These are all over the last month or so. I thought I'd share.

Park East Tower in St. Louis' Central West End
ParkEastTower.jpg

Humane Society of Missouri "Bark in the Park" in Forest Park. Lots of rain.
Bark2.jpg

Bark1.jpg

St. Louis Union Station.
RunforSight.jpg

St. Genevieve Missouri or "Wine Country". A missing bridge took me on a 15 mile, gravel road detour to get to a meeting at a winery.
0414001436a.jpg

0414001428a.jpg

 

Nice truck. I like black but not prictical here in FL. What tall building is that in the first pic?

 

Nice pics. Looks like you had some fun on your little jaunt.

 

Sorry, captions have been added. That building isn't that tall, I was on a 5 story parking garage. But it is cool. I had some 1500 watt HID Fresnel lights illuminating it for a special event.

 

Nice pictures and a sharp truck! I like the looks of the tires, are they any good?

 

Well, since you asked, here is the letter I sent to Cooper tire last week....along with a bad tire. It should probably have it's own thread.
__________

Greetings.... I have purchased 4 new Cooper Zeon LTZ Tires LT265/70/17 from TreadDepot.com, order number #####. They have been installed on my 2006 Dodge Dakota Laramie. My old tires were smooth as glass, but worn out. I purchased the Cooper Zeons as a recommendation from a friend...as well as good reviews that I have read on the tire. American made was also a big plus.

I know they are big tires, and can be hard to balance. Here is what I have done. The truck has 70,000 miles, and has had many suspension parts replaced. Tie-rod end, sway bar end links, shocks. In addition, all suspension components have been given a clean bill of health by 3 shops. Here is what those shops have done.

NTB - Installed tires with alignment results in bad vibrations between 60 and 75mph. NTB double checks that everything is tight in the front end, rebalances, and states that all 4 tires were slightly out-of -balance. Problem remains.

Whitefront Automotive - Went to this shop on a friend’s recommendation. They check the front and rear. All suspension systems confirmed in good tight condition. They re-balance tires again and find that all 4 are out of balance by 1 to 2 ounces. They re-balance, and have multiple weights at different positions on both sides of the wheels. (In retrospect this was the best balance performed, but there is still some heavy vibes)

AutoTire - After some research on-line, it seems that I should find a shop that uses a Hunter 9700 Road-Force Balancer (AutoTire has one). I also make sure that AutoTire uses the correct mounting collar for the Chrysler Chrome Clad Wheels, as the improper use of "cone collars" will seat incorrectly on the wheels while balancing. AutoTire performed a second alignment and confirms that the alignment is good. They also tell me that Whitefront incorrectly balanced the tires by using the multiple weights to "bisect" the wheel. They also tell me that the tires are out of balance by .5 to 1 ounce per wheel. After another balance, they are worse than before. I take it back again, they rebalance all 4 tires again (found 1 tire .5 ounce out of balance) and rotate front to back. This does nothing to solve the vibration, but does change how it feels. In addition to the vertical “bouncing”, I also feel a horizontal “lateral wobble”.

I then take it to a second AutoTire where a co-workers father is the store manager. After reading this letter, he will not attempt to balance the tires because he recommends using a “5-finger lug centric adapter”, which he does not have. I agreed with this remedy. He sends me to a third AutoTire that does have the adapter. That store manager re-balances the tires again, but will not use the adapter because his “training” tells him that the adapter is only to be used on after-market wheels. He even removes a tire from the wheel to re-index the tire on the rim. No change. At this point, I have about 5000 miles on these tires.

Here comes the good part. I do more internet searching and find a product called Dyna-Beads. I have installed 4 ounces of Dyna-Beads in each of the tires and removed the wheel weights. THE VERTICLE VIBRATION IS GONE!!! The rear axle now rides very smoothly. The front is much smoother too and does not seem to bounce up and down any longer, but, I still have a back-and-forth wobble in the steering wheel at 60-65 MPH. It is a pretty significant wobble. I then swap the front and back tires on the driver’s side of the vehicle. The steering wheel is now smooth, and I have the vibration issue back in the rear axle. So I believe I have isolated the main issue to one problem tire. I do not believe that the problem is a bent wheel as the truck rode very smoothly before the new tires.

I contacted Treadepot.com on May 3rd and was shipped a new tire under order number #####. I was also given a Return Authorization (RA) number of ##### for the bad tire. I received the new tire on May 6th and had it installed on May 7th, along with 4 ounces of Dyna- Beads. Problem solved! I now have zero vibration at speeds up to 75 mph.