When I got my new wheels I ordered four Falken 912 tires to mount on them. When they all arrived I took my car down to the tire shop I usually go to, and had them fit the tires. Here's what happened.

The first tire blew (lip of the tire) on the mounting machine. They claimed it was a defect in the tire and told me to call the company I ordered them from. Unfortunately, edge racing's website has been down so I don't know if I can contact them or not.

Yesterday (6 days later), driving home my left rear tire blew out, unexpectedly, at 40mph. I took it off the wheel, and it had almost the exact same damage.

I limped the car home on the doughnut and then put all of my SE wheels/tires back on. A THIRD Falken was bulging on the inner lip like it too, was about to blow out in the same sport as the other two.

Here is a pic of the 2nd tire to blow out (all three are essentially the same)





I went to the shop that mounted them today, (local non-chain place) and they are refusing to admit responsibility, claiming that their machine cannot cause that damage and that Falkens are ****. I've asked several mechanics, and a technician at discount tire, and they all claimed it was the installers fault, not the tire.

The wheels are used, but appear to be very straight, and even if they were not perfect, I cant see them causing the shredding/slicing damage to the tires.

To sum up, I have 3 blown tires, all with less than 200 miles on them and I did not hit anything to cause damage to them.

So do you guys think the wheels, tires, or installer is at fault here? I'm obviously not going to trust the 4th tire that is still in good shape, so I'm out $300 for tires here.

 

Get written statements from all of the places that you've talked to saying that it is installer error and not a defective tire. Take those statements back to the shop you had them done and tell them they will replace the tires since they are at fault. If they refuse then take them to small claims court

 

It appears now that the shop will be closing shortly because the owners are going to jail (drug charges)

The tire vendor themselves (edgeracing) also appear to have gone out of business. The only recourse it seems is Falken themselves. Although I doubt the damage is manufacturer defect.

Moral of the story..uh...

C'est la vies?

 

It actually is more likely to be a manufacturer defect. A normal up to date tire installation machine should not cause that type of damage. Go back to the shop ASAP and check out the machine (if they will let you in). Take pictures of it including close ups of the part that pushes the tire under the lip of the rim. If they ask say you want to show the supplier that there is nothing wrong with the machine. With that they might be more inclined to let you take pictures of it. Contact Falken directly and send them pictures and tell them the story. To back their product they may help you out. Bear in mind the supplier would have a hard time causing damage to them since all they do is warehousing and shipping. If there was no visible damage when you received them then it is either a manufacturers defect or the shop screwed up.

Good luck.

 

The owner of the shop was adamant that his machine could not cause the damage. He had me feel the tip of the device that pushes the lip of the tire onto the rim of the wheel.

Time to email Falken.

 

that is definately operator error.. if you dont lube the tire up right and dont mount the tire where you can push the bead down past the lip it actually catches on the rim causeing it to tear which is what you have there. you could (if they werent going out of business) sue them for basically making your car unsafe to drive on the street which in turn is threatening your life. i have seen a few accidents from tires that were mounted improperly maily by walmart in this area. and one of those accidents resulted in a fatality. so yeah its a very very bad thing. and there is no way in hell that could be manufacturer defect. they wont even ship the tires out if they have any cracking or warping on the bead.

qualifications: tire trainer for 6 years, and yes i have even done that myself when i was first starting out as a mechanic a long time ago. happens more on low profile and reverse mount rims. but i would never let one actually get out of the shop like that.. and yes you can tell that you ripped it before you air it up. so they intentionally sent you out of the shop knowing you had tires that were dangerous on your car.

 

unless the shop is brand new or has super high volume the machine will not have the arm that pushes the bead under the lip of the rim. even my shop that does over 1 million dollars a year doesnt use those machines. mainly because they are way expensive. normal machines like the ones we use are around $4000 to $6000 the ones with the automatic arms where all you do is put the rim on and tire and step on a pedal are like $10000

 

$10000? I had one in my grade 11 auto class. I have a hard time believing the school would have spent that much on one shop machine.

 

I think its apparent that you are correct. In fact they were putting the tires on wrong at first (they didn't realize they were reverse mount wheels, which they are) and almost outright tore one right there. I have a feeling that Falken is gonna email me back saying they are not responsible and I'm just gonna be left with a pile of worthless tires.

 

it was probably donated then . most school shop equipment is. we had 2 or 3 in our college classes but i know that school didnt pay for them.

 

as a 4 year tire monkey speaking, its obvious operator error/ignorance.