So the other while giving a co-worker a ride home from another co-workers house warming party I hit what must of been the biggest pot hole (Rittenhouse square area, for those in Philly.). The next morning I notice my radio was hanging out and that there was a bubble in my tire located on the side. These are basically brand new Falken Ziex ZE-512 that I just had mounted on last weds. They have at most 100 miles on them. My question is, is this fixable or will I just have to buy another tire? How many more miles can I drive on them until anything happens.

 

No it is not fixable. A hard impact to a tire(pothole) or driving on a tire while its flat causes the belts in the inner liner of the tire to separate, after the belts separate air gets in there and makes a bubble(some big some small). It will blow out fairly soon and that wont be fun, if u still have your spare i suggest you put it on until u get a new tire.

BTW, potholes suck dick

 

I have the exact same tires on my car and got a bubble on the sidewall. Took it back the the shop and they gave me a 50% discount cause i had 90% tread left. And definatly put your dummy tire on cause that sucka will blow...

 

Where did you buy the tires from?

 

A 50% discount with 90% tread left? What a shoddy shop. Any honest shop would have just replaced the tire under a manufacturer's defect warranty. Hell, that is what I do. I don't really care how the bubble got there, but with that amount of tread left, there is no reason to charge my customer for another tire. Unless my customer is being a huge *****, I don't charge them for the tire, just labor.
Dan

 

Update
For any of those who care I decided to call Discount Tire Direct where I purchased the tires from and Jay was nice enough to sell me the Warranty for the tires seeing as I was in the first 30 days of my purchase. One thing I didn't know was that he mentioned with low pro tires they are prone to this type of damage under high impact. Are Falken Ziex ZE 512's considered low pro tires, and what excatly are low pro tires and what are the advantages?

 

Low pro = short for low profile. Basically, any regular person would consider most likely anything under a 50 series sidewall to be low profile. There is no real advantage to having a low profile, besides the fact that some of them offer a "rim protecting edge" that sort of "overlaps" the lip of the wheel in chance of having a flat that you absolutely MUST drive on, or also curbage occassionally. And yes, in most cases lower profile tires do have more of a chance of developing a bulge in the sidewall or a slipped belt, just because there is no much room for error basically. It does happen more often than not on lower profiles, at least around my area. We see it at work all the time. Trucks or cars with bigger sidewalls it isn't too common on. Just be careful and DEFINITELY watch for those potholes!
Dan

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by igotskraped &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">Low pro = short for low profile. Basically, any regular person would consider most likely anything under a 50 series sidewall to be low profile. There is no real advantage to having a low profile, besides the fact that some of them offer a "rim protecting edge" that sort of "overlaps" the lip of the wheel in chance of having a flat that you absolutely MUST drive on, or also curbage occassionally. And yes, in most cases lower profile tires do have more of a chance of developing a bulge in the sidewall or a slipped belt, just because there is no much room for error basically. It does happen more often than not on lower profiles, at least around my area. We see it at work all the time. Trucks or cars with bigger sidewalls it isn't too common on. Just be careful and DEFINITELY watch for those potholes!
Dan</TD></TR></TABLE>
Hmm I see, well the size I ordered was 195/55/15 which is stock Blade size. I guess I better start watching out for those pot holes. Thanks for the advice and info.

 

Not a problem. Did you end up going with the Falken ZIEX512 or something different?
Dan

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by igotskraped &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">Not a problem. Did you end up going with the Falken ZIEX512 or something different?
Dan</TD></TR></TABLE>
Yea decided to go with Ziex 512 all around. Its a very good tire from what I've experinced, just got to watch out for them potholes. I was lucky I hit that pot hole going a slower speed, I'm sure any faster I would had a blow out right there or a bent rim.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by igotskraped &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">A 50% discount with 90% tread left? What a shoddy shop. Any honest shop would have just replaced the tire under a manufacturer's defect warranty. Hell, that is what I do. I don't really care how the bubble got there, but with that amount of tread left, there is no reason to charge my customer for another tire. Unless my customer is being a huge *****, I don't charge them for the tire, just labor.
Dan</TD></TR></TABLE>

Just a little FYI, but that bubble would not be covered under the manufacturers warranty. There is no defect in the product, it was simply user-induced damaged. You are a pretty nice guy to warranty that for the customer considering Falken most likely wouldn't reimburse you. I am an authorized Falken dealer which is why i know. I must say that Falken does back their tires much better than most companies out there though.

 

I would not drive on it. I would bring it back to the place where you bought it, and explain truthfully what happened. If they want to cover it under warranty, that's up to them. (I wouldn't expect it, but if they offered, I wouldn't turn it down.) Even if they don't cover it under warranty, they might offer you a deal on replacing it - since they just made some profit on the first four tires, they might be willing to give you a fifth at a lower price, under the circumstances.

 

I'm well aware that Falken or any tire manufacturer for this matter does not cover an impact bulge under their warranty. We get paid for all of our junk tires anyhow, so whether Falken pays us or not isn't really a big deal. All the junk tires are bought then shipped to 3rd world countries and sold over there.
Dan

 

did you have to send the tires back to them for them to send you a new one?

 

Well what I did was call up discount tire direct and the salesman Jay sold me a warranty for the tires since I was still within the first 30 days of purchase.