[CNY_Dave]

Didn't see a bad spot on a tire before buying used snows.
One small spot, little smaller than a credit card say, has significantly less tread.

Anyone see this before? Tire guy said didn't really look like tread separation.

Of course this was seen after dismounting 8 tires (4 these tires 4 rims they were going on to), mounting&balancing these 4, paying to dispose of the 4 bad tires, all told $120 just in moving tires around on rims...

 

[eagleeye]

what tires by make / model / year are those. (some chinese thing?)

might be something that was parked on or in something that did not like it.

or a sunny / hot spot where it was stored.

 

[eagleeye]

maybe it was skidded or pulled down the street in park or with a seized wheel.

 

[DoctorMemory]

I've seen odd wear patterns similar to this from vehicles with worn front shocks. Wheel imbalance causes it to bounce, always coming down in the same spot. It's more commonly in the center of the tread, though, so not sure if it might have caused the issue you're seeing.

 

[Inuk]

Maybe a crushed fender rubbing on the tire? I would imagine someone would stop driving hearing the noise, though... In any case, I wouldn't drive on that. $120 is nothing compared to having a crash due to poor traction on one side. Probably not good for the differential either.

2008 Outback 3.0R Premier (Vancouver, BC)

 

[1 Lucky Texan]

maybe some debris or off-cut layer of rubber got stuck unnoticed in the mold that time?

tires made overseas may still have a lot of human labor in them. I say possible manufacturing issue but???? we may never know.

 

[Mott Power]

It's called "patch wear". Worn strut/suspension or out-of-balance wheel.

 

[Inuk]

maybe some debris or off-cut layer of rubber got stuck unnoticed in the mold that time?

tires made overseas may still have a lot of human labor in them. I say possible manufacturing issue but???? we may never know.

It's a used tire. I didn't notice the second photo showing it's a flat patch, suggesting the car was dragged with the wheel not moving, possibly with a flat tire.

2008 Outback 3.0R Premier (Vancouver, BC)

 

[Inuk]

It's called "patch wear". Worn strut/suspension or out-of-balance wheel.

See the second photo. It doesn't seem to be all the way around the tire, which would eliminate anything to do with rotation, including suspension issues, low or high pressure, etc.

2008 Outback 3.0R Premier (Vancouver, BC)

 

[Mott Power]

See the second photo. It doesn't seem to be all the way around the tire, which would eliminate anything to do with rotation, including suspension issues, low or high pressure, etc.

2008 Outback 3.0R Premier (Vancouver, BC)

Not necessarily, patch wear is specifically known to not cause wear around the circumference of a tire and show in only certain parts of the tire's rotation (see the right side of the photo I posted, they occur in patches). If you have a worn damper then the spring won't settle as quickly when going over a bump and continually transfer the load back and forth to the tire as it settles, causing more wear at particular oscillations of the wheel's rotation and showing in patches. Out of balance (which this seems more like since it's in one location) means as it rotates, that one area has more weight than the rest of the wheels circumference. As your speed increases, the heavier section carries more rotational mass and wears more quickly as it contacts the ground with more force during every rotation.

 

[eagleeye]

good posts.

what is the tread depth on those used snows?

I don't think you will be going 75mph down a ice covered 4 lane with those. ....as you have been known to do on fresh ice grabbing stickies.

 

[Richard Pare]

Is the worn spot actually a flat spot that is lower than the rest of the tread, or is it even with the rest? If even with the rest, it is a defective tire that has the carcase bulging outwards in that area.

 

[idosubaru]

My WAG is the vehicle was in an accident and the localized damage occurred during the accident event or during recovery/flatbed/moving around. localized wear would be no surprised, an accident would be no surprise on a car needing winter tires in NY, and no surprise that they were no longer needed and sold used. But I'll drift from speculation to facts:

It's either a defect or the vehicle moved with the wheel locked.

We can probably envision a scenario where the wheel was turned and vehicle was on an incline during a towing, accident recovery, or emergency stopping incident and that's why the wear pattern doesn't extend all the way across from inside to the outside.

It's one spot on the tire so it's not alignment or struts or wheel bearing..etc.

 

[1 Lucky Texan]

if we knew if the tire had to be balanced with a LOT of weight - what? - over 4oz ? - then we might more confidently decide between poor construction or some abuse like sliding.

 

[Richard Pare]

My WAG is the vehicle was in an accident and the localized damage occurred during the accident event or during recovery/flatbed/moving around. localized wear would be no surprised, an accident would be no surprise on a car needing winter tires in NY, and no surprise that they were no longer needed and sold used. But I'll drift from speculation to facts:

It's either a defect or the vehicle moved with the wheel locked.

We can probably envision a scenario where the wheel was turned and vehicle was on an incline during a towing, accident recovery, or emergency stopping incident and that's why the wear pattern doesn't extend all the way across from inside to the outside.

It's one spot on the tire so it's not alignment or struts or wheel bearing..etc.

It could also be from a skidding session - tire distortion under severe side load will produce the same sort of worn spot.

If something from an accident, my guess would be that the driver was attempting to turn to avoid something, but had the brakes full on with the tires skidding. Assuming that the worn spot is on the outside edge of the tire and the steering was pointed to the left, this would be the right front tire.

If the whole car was skidding, right side first, this could be either the front or rear on the right side. The left side tires would also show at least SOME scalloping like this, but nowhere near as much because of the weight transfer.

 

[CNY_Dave]

The spot is a little lower than the rest of the tread, but the carcass under that spot is also higher than the rest of the carcass.
Just the one spot.
No apparent unusual amount of balancing weight.
Pretty good tread on the rest of the tire and the other tires.

My best guess based on all that is somehow a bunch of tread got removed, and the carcass has been moving outwards a bit in that area as the tread there is unsupported when that part contacts the road.

Financially speaking, I will be driving on it, will put it in the rear.
I will do the 4-chalk-marks-10-rotations test at some point.

I walk around the car every day to check the tires and am used to listening to what the tires will tell me so if it does something weird I'll catch it before something dramatic happens, probably.

If I manage to sell the 5x112 rims that the tires came on I'll be happy with 1 season on them.

The tires weren't sold with the car when the car was sold (or junked).

 

[eagleeye]

what were they on with a 5x112 spec?

 

[Richard Pare]

The spot is a little lower than the rest of the tread, but the carcass under that spot is also higher than the rest of the carcass.
Just the one spot.
.

Defective tire then - the carcass will not bulge outwards like that unless it has started delaminating. Also, if the tires were not marked as to the direction of their original rotation, rotating it in the opposite direction - if it gets mounted that way - will aggravate the delamination process further.

If you run it, keep a really close eye on it - it could catastrophically fail.

Personally, I would junk it - not worth having it fail in the middle of a corner.