Patching Tire?

[TAG51]

Any thoughts on patching tires. My tires which came on the Montana have less than 300 miles on them. While inspecting the tires prior to departure I found a nail "dead center" in one of them. Before I go anywhere I will have this fixed. Question is do I replace or have the tire patched?
http://i67.tinypic.com/veakiw.jpg

[BB_TX]

Repairing a nail hole in that location should not affect the integrity of the tire. If the tires are OEM Chinese ST tire you might consider replacing them all with better tires.

[rohrmann]

Yes, time to get rid of the Trailer Kings. That nail was a sign from above. Get some G range tires, Goodyear, Sailun, or one of the other brands out there, and you will have a much safer rig.

[mlh]

If they are the original equipment China bombs you NEED to replace them. If you keep them sooner or later you are going to have a blowout they could do thousands of dollars in damage. Replace them with a good G rated tire and you will have no tire problems.
Lynwood

[waynemoore]

2X on the sign from above. Get rid of the China bombs.

[kdeiss]

All depends on the weight of your rig if you have to go to G Rated tires
A good quality Lt E Rated may just work fine!

[1retired06]

Agree, swap them out, although a plug/patch would work. Many tire dealers will no longer do plugs, especially on the sidewall.

[hybridhauler]

The dry weight shows to be around 13480lb plus all of the gear you have stored onboard. So you are getting close to the upper limits of the original ST tires.
It is sometimes hard to justify replacing a set of tires that appear to have no issues. But, when you are sitting on the side of the interstate with cars and trucks whizzing buy, you will second guess your decision especially if you have the Marathons fitted on your rig.
After having two blowouts in less than ten miles of each other, and having $2500 damages to our rig, purchasing a set of G rated tires was a no brainier
Just my two cents worth. Others may have different opinions.

[DQDick]

Nope same opinion here. Dumped perfectly good OEM tires for G614's.

[bethandkevin]

A patch will be fine. A patch plug or stem patch is best. I won't beat the ST tire horse, but I do agree with the others.

[Rondo]

Tony as others have stated here-- the OEM tires are an accident waiting to happen and putting new tires to replace perfectly good tires seems to be stupid but believe us when we say get rid of those tires before you have a blowout and take the side of the unit out and it costs you $3000 or more to have it fixed. In most cases the tire dealer will buy yours from you BUT at a drasticly reduced price and resell them to an unknowing buyer but dump the OEM tires as soon as possible. I wouldn't pull my unit off the lot unless they put G614's on the unit. The dealer kept the OEMs and sold them to another unknowing buyer of a much lighter unit than our Monte.

[rames14]

If you browse through this section, you will read story after story of members who thought they could make it till later. They all ended up having damage plus the cost of the new tires. Good G series tires and TPMS are the best insurance against damage and sitting on the side of the road.

[TAG51]

I'm convinced replacing the tires are the way to go. Why waste money on anything which will be replaced in the near future. I'll go with either the G614 or an LT style tire from other vendor. I prefer Michelin.

Thanks for all the input.

[BB_TX]

Check your weights. The Michelin XPS Ribs are rated for max load of 3,080 lbs (I think). That is fine for my somewhat lighter trailer and I love them. But that may not be quite enough for your heavier trailer. The OEM STs are probably rated for over 3,400 lbs.

[Art-n-Marge]

As a former RV transporter, I can vouch that any kind of tire from the factory, is probably mistreated. I am such a tire care proponent, I can say that the few trailers I towed were not mistreated by me, but that doesn't mean I didn't witness many counterparts just wanting to get the job paid as quick as possible, so they can get another job. I can tell you I was passed by many transporters, not just private owners driving way faster than the speed limit of any ST tire on the rig. I'm assuming the trailers whizzing by me, had the cheapest STs money could byk so these are now prone to early failure from the abuse.

I have stayed with STs on my rig for the past 10 years. The only bad STs I've had were the original Missions on the trailer (that may have been abused by some transporter, but I also think they may have been suspect since they were amongst the brand where the term China bombs came from).

Other Monty owners have just upgraded to the best tires they can find, but I've stayed with STs (Marathon, Maxxis, and now something called Centara). I then monitor the PSI and condition a lot! No problems, except when I destroyed a couple Maxxis by getting too close to a drainage curb (and that was MY fault). That's how I got involved with Centara (replacements for the two Maxxis I destroyed).

[TAG51]

Bailed on the Trailer Kings and bought Sailuns Load Range H. Had to upgrade wheels TO 17.5 from 16 as well but found a good deal at trailertiresandwheels.com. 5Tires, wheels, mounted, balanced, delivered for just over 2K. Now the fun part.