MythBusters 18 Wheelers, Can Exploding Tires Kill?

[70mackMB]

Tires and other things involving trucks. May good pieces of information passed along to the general public.    .....Hippy

 

[tjc transport]

i remember that episode and almost fell out of my chair laughing at it.

when a tire lets go, the tread does not come off the tire like they sent it with their machine. when a cap of a tire peals off, it does not shoot out like shot from a cannon. it peels slowly over a few rotations. even if a tire blows out.  

you will have a much better chance of being seriously hurt by the glass from the window than buy a piece of tire when riding behind or alongside a truck.

the only time i ever saw anyone seriously hurt or killed in 55 years driving was when the whole wheel came off and hit a car going the opposite direction, or a state worker on the side of the road. 

[Mark T]

Maybe it's just me, but all I noticed was that chick  what a cutie 

[mrsmackpaul]

If you have Facelessbook this will work

https://www.facebook.com/share/r/14QaWfvLtf/?mibextid=9drbnH&s=yWDuG2&fs=e

 

Even if you don't I reckon it will work

 

Paul

[mowerman]

same here TJ   i believe they can do some real damage,,,but in 49 years of truck driving ive only seen them fly around the wheel opening and then pieces of cap  come out the back,,,alotta times  tear off the mudflap and sometimes the bracket  ,bob 

[GA_Dave]

Years ago, I responded to a wreck on the Interstate where a Nissan pickup had run over a retread that had just come off a semi.  It got wrapped up in his right front wheel, forcing him into a hard left turn at 65 MPH.  His Nissan rolled three or four times, totally destroying it, but he was basically uninjured.  He was sitting on a nearby guardrail when we arrived on scene, crying.  It was his first new vehicle and he had just bought it that morning.  The option/price sticker was stuck to the shattered glass that had been the window!

[Joseph Cummings]

I had a float come apart on the steering axle of a boom truck on the Jersey Pike. It tore pretty much the whole right front fender off, ripped the brake hose, and it bent something I had to fix back at the shop, but I forget what. I wouldn't want to get hit by one

Years later my buddy the same truck on the TP in Ohio and blew a float and he rolled the truck, Tore the Simon -RO 23.5 ton boom right off the truck. He had to kick the windshield out to escape. It was late at night and the first thing he does is call me with his adrenaline pumped through the roof, talking fast as hell in his Jamaican accent. Lots of  Bloodclaat and pussyclaat lol

[JoeH]

I had my inner tire on the right blow the mudflap off the left side of my truck once.  A couple times I've had tires on the right lose their cap and rip the bottom few rungs off a steel ladder that goes up the backside of the truck. The damage a tire will do really depends on the type of failure.

[tjc transport]

i had right rear inner blow on a dump truck and blew the mud flap off, and also rip the right tailgate latch rod rite out of the latch assembly.

[mowerman]

One of my last trips, a grain  truck passed me, taillight assembly, blown apart and gone as well as the mud flap and bracket trailer look pretty new also it was empty

[mrsmackpaul]

19 hours ago, Joseph Cummings said:

I had a float come apart on the steering axle of a boom truck on the Jersey Pike. It tore pretty much the whole right front fender off, ripped the brake hose, and it bent something I had to fix back at the shop, but I forget what. I wouldn't want to get hit by one

Years later my buddy the same truck on the TP in Ohio and blew a float and he rolled the truck, Tore the Simon -RO 23.5 ton boom right off the truck. He had to kick the windshield out to escape. It was late at night and the first thing he does is call me with his adrenaline pumped through the roof, talking fast as hell in his Jamaican accent. Lots of  Bloodclaat and pussyclaat lol

Those last couple of lines gave me a chuckle

[mrsmackpaul]

Tyres really are cheap now, they are cheaper now than 30 years ago 

I remember back in the late 70's on the news in Australia a bus/coach in the U.S. had a cap come of and it punched thru the floor and killed the child sitting in the seat above it

Now this was big news, no internet back then and we heard about it in Australia,  really is kinda scary

Even clean skin tyres do a huge amount of damage when they let go

The faster we go the greater the chance of it happening 

Drive tyres on a hot day are to hot to hold my hand on

 

Paul

[Geoff Weeks]

Almost all tire failures are casing failure, not cap failures. I've had them on virgin casing and on capped casings. In all my time I have had ONE cap failure, it threw a 4x6" section of tread off the casing.

Just about all aircraft are landing on capped tires.

Casing failure can be caused by abuse, running low on air, over loaded, and yes time. I used to get three tread lives off my casing, one virgin, and two caps. A few times I tried 3 caps (4 total) but found they would fail prematurely and it wasn't worth it. If I didn't get three full treads worth of life, I felt cheated and wouldn't use that tire again.

 I had one casing blow apart sitting still in the yard, and it was a virgin casing!