Almost every thread on “tire life in RV usage” has said something about “tire inspection.” What hasn’t been properly or completely covered is the “how to” and “who can” do a competent job of inspecting tires. Well, in this post, I am going to try.
What is a tire inspection
When we talk about tire inspection, most of the time we are referring to inspecting a tire after a few years of use. The owner wants to know if it is OK to use the tire for a few more years.
This post is not about the “inspection” every owner should do before leaving on the next trip. That inspection just covers the basics of looking at the tread and sidewall and checking tire inflation. This post is about an inspection done to determine if it is OK to use your tires for another year or two.
How to find a competent tire inspector
I have read some posts where people point out the difficulty of finding someone they can trust to do a competent job. Yes, answering the question of “Who do you trust?” is difficult.
Here is what I would consider:
A “complete” inspection would include, at a minimum, a visual inspection of the internal and external surfaces of the tire with bright lighting and running hands across and touching every inch of the interior and external surfaces. This would require each tire to be removed from the RV and dismounted. This presents other problems as dismounting and remounting a 5+-year-old tire must be done with extra care, as the old rubber is more susceptible to tearing.
Ideally, on steel-body tires, an “X-ray” or “holographic” inspection is desirable. This type of inspection is many times done before a steel-body tire is retreaded. But because of the potential for tire damage, not many dealers are willing to risk damaging a customer’s tire, so they are not willing to do the dismount and remount.
Also, I doubt that you will find any regular tire dealer has the necessary equipment to do X-ray or holographic inspection. Even if you found a retread shop willing to do the inspection, you would probably discover the cost of such an inspection to be very high, maybe more than the cost of a new tire. So what are your options?
- Don’t do a complete inspection and hope you have no problems.
- Or do an inspection without dismounting the tire from the wheel yourself.
If you do the tire inspection yourself
If you decide to do the inspection yourself, I would strongly urge you to educate yourself on what to look for. You need to be aware that a thorough inspection of a tire on your RV should take at least 10 minutes for each tire.
BEFORE you start, review and be sure you understand all the points in these 7 blog posts:
- Sidewall bump
- Defective tire
- Did you hit a pot hole
- How to avoid tire failure
- How to avoid tire failure and RV damage
- General guides on inspection
- How do I inspect my tires?
OK, so what should you be looking for?
- Signs of the tire being “out-of-round”. You can learn this by doing a “free-spin-inspection” (see link in the “How do I inspect my tires” post).
- Bumps or depressions in the tread or sidewall.
- Cuts or snags in the sidewall or tread.
- Punctures, rocks, nails or screws in the tread.
- Ask yourself, “Has the tire ALWAYS been fully inflated?” This means you NEVER had a Low Pressure Warning from your TPMS (tire pressure monitoring system).
- Did you do a test of your TPMS and the TPMS warning system within the last 12 months?
If you see anything suspicious or “different” in one of your tires, you should probably take that tire to a dealer that sells that brand of tires. Have the store manager inspect the tire to determine if it needs to be replaced.
If you ever had a TPMS warning, that might be an indication of potential internal structural damage and that tire needs extra examination.
Roger Marble
*****
If you have tire questions, check out Roger’s posts on RVtravel.com. There are hundreds of posts covering everything to do with tires.
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RVT1262
Don’t forget to inspect the inner sidewalls too.
They are just as prone to failure and damage as the outside.
Yup. I said “A “complete” inspection would include, at a minimum, a visual inspection of the internal and external surfaces of the tire with bright lighting and running hands across and touching every inch of the interior and external surfaces.”
Thank you for the thoughtful discussion, Roger. Have a great day and safe travels!