Is it me or is it time to ban recap tires from on-highway use?

Caps are only as good as the driver who ran and maintained the casings. Most "drivers" anymore drag trailer and even tractor tires over a curb multiple times a day without a second thought. If I do that once in a year with trailer tires its a big deal. Never mind keeping air pressure right. I'll run recaps with confidence on any casings that I've had. But I won't buy random recaps from a tire place.

 

Caps get a lot of crap on their own.

6 or 7 years. You must not go anywhere. Even virgins won't last that long. Unless they sit more then work.

 

Yep, I would not have capped any case that had ever been flat or I knew the sidewall had been abused. Never had not one problem with a tire I had capped.

 

Radials and Q-brakes too some had inflaton systems [40-45 and other 'unusual' chassis] and most suppliers now have re-furbs with LED lights and radials on spoke hubs cheaper. they are slowly phasing the old 1000 x 20 stuff to the china tires 'snow king' and 'leopard' will eventually dissapear

 

We kept a couple bias 'full cap' recaps for the spread axle we had as it would rip regular caps off fast.

Tanker yankers don't like any tire failures, fenders and hose tubes n supports get expensive

 

We stopped running caps on our 3 axle chassis for this same reason

 

You were simply lucky, I'm hooked to a chassis for Monday, all 8 tires are bias caps, checked the air, all were low, 2 of the tires have channel splits, but it's not bad enough for repair to replace them, so it'll be a 60 mph slog to the customer with 36K in the box, only upside is with all the rain and cool temps predicted this week, they should hold up decently.

Two summers ago, we were doing a bunch of fireworks loads to NM, the first three loads were on regular 40' chassis, the one trip I never exceeded 55 mph and still had to stop every hour and sit for 20 minutes or so to let them cool down they were in such bad shape. We took pics of them, including showing the placarded load, pool manager verbally shrugged his shoulders at us. After those first three loads, we ate the cost to flip the loads to our 3 axle chassis, it was safer.

 

Watched a 53’ van up ahead of me on I 10 blow a right rear super single fat boy tire.
Looked like he hit a land mine! Pieces of tire, mud flap and trailer went all over the road. Driver did a good job holding it on the road.

 

As far as the inflation debate,, you run what the inflation pressure is that’s stamped on the tire. I would trust the engineers at Michelin or Goodyear than internet experts.
If it says 110 pounds cold, that’s what I do.

 

The tire is considered flat when it’s at half the recommended psi listed on the sidewall. According to regulations.