Has anybody had any good or bad experiences with retreads?

After searching for used tires for about 30hrs, and not wanting to spend $700 on something as aggressive as I wanted for new, I broke down and bought four retreads yesterday.

When I got home, I looked up the company who manufactured them, and they had really good reviews everywhere, and no angry forum threads posted about them sucking/failing. I'm not going to name the company unless asked, since I don't think its really important to name drop unless you actually want to buy them. PM me, or just prod the crap out of me on this thread, and then I'll divulge the maker. Lets just say that they are a respected, upcoming, American tire recycler.

The reason I'm posting this is because so far, I'm impressed. Supposedly, the customer service is outstanding, tread life is typically 30k+, and blowouts are few and far between. I've only had the tires for a day, so I can't vouch for this myself. My only experience is that they ride smooth, don't vibrate at all at any reasonable speed, only took a little bit of weight to balance, and have no more than the typical change in feel from street to mud tires. The tread pattern I got up front is proprietary I think, but its a pretty standard aggressive all terrain. The tires I got in the rear are a copy of a mastercraft courser m/t. They are really chunky, and so far grip great on dirt, mud, gravel, and pavement.

My understanding had always been that they were inferior, and liked to fall apart, and never felt right. The tire shop assured me that all the tires you see along the road were most likely underinflated, whether they were new or recapped. Apparently there is some study on this to prove that the failure rate is the same, but I can't find it. I haven't really looked either. But . . . they had a warranty, and they were $362 for all four, mounted and balanced. I like them so far, but hey, they could all blow up tomorrow on the interstate and kill me.

 

I work at a tire store and they still do some recaps in certain sizes and try to sell the ones they have. I would not want them for a daily driver. Look at the sides where the tread meets the tire on both sides. Keep looking at the tires at least 1 time a month . The tire itself can be a be a old tire just look at the DOT # the last 4 #'s is the date of the tire

 

I'd never put retreads on a non-dually vehicle. You see 100's of blown retreads on the side of the highway in a trip along Alberta, I couldn't imagine my vehicle relying on that retread to hold it up. Do it right... retreads aren't right.

 

from what i have been told you never really want to run retreads on the front. i usually wait until i find a good deal on tires. the set on my 81 came to $300 after tax brand new and another $40 to get them installed. i never got them balanced and they do not shake until i hit about 110km/h.

 

Retreads is all i use in the winter on my dakota never had one come apart and i have hauled 2 ton of scrap iron (2-3hour 1 way).

 

treadwright.com is an off road re-tread tire company and I haven't read a single bad thing about them.


Prod prod prod prod prod prod prod prod prod....

 

http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=1&ved=0CFIQ FjAA&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.nhtsa.gov%2FDOT%2FNHTSA% 2FNRD%2FMultimedia%2FPDFs%2FPublic%2520Paper%2FSAE %2F2009%2FCOMVEC%25202009%2520Tire%2520Debris%2520 Svenson%2520(2).pdf&ei=6MXLT5eCFYPJ6gHtr5HwDw&usg= AFQjCNEiOw61Mv4wjKtKCopPi52mjnig1A

I found the study. Check out pages 33-35 in particular. Thanks, tooltime, for the info about the date. I can't find the date on the tires. I don't know why. I know what the new and old style date should look like, and can't find either. Just [DOT-[random letters, no numbers that look like a date]]. Is it only stamped on one sidewall?

Wolfie, I don't know what size your tires are, but I run a LT235-85-16 load range E. They start at about $120 for a new offbrand summer tire. A decent all terrain is about $160 in this size.

2x1972, you guessed it.

 

i got 235-75r15's but that is the stock size for the 1/2 tons.

 

I was considering a set of Treadwright's for my '95 before I bought these Falkens from Discoun Tire Direct. I would have paid about $600 for what I was looking at, but I didn't want/need an aggressive mud-terrain tire, and didn't like the all-terrain options they had. I ended up paying $900 mounted and balanced for these Falkens, with a 50k warranty, after a $100 mail in rebate. So I think I still did pretty good. You probably did even better though...

 

The DOT # should be on both sides of the tire. The build daye will be on 1 side though should be 4 #'s or 3 #'s. If it is 3 then the tire is very old before 2000 if not mistaken. Say it says 4010 then the 40 is the week it was made and the 10 is the yr(2010)