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Old 09-22-2011, 12:37 PM   #55 (permalink)
MN Driver
2000 Honda Insight
 
Join Date: Jul 2010
Location: Minneapolis, MN
Posts: 57
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Be very careful with RE92's when they are giving you the thump thump thump. I had two RE92's had their tread separate on me. One was when I was going to Detroit and could see the metal through the centerline of the tread when I was doing my pre-trip check the morning I was leaving and the tire was normal a week before but it had a slight thud thud thud going down the road. So I pulled the tire off and swapped it for one on my other Insight. While the tire was sitting in the garage over the 5 days or so I was gone the tire had split open but still held its pressure.

The second time the tire looked fine and I was driving about 50mph and the thud thud thud got louder over the period of about 30 seconds and I was looking to get into a nearby gas station that was within eye's sight range and just crossed a bridge and was still slowing down and THUD, good bye tire and front end met the ground hard. I was surprised that the car felt just as in control riding on the rim for the short period that it took to go from 30mph to zero to a good spot to put the spare on. After two of these I can now get the spare on in 7 minutes, those little scissor jacks are a pain but you can fit a hydraulic jack under the car when your ground clearance is just a few inches(5 cm) from sitting on the rim.

I'm just saying be careful and inspect the crap out of that tire if you see any areas that look a little bulged or any areas where the tread is unevenly deep across the tire(from inside to outside) likely from a bulge, expect that tire to fail. Also look for cracking that is in line with the circumference of the tire. After having two tires fail through tread separation and two that had leaky valve stems, I replaced all four. One of the separated tires was on the rear and as old as the car. The other one was a newer replacement. Having the car parked outside in the sun for 3 years without being driven by the previous owner is the reason for these troubles but it brings out warning signs to watch for.
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