|
A "MADE IN
CHINA" ADVENTURE
I must begin this tale with a disclaimer. I appreciate China, its
culture, heritage and history. I enjoy Chinese art forms, music,
sculpture, and architecture. I have become very fond of several Chinese
individuals I consider friends. And I LOVE Chinese food. However....
Do you remember toys "Made in China" recalled because of
lead-based paint? Baby strollers and cribs "Made in China" taken
off the market due to faulty safety latches? Infant formula "Made in
China" poisoning Chinese babies? Costume jewelry "Made in
China" pulled from stores because of choking hazards? Drywall
"Made in China" emitting noxious fumes that sicken homeowners?
We personally have never experienced any of these. We never purchased
or were exposed to any of these hazards. Recently, however, we discovered
that vehicle tires "Made in China" are not immune to trouble,
either.
Just a year ago we bought four new tires for our thirty-two foot fifth
wheel trailer. We had experienced a flat once on the previous set,
apparently due to hyper-flexing and road wear. The "expert" at
the tire store encouraged us to upgrade from 10-ply to 14-ply tires to
increase durability. Then he suggested – you guessed it! – a brand of
14-ply tires "Made in China." They were less expensive than U.S.
made 14-ply tires, so we took his advice and had them installed.
Last week, our first day out on our annual spring migration north, one
of those tires blew. It was late in the day and we had been traveling
steadily, but not at high speeds. There were, as always, road hazards
along the way but we had neither seen nor heard any evidence that we hit
something. Yet the right rear tire had blown loose a piece of tread which
wrapped itself around some of the electrical wires in the affected area.
Bruce was able to fix this damage with electrical tape. Together we
changed the tire, got back on the road and drove slowly and carefully on
our spare to our destination for the day, less than ten miles from the
site of our trouble.
The following morning, Bruce called a local tire store. Yes, they could
get a replacement tire for us but they would have to order it since they
don’t keep 14-ply tires in stock. It would be delivered the next
afternoon, delaying our departure by a day. The tire arrived ahead of
schedule and was "Made in the U.S.," a rather expensive
replacement.
The next morning we were less than ten miles from where we had started
when we again heard an ominous ‘pop’! "What was that?" I
asked nervously. Then the tire pressure monitor began to sound its alarm.
The left front tire on the rig had blown!
We had not hit anything, the tires were not hot, and we were traveling
only 55 mph on a smooth road surface! The blow-out had been so powerful
this time that it peeled the tread off the tire all the way around,
wrapping it around the brake cable! What, we wondered, was going on?
Bruce is a calm and patient man. But this time, as he crawled under the
rig to lower the spare, he muttered, "We’ve had enough practice in
this maneuver already, haven’t we?" Yes, I thought, because we
decreased our "tire change time" by a full five minutes!
We loaded the mutilated tire into the truck and returned to town, back
to the same tire store where we’d bought the last replacement. The
manager met us as we pulled in. "Need a little air?" he asked,
eager to be helpful.
"No," I replied, "we’ve got a big problem."
Bruce described what had happened. The tire-man looked over the
situation and then said matter-of-factly, "I would never sell a
Chinese-made tire. I don’t trust ‘em." He went on to describe the
two choices we had (which we already suspected!): order in another
replacement 14-ply tire and take our chances with the two that hadn’t
blown yet, or buy four new 10-ply tires and replace all of the fifth-wheel’s
tires again! We opted for the latter choice, which cost about $100 less!
We ate our lunch in the tire store parking lot as our rig got new tires
all around. The14-ply tire that was just 24 hours old became, according to
Bruce, "the most expensive spare tire I’ve ever bought!"
We’ve now had three days of travel with no more ‘trials by tire’.
So we’ve added a new slang phrase to our vocabulary. When an experience
turns out to be less than anticipated, it’s now referred to as a
"Made in China" adventure!
4/24/10 - mshr |