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I am coming across articles about Chinese tires. Are we going to be riding on Chinese tires anytime soon? Are some of the tires we already have actually made in China but we don't know about it?
Quite a few, unfortunately. A very quick search found some Fuzion 245/70-17 truck tires (2nd make I selected after Bridgestone, which were US and Canada in origin) from there. Select the link and then "Specs" to see the full data.
If this is true, I just hope our government puts strict standards on the quality of tires imported into the country. Clothes and furniture I can see having no quality control measures - you get what you pay for. But tires are another story...
Given that the episode with Ford Explorers and Firestone lasted for some nine years, don't be surprised at my lack of faith when it comes to quality control procedures for either imported or domestic tires.
We bought a used Rav4 (AWD) a couple of years ago with brand new all season Champiro, made in China, tires. During the first snow I noticed the car sliding alot, activating the traction control and ABS. I replaced the tires with Good Year Assurance and it was like day and night. It was literally a different car. The driving aids rarely came on with the Good Year's. We even towed a U-Haul trailer from CO to SoCal through 150 miles of snow and ice on I-25 and about 50 more on I-40 around Flagstaff. We also had the same Good Years on our MDX and they worked great during many winter storms. I will never buy Chinese made tires. I can't see the justification of saving a couple hundred dollars and having to live with crappy tires.
IF you know they are Chinese. I have always assumed tires are either American, Japanese or Korean. Never occurred to me to check where they are made. This pretty well concealed from the consumer.
I am coming across articles about Chinese tires. Are we going to be riding on Chinese tires anytime soon? Are some of the tires we already have actually made in China but we don't know about it?
There are a lot of cheap chinese tire companies in the US already, and surprisingly, many major names make a number of models in China, from Bridgestone to Cooper, even though they say made in the US or Canada, you really have to be careful as their cheaper models are usually chinese made.
IF you know they are Chinese. I have always assumed tires are either American, Japanese or Korean. Never occurred to me to check where they are made. This pretty well concealed from the consumer.
Last set of tires (Firestone) were made in China. That was years ago. They weren't particularly cheap tires either. They weren't ultra performance summer tires or anything, just run of the mill quality all-season tires. They were perfectly fine. Not as good as the RE050s I had on it before I started doing stupid amounts of freeway driving, but then they also last easily twice as long and don't cost $250/tire. I didn't expect a tire that cost $100 less and actually had decent treadwear to grip as well as a $250 performance tire that was made with almost no consideration to longevity.
Prius the tires come from Japan. They're the special extra-cheap version of the regular Goodyear Assurance. It's the only version they make in Japan. China makes the regular spec 17" version, so if you've got a Prius with the optional 17" wheels, chances are they came from China. They're also made in the US, but I don't really see them shipping tires from the US to Japan to put on the car to ship back to the US. Maybe, but it would probably be cheaper to just use the Chinese tires.
China doesn't bug me. Crap is crap, doesn't much matter where it comes from. I've been using Lenovo laptops (Chinese) for years. Aside from not putting decent screens in them until just recently (business laptops for old people with bad eyes, high resolution and color accuracy weren't a big priority), they're very high quality. I have some electronic/computer stuff that's made in China as well that's fantastic, easily as good as anything made in Japan (and just as expensive). Then there's consumer grade stuff. I'm on my third LG G2 phone. GPS sensor on the first two went out completely, third one has very poor GPS signal strength but at least it works. Was driving with a friend's GPS and kept looking for turns 200 feet before since the third LG G2 can only pintpoint to about 200 feet of accuracy. I'm not a big fan of Apple products, but the quality is usually pretty good. The iPhone is mostly a Chinese product, although it gets parts from everywhere. Hardware/quality, I'd say China beats most people when they want to on electronics. iPhone is basically the standard for quality of consumer smartphones.
Last edited by Malloric; 09-24-2014 at 12:39 PM..
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