SWR vs. DRW: What's Your Tire Blowout Experience?

If you experienced total loss of air or a blowout on your SRW or DRW, tell your story. Please don’t share your opinions about the two drive trains.

A couple of years ago, my outside dual on the driver’s side had a complete loss of air while towing my 18,000 pound toy hauler. (Not a blowout.) I did not even know it until I stood up on the tire at a truck stop to reach into the truck bed. Since then, I’ve wonder what the experience would have been if I were driving a SRW truck. What would the experience have been if a serious blowout occurred on a SRW vs. DRW?

I brought my brand new DRW home from the dealer with an inner flat tire. Didn't know until a couple of days later when I did the tire pressure check.

We've had two separate trips where we have lost air pressure on the outside dual, and didn't know it. One time was discovered while we were driving around unhitched, but we were towing the day before, (it was fine before we headed out) so we don't know when it went down.

The other was caught before we hitched up. Firestone checked and replaced the valve core. Unfortunately the stem was also slowly leaking, and towing our way home, the tire went low again. Noticed it on a diesel stop. Filled with air, continued until we could find a place open to repair it, just took it really easy on the service road.

Need to add TST sensors to the truck, I suppose!!

During the summer in 2010 me and my DW were on our way back from a long trip from SC and we had 2 complete blowouts on our 2007 F350 SRW CC 4WD.

The tires were practically brand new Goodyear Wrangler ATS tires, they were on the truck for approx 2-3000 miles before the trip and I put around 3000 miles on it during the 2 1/2 weeks of the trip.

We were on the way back home and were just outside of a Little Rock when the passenger side rear tire completely blew out.
We first called roadside assistance but they said it would be 2hrs or more before they showed up. So I dropped the trailer and put the spare tire on hooked back up and headed down the road towards home, we were about 3-4 hrs from home.
Just outside of Dallas, maybe about an hour from home, the driver side rear tire blew out.

It was after 7pm on a Sunday and no tire places were open and the ones we did find open did not have any tires that would fit the wheels, 20" factory. Needless to say it was a long day.

The trailer I had at the time was a triple axle toy hauler. I towed this trailer for thousands of Miles with no problems to the truck before.
Thankfully we were on level ground as we had just come out of the mountains and I would've hated to have been ononeof those narrower passes and have a blow out coming downhill.

I started looking at duallys then and we traded the larger heavier trailer in on the Key Largo in Feb'11 and bought the new truck in June.

We have towed Campers for over 45 years and never have had a blow out on the TV. Very fortunate for that and hope it continues. Had several low tires but they were always caught in time. Single and dual both over the years. I cant begin to count how many tires we blew on the campers. All of them 8 or more ply. We currently tow with a SRW and plan to continue. We also now only run H rated tires on the trailers as I got tired of changing the blow outs not to mention the damage they did.

Our old Class C motorhome, dual rear wheels. Had outer passenger dual fail one trip while towing tri-axle trailer with full-size pickup behind RV. Some nice folks stopped with a rolling floor jack and helped me change the tire (much better than the tools I had on hand and it was blazing hot out).
Our last Class A motorhome, had an inside driver dual fail, tread separated (loud) on the eway. We continued to an off ramp, went to a large parking area and call road service. I had it pretty much changed by the time they arrived and started to doubt the fees paid for such a service. Upside, that RV had full hydraulic leveling jacks so it was easy to lift the vehicle off the ground.
The next set of tires we put on there had multiple failures within a year, side wall would actually rupture in a true "blow out" fashion. Inside passenger dual failed and didn't notice, but while at the RV dealer with the rig, they did and helped me change it (failure had to have happened not far from there). Caught the next one (same set of tires) before the rupture, it had a huge "bubble" on the sidewall.
Needless to say, the remaining tires from that set were thrown away and a different brand was installed. Had passenger front with cord/ply separation (impact on highway pothole, I think) and while it didn't fail per se, it was literally a square tire when done, rig would waddle side to side as you rolled through the parking lot.

On my 2011 F150 (SRW, obviously) had the driver rear fail after hitting a chunk of steel debris on the eway while towing one of our enclosed trailers (7x16). Tire pressure monitor told me of the impending failure. We hit the next off ramp and went to the nearest fuel station. Found the cut, it went through the cords on the face of the tire. Put in a plug and aired it up and was good to go for home. Replaced that tire once we got home, the plug would hold while moving, but would leak down over night.

I've had inner and outer duals fail, fronts fail (but not in major fashion) and rears fail on SRW. There's a better chance you can "limp" somewhere with one failed dual but there's also the probability that the inner dual pressure will be neglected and fail sooner than it should.

Never lost a tire on a TV while towing, only ever had one that was cut by a piece of steel falling fron a truck on the interstate.

Dave,

On my new '12 F450, on the trip home from Indiana with it (pulling the Landmark), a passing motorist flagged me down, motioning a tire issue. Sure enough, passenger side outer dual was flat. I had no idea. The DRW did not have a factory available TPMS. One day, I will remedy that.

Last summer, on the last night of the Goshen rally, I found one of my inner duallies had lost all of it's air. Used Good Sam ERS to pull it off, but we could not find a leak in it. The tech figured it was the plastic gated valve cap that might have been damaged enough to leak (it had some marking on the tip). So he reinflated it, gave me a full set of metal gated caps, and put the tire in the spare position. It never lost air again and has been rotated since to a road position.

Like many others, we had an inner dual go flat. I did notice a strange feel to the way the truck was riding/handling but attributed it to the road surface. We stopped for fuel and I notice the smell of hot rubber. It was then that I noticed the inner drivers side tire flat. Called the road service and had it changed out. It was repaired N/C at a Goodyear dealer in Nashville. This occurred on the way to the Heartland Nat'l. There was a large screw in the tread.
Glad I have a dually!

jbeletti said:

Dave,

On my new '12 F450, on the trip home from Indiana with it (pulling the Landmark), a passing motorist flagged me down, motioning a tire issue. Sure enough, passenger side outer dual was flat. I had no idea. The DRW did not have a factory available TPMS. One day, I will remedy that.

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Jim:
Don't you have an accessory TPMS for the Landmark? That sure saved my bacon when I had a trailer tire shredding and deflate some while not feeling a thing in the tow vehicle. You can have up to 24 tires monitored on my system.

Didn't lose the air,, but sure lost the bed panel and a few other odds and ends underneath. This happened 5 days after Cody rally.


Jim M

jimtoo said:

Didn't lose the air,, but sure lost the bed panel and a few other odds and ends underneath. This happened 5 days after Cody rally.

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Jim M

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How much did michelin help you out?

I just bought 7 new michelin 8 plys on my DRW and they come with a road hazard warranty.

wdk450 said:

Jim:
Don't you have an accessory TPMS for the Landmark? That sure saved my bacon when I had a trailer tire shredding and deflate some while not feeling a thing in the tow vehicle. You can have up to 24 tires monitored on my system.

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Bill, yes, I have the Valor TPMS for the RV. The sensors are not mounted outside. They are on the inside of the rim somewhere. I have not decided whether to order and install the same sensors on the truck. As I get new demo RVs often, hard to say if Heartland will stick with Valor for as long as I'll own the truck.