How much force is in a tire blowout? A lot!!!

Your right they don’t. A kick or thump is sufficient. If your gonna have a blow out, your gonna have a blowout. Bad belts or just some sort of defect. Or maybe even a recap.
Checking your air pressure to make sure you have it on spec won’t don’t a #### thing for you fella but if you want to check 18 tires with a gauge every single morning and hook air in to them to fill them to spec, more power to you. You are the only one I ever heard of that does such a thing. Just sayin

 

I remember when I had blown up the left two drive tires clean off it's drum (Wheels and all) and it also took out a number of items around that particular part of the tractor, bent the catwalk and so on (Did not hurt the container and chassis above it one whit)

They were like a double bomb at 60+ near the welcome center southbound on I-83 back in the late 1988 time period on my offset cab mack. I walked across both lanes near the MA PA line to get to the payphone (Im going to play in 80 mph traffic today ma... twice...) and get road tow going to where I am, it will be a while. I had lost parts of my air system and was unable to hold air etc. I did not have the experience or teaching from old hands how to use a vice grip to fold over a torn airline and pinch it off in those days.

The Lawman showed up. walked to my fuel tank. Says this is not a rest area, get going son. I pointed to my left and down at the bomb destruction around my tractor on that side and told him this one isnt going anywhere until a tow truck gets to me.

Oh. (Like you did not have eyes Mr Trooper?)

He then used me as a radar blind. First customer up was a yellow corvette in excess of 100 raced out and captured him. Came back to my front bumper and hung his radar ear out and waited for the next lawbreaker. I think he had captured a minimum of 10 by the time road service showed up with two tires.

For this one to be bolting tires on wheels hanging his bum out into the right hand travel lane took equal parts of dum dum and courage. Im surprised the traffic did not kill him then and there in those days.

 

I use a gauge on every tractor tire. The trailer isn't mine and a thump is good enough.

 

That’s not so bad I guess. But not necessary. However It’s your truck and you are at liberty to do so. You could get a few more miles or save a few mpg. But it’s not gonna save you from a blowout from an underlining tire issue. You should know if your tire lost a compromising amount of air from a thump. A daily thump to the tires will reveal a tire that picked up a nail or a valve stem leak. That’s if you know your truck. After all the truck has been sitting for 8-16 hours depending on if you Otr or not.

 

i had a guy blow a super single on his trailer. when he was passing me. it felt like someone hit me in the chest

 

5-10psi low won’t cause a tire to blow if it’s not already trashed.
I can tell my tires are below the 105psi I keep them at with my tire thumper. (Company says 100, tire mfg says 110) at 90psi if you can’t tell you might as well throw it in the trash
You can’t just whack it and pretend to know what you’re doing.
If you can tune a guitar you can read tires with a thumper. I can also do it with my heel.

 

What s even scarier about a blowout is when a mechanic is about to change a tire. I seen one blowout when a mechanic was right by it. It knocked him out for a minute

 

I hammer my tires every morning.

The best way to tell they're low, however. Is look at them when your loaded. You'll see a low tire every time. Or even one that's starting to get low.

It's not hard to see your tire bulge when loaded.

Today's tires are dangerous but nowhere near the old days with split rims.

That dummy only had a blast of air.

Imagine the split rim ring coming off.

 

I worked in a tire shop that used to work on split ring rims. A worker forgot the chains. The ring wasnt properly seated. The worker died when the ring opened his skull.