making a mistake. Branding becomes a shortcut for people who don’t have time to research a topic thoroughly. A classic one is gasoline. It’s all the same stuff, only the octane rating matters. Another is monster cable. People paid 10x for cables that sounded absolutely no different out of fear of losing audio quality.

As many have said, most of the problems with trailer tires are readily attributed to the oems. including FR, selecting marginally rated tires for the application. Others can be explained by improper maintenance. It is much easier to blame a problem on the tire than to take responsibility for the failure. So, barring convincing data to the contrary, I will continue buying conservatively rated tires from low cost manufacturers. I do the same with everything I buy unless there is clear data to the contrary, for example with auto makes. I buy Toyotas because of their strong reliability record and resale value. I never buy a luxury brand of anything unless that is the only way to get a feature I need. Saves a lot of money and has served me well so far.

Others are of course free to choose differently with your hard earned dollars.

I doubt that very many corporations today will knowingly choose to increase costs to improve their product quality unless there is an independent data source or threat of litigation keeping them honest. Much cheaper just to spend marketing dollars. The marketplace is not that efficient, as this debate of trailer tires shows, it’s not easy without that independent data source to figure out which products have better quality and reliability.

The good news is that most manufacturers have figured out by now that quality reduces costs. The Toyota Production System, now more generically known as lean manufacturing, has been adopted globally by most serious manufacturing companies.

As for the pejorative term “knockoff”, that implies copying has taken place. I don’t think that is an appropriate label for a tire manufacturer selling their products under their own brand. No one is mistaking their Chinese tires for Goodyear or Carlisle tires. We are buying an inexpensive tire, not some fake copy of another tire brand.

If there was independent data available for trailer tires similar to what is available for passenger car tires then we could all make more informed choices. I use Consumer Reports for info on passenger car tires and have wound up with South Korean brands Kumho and Hankook recently, and been very satisfied. Good value at a good price. If there is similar data for trailer tires I haven’t seen it anywhere.

So, barring data I’ll continue to follow my standard practice of buying the least expensive product with the features I’m looking for. Others are free to follow the opposite approach.