Another Tale of Bad Goodyear Tires

[moisheh]

Our Dynasty came factory equiped with 295/80 G670 tires. Actually until recently all MH's in that size range were either GY or Michelin. Toyo was OEM on CC and National but after being sued by CC they no longer want to be on MH's. The GY's rode and handled nicely but at around 20,000 miles they were rivering. This is wear on inner and outer edges and is well documented on this and other forums. Other than a few lucky RV'rs GY has not warranted this factory design defect. I spent the last 2 months waiting for the GY factory rep to examine the tires. Apparently this type of problem can only be warranty approved by the factory! This rep covers from Thunder Bay, Ont. to BC. A huge area. He was a jerk. Took one look and said it is my MH. Either mechanical problem or Alignment. I showed him my work order from 2 weeks ago and from 20,000 miles ago. Both showed the unit aligned to the same specs and that there is nothing wrong with the suspension. I had changed the original Bilsteins to Koni's at 9000 miles and they are still perfect. Then the rep handed me a whole bunch of BS about my ( and other MH's) chassis designs. He said this was the first time he heard of these tires being problematic! What a liar. I then asked if he would at least pay to have the fronts put on the tag axle. He said NO. I lost it after that and will not print what I called he and GY. I was so angry I drove right over to the Michelin truck dealer and put 2 new Michelin's on the front. The moral of this story is that if you are buying a MH and it has those tires either walk away or insist on something else. There are hundreds of posts on this subject in various forums. One common theme has been that changing to anything else does away with the problems: Michelin's. Continental, Toyo, Hancook, BFG, Firestone and more. I bet you could put Double Coin ( bad idea)or even something with a name like Happy Rooster and have better results. I have instructed my drivers to never use GY's on any of our small fleet of vehicles. How can they continue to flog these knowing full well that people are unhappy? How can you sell a tire specifically for RV's without a decoupling groove? My rant for the day

[movin-on]

Is this problem just in your size tire...I have 275/70 22.5's G670's with over 35000 miles on them and they still look and ride great...I went to these because the original Michelin XRV's had blowout issues...At that time Michelin was blaming everything except the tire...Always something...

[Mike Canter]

Moisheh, I feel for ya. On my previous MH I went through the same thing with GYs. They told be the MH was out of alignemet so I had the front and rear checked and it was right on. I did all they said and they still wouldn't pay anything. On the next MH, the Signature, it still had the factory installed GY G670's on it and they were rivering at 24K miles but had planty of tread left in the middle. The tires had aged out and I just wasn't going to put GYs back on it and go through that all again. So I put Michelins on it. I used a tread depth vernier the other day after putting 20k miles on the front and 8K on the back and the wear is absolutely even. Goodyear is sure losing a lot of money.

[moisheh]

Goodyear has become the new Firestone. Somewhere in a board room GY executives have discussed this problem and like the Pinto gas tanks have decided it is cheaper to do nothing and just keep making bad tires. In a few years they will be whining that the Chinese have too much of the tire market.

[Zbugsii]

I got rid of my GY soonest I could, they were cupping, out of round and could not be balanced anymore. Worse yet, two years ago, I decided to give GY (american made) a chance for my car tires.... what a mistake. Again, out of round. Once I get a bit more mileage out of the car tires I will replace them with Michelins...

GY has lost my business for ever more.

[TEDDE]

My DW and I just got back from a 5 week trip to the USA. While down there I noticed wear on my passengers side front tire. The wear was on the outside edge only. but had a wheel shimmy at 65 miles per hour.I believe you call it rivering. I got concerned about this and went to a local tire place and they told me I had to change all 6 tires. They also told me that I had a front end problem. I got a second opinion and decided to leave them on and return to Canada. I am going to replace the front tires next spring with Michelins. My question is can I only change the front 2 tires and do the other ones next year?? The back is wearing very nicely but the front rivering has me worried about saftey. Can I mix GY's with Michelins??

Ted

[Midniteoyl]

Yes, you can mix front and back.. rule is 'same tread on same axle'.

[Mike Canter]

I first just changed my front to Michelins so I still had GYs on the back. Had no problems.

Shimmy at 65 mph or a cupping wear pattern has nothing to do with rivering. Shimmy is caused by a wheel being out of balance and cupping is the wear pattern caused by a wheel being out of balance for a long time. The excepting is that if the shock is really bad the bouncing can cause a cupping wear pattern and the bounce can feel like a shimmy. So if you had those #$%@ Monroe shocks then it can cause problems like that. If you haveKoni or Bilsteain then it is most likely tire balance.

Most MHs have no camber adjustment on the front end so you cannnot wear the outside or inside edge due to being off on camber. What you see is what you get on camber. Castor will not wear the tires if it is off. Too mauch toe in can wear the outer edges and too much toe out can wear the inner edges.

[Barlow46]

Goodyear lost about $5000 from me also. Bought my 05 in 2010 and immediately went with 8 new michelins. Peace of mind is good for now and so far (8000) no signs of rivering.

[cabin man]

Goodyears= good for a year !!!!

[Mochisme]

Ok yall have thrown out a new (to me) term that I would like to understand. What is "Rivering"? If I am going to watch for it, I need to understand what it is other then a tire problem. Thanks.

[Mike Canter]

Rivering or River Wear is where the second tread in on either the inside or outside or both sides wear but the outer tread does not. It is mostly seen on long wearing tires.

[moisheh]

Mike: There seems to be more than one definition for rivering. I looked at the book that all tire companies use to define wear patterns and their causes. In that book they call it rivering or erosion wear and it is on both the outside and the inside of the tire. But extreme wear. Mine would be out of rubber in 5 or 6000 miles! Here is what one of the large RV aligment shops says about rivering:


"A ripple on the extreme inside or outside of the tire in the first ¼ to ¾ inch of the tread may indicate "River Wear"

I looked for some good photos online but without success. Some tire web sites refer to rivering where the wear pattern angles across the tread like a river

[Bikedaddy]

Here is a website that will explain the different wear patterns. About half way down they show erosion wear, (river wear).

http://www.kaltire.com/index.php?page=tire-wear-conditions