Front Blow Out with Comfort Drive

[danleininger]

Originally Posted by rebelsbeach

Ken Sherwin, for those of you that must not know, is the granddaddy of Comfort Drive..... It's HIS baby and all those blowouts were on a test track in a controlled environment.

Way too cool. I hope he's got some video of some of those blowouts that he'd be willing to share with us. PLEASE!!!!

[wnytaxman]

Originally Posted by D Lindy

wnytaxman; if you're only reason for buying the system is so that you have it in case of a blow out, IMO I wouldn't spend the money. The chances of having a front blow-out are slim to none. I drove Truck over the road and had 1 front blow-out and had drove OVER 1 million miles in that time.

As others have said, I wouldn't buy a rig with Comfort Drive just because of a fear of a possible blowout. My question was just based on finding out what others may have experienced with their rigs and during a blowout. Just getting more information for my search.

[KenSherwin]

Responses to various questions and comments in random order:

Our product is the ColumnDrive that Newmar calls Comfort Drive. I like their name better.

Yes, I was testing tires and vehicle behavior...........and I'm the luckiest guy I know! I get to do all kinds of fun things with these coaches on somebody else's dime!

Yes, I was on a test track.

Easy on the "granddaddy" stuff. My first ColumnDrive hasn't had kids yet!


No, I can't post videos. We do not advertise ColumnDrive to help during blowouts and will not show anything that indicates it might. I would not buy a Comfort Drive just to handle blowouts, either. I WOULD buy it to keep my old shoulders from hurting like they do when I drive an obsolete bus (that's one without ColumnDrive).


Everybody pay attention here:

Actually, I do know about low air pressure. Low air pressure absolutely WILL cause "rapid air loss". (You gotta love those euphemisms.) I could destroy a tire in 20 minutes. What I proved was that a steer tire with low air pressure will probably NOT cause the coach to pull before the tire destroys itself. In all the tests I've done, the driver was never aware that he had a problem, even on a vehicle without a ColumnDrive. Even more unexpectedly, he could not tell that he had a low tire on a bus with MANUAL steering. The takeaway here is to check your tire pressures often.