Steel Belt Separation?

[Falaholic]

Yesterday noticed the front tire skipping on the most moderate turns and curves. Pulled over, pumped the handlebars and noticed my sidewall flexing alot more than it should. Called it a night and headed home. Parked it and pumped it to 40psi, and went to bed.
Woke up in the morn, and checked pressure; 20psi.
Soap, water, spray bottle found 4 leaks, all of which have hair thin metal wire coming out. Tried pulling on a few and none of them would come out. Came to the assumption, that my steel belt is separating. Am I correct in this assumption?

Sorry no pics.
Just looking for advice on getting them replaced via warranty, as they are ~6 months old, and ~3K on them.
Tires: Dunlop Roadsmart II, 110/80/18

 

[[email protected]]

Yesterday noticed the front tire skipping on the most moderate turns and curves. Pulled over, pumped the handlebars and noticed my sidewall flexing alot more than it should. Called it a night and headed home. Parked it and pumped it to 40psi, and went to bed.
Woke up in the morn, and checked pressure; 20psi.
Soap, water, spray bottle found 4 leaks, all of which have hair thin metal wire coming out. Tried pulling on a few and none of them would come out. Came to the assumption, that my steel belt is separating. Am I correct in this assumption?

Sorry no pics.
Just looking for advice on getting them replaced via warranty, as they are ~6 months old, and ~3K on them.
Tires: Dunlop Roadsmart II, 110/80/18

If you still have good tread depth and this is happening I would definitely get some photos and contact Dunlop.

Sent from my SM-G930V using Tapatalk

 

[Traumahawk]

Just curious, but there SHOULD be a date of manufacture somewhere on the side.

 

[Falaholic]

Dunlop's website states to contact the place of purchase; calling them tomorrow morning.
There is plenty of tread depth. Even found a leak in one of the water channels.

 

[Falaholic]

Just curious, but there SHOULD be a date of manufacture somewhere on the side.

Went outside and checked, there is no direct date o the side wall. Assuming that the serial number would dictate its DOB.

 

[D-Max2012]

It should have something on there like this:



If they are anything like automobile tires, look for the last 4 digits.. 5107 would equate to 51 week of 2007.

The LM LR, should be manufacture's code and wheel type (you'd need to look up that info).

 

[Falaholic]

Thank you. I did find the DOB: 1012.
So Feb 2012, and I bought/mounted the tire June 2016. Already 4 years old.

After 5 calls to Corporate, and passes around, I was finally giving the number of the lead rep that handles these types of claims. After explaining to him the situation, and sending him photos, while he was still on the phone. He couldn't make heads or tails of it, so he had me take the tire to a local distributor. Tire off, in trunk, and off to the races. Rep at Cycle Gear looked at it, tried tugging on one of the threads, and said "never in my life have I seen anything like this, but you're right the steel belt is coming through the tire...from the inside". Got a call from the Dunlop rep, sending a replacement, should be here before the end of the week. He is concerned enough about this defect that he is going to have UPS come by and pick it up from me to send to their engineers unk:. I'd rather hear this than a typical throw it away, and we'll sweep this under the rug.

So from the point of contacting the rep, this went smoothly, had to jump through a hoop or two, but it was expected. Now going through Corporate just to get to the right person, now that was unacceptable.

Pics to come...

 

[Fire-medic]

I believe there is enough Dunlop factory interest in seeing if this is serious enough to issue a recall, if they find other instances in your March 2012 (ten weeks into the year is the middle of March) production date. They will know what plant it came from due to the coding on the tire, and with the date and the plant, they will be able to see if multiple warranties have been done on that product from that plant, at that time. Remember the Firestone tires on the Ford Explorers? The attorneys want to avoid at all costs that kind of bad publicity, not to mention there were fatalities involved.

 

[[email protected]]

Glad to here they are doing something about it.

Sent from my SM-G930V using Tapatalk

 

[Falaholic]

 

[Falaholic]

... if they find other instances in your March 2012 (ten weeks into the year is the middle of March) production date.

I see my error, thank you for correcting that.

 

[Fire-medic]

Some pics!

 

[Falaholic]

So I got my replacement tire installed Monday.

Showed the installer why I was replacing the tire, and he too said he's never seen a tire do this.

Upon removing my tire he came to me and addressed a possible reason why my belt was separating. He looked in the book and saw that the Vmax originally comes with ply-biased tires. He said that when he looked at the radial tire, it looked weird. Said that he felt that the tire was too big for the rim, even though it was the right tread width; 110. He felt that biased-ply wouldn't cause a mushroom-ing effect that he is seeing with the radial. He felt that because it was a radial, that the rim was causing the sidewall to pinch; bringing the sidewalls closer together and producing a sharper pointed V in the center.

He wanted me to go with a biased-ply, but I said no and chaulked it up to a defective tire. I had a Battleaxe on the front that was a radial and lasted (IIRC) ~7K. Also knowing that others here are running radials on their Vmaxes as well. I wasn't going to go back.

ETA: Roadsmart II tires have been discontinued and replaced with the Roadsmart III. Will keep everyone posted.

 

[Falaholic]

Almost forgot to mention.

Met a guy at the shop that day on a '98 Vmax; exhaust and jetted.

On thing that he told me. 24K miles on the clock...still original tires.

I called BS over and over, yet he insisted they were the original.

Hmmm, garage kept, clean, top speed 90mph? Is that the secret to tire longevity?

 

[1FK00]

Well, no oxygen or UV also helps. Hard to find though. The no oxygen part is especially hard on the rider.

 

[Traumahawk]

Almost forgot to mention.

Met a guy at the shop that day on a '98 Vmax; exhaust and jetted.

On thing that he told me. 24K miles on the clock...still original tires.

I called BS over and over, yet he insisted they were the original.

Hmmm, garage kept, clean, top speed 90mph? Is that the secret to tire longevity?

I wouldnt ride a bike that the tires were 18 years old, with 24K on the tires. IMHO, theyve been changed before.

 

[Fire-medic]

I don't think so, original tires!

 

[sdt354]

Lot's of us running radials on stock wheels. I don't buy the argument for bias ply over radial. Though nothing wrong with bias ply's either.I think you just got a bad tire. I and some of my friends have gotten tires that were't any good new. Running out, was usually the issue.
Steve-o

 

[davesax36]

The only thing that would make it mushroom funny would be a width issue anyway. If you put on a 110, that shouldn't be the problem.