Buying New Tires in Mexico: an adventure

General Discussion
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I enjoy Irlandes stories of life in a small Mexican village. I doubt if he is in any more danger than if he lived in a small American village. In my experience, if you act like you belong there, you are not in much danger anyplace. Due to 24 hour news and the internet we have become an increasingly fearful and paranoid society.

Irlandes doe not have to worry about having me for a neighbor, I hate hot weather, love living in Western NY and as long as I have children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren living here I am not moving anyplace.
I see deer, turkey, coyote, and foxes out my back window and red tailed hawks and even an occasional eagle patrol the fields behind my house.

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Maybe a bit more, but not much. We hear about the cartels and such, but they are not everywhere. We have a state prison and they keep a large contigent of police here in case of riots. Which means the cartels would probably pass on this community. Still, anything which has ever happened any time and any place can happen any time and any place.

In any case, life in rural Mexico is not for most people, just as life in the Mojave desert is not for everyone, but there are people living there very happily.
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@db In January, I wrote a posting about buying new tires, and you can find it by doing a Car Talk search for Euzkadi. You posted on that thread. At least I think so, darned memory banks. But, it is not a memorable thing.

@CapriRacer I understand perfectly. The problem is worsened by a defective tire pressure computer. the tire light is on most of the time, and a reset will not reset. So, we kept going until we realized the noise was unusually bad. The last time I needed a Toyota tire pressure computer, also automatic brake computer, they charged me $2000 USD.

I will see if I can make a photo and get it on-line.

Thanks all for comments.

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it didn’t work. Instructions said to paste and I did but all it did was post a link to my camera memory chip.

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why not truck tires with more puncture resistant sidewalls? like you might see on a humvee? you van might have 16" tires now. see if you can fit 15" rims with taller sidewalls. than you might use 70 series tires or 75series tires. you dont need 215-65-16. try 215/70/15

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When I got it used, it had 235/60/R17 and it now has 102H on the end. This is at least one size bigger than listed on the door post already. Distance recorded and velocity are off by around 4% as best as I can measure it.

Mexican roads are normally very bad for tires. Yokohama plainly tells you that your tire guarantees expire the minute you enter Mexico, and they are well justified.

I will keep trying until I get the photo posted. I have done it many times on other boards, so it shouldn’t exceed my capabilities.

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IMG_6500
IMG_6500.JPG1000×750 113 KB

Will try this. I made the file browser small and also firefox and then was able to drag it across. Wish me luck. Not sure about contrast, though.

Photo is larger than shown here. Right click and you can see more than shown here.

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Tire got damage-need tire-ordered tire-end of story.

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Volvo nails it. That is exactly the case. But, we humans are curious cusses, which is why we don’t live in caves any more. (Except for some neighbors up the hill.) So, I wanted to have some idea if this was a cut or damage from banging down on a pothole edge. Not important, just curiosity. Thanks.

Also, it was a Rest Of The Story, a follow up on my January posting which told about finding a place that could actually balance tires. And, buying the tires.

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60/17? like minivans need 17" tires. tire is 28.1" dia. work backwords to find a 15" wheel with 28" tire.225/75/15 is a bit big. lots of truck tires that will work. get one with kevlar sidewall. woohoo

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irlandes,

Thanks for the photo. Look on the inside of the tire right where the split is. Do you see 2 marks - each one a bit away from each end the split? If so, then the tire bottomed out and ruptured the sidewall.

I do see a bit of sidewall abrasion caused by running the tire flat and you should see some of that on the inside as well - and perhaps that inside abrasion will obscure one of the marks.

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Let me think this through. Buy four new rims at great expense, and all new tires again? Then in six months another bad tire, based on past experiences? And, have unknown handling parameters?

Maybe not, but it is interesting to consider the possibilities. I know I am not an expert on tires and rims, which is why I want to learn.

Looking at it from the outside, well, you saw the photo. From the inside, there is a lot of threads hanging as if it was a brute force action, which agrees CapriRacer’s theory.

Interestingly, I was driving very slowly, no more than 38 mph on good paving, and creeping when there were pot holes.

Except for wanting to learn more, I view this as merely a price to pay for my decision to live in Mexico. And, cost of living here is so low, with the dollar so valuable, that a new tire once or twice a year is no more than a nuisance.

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When it rains, it pours! Today, I planned to make a four hour drive to the second largest city in the state, with two of my “grand-daughters” and their mother. Closest gas station has a nasty habit of running out of gasoline, so I drove another 5 minutes to the next village. Instead of driving through the town, I took the new by-pass around the town. As I came around a sharp turn, there was a piece of curbing in the traveled path.

No need to point this way and that. It was theoretically avoidable and I simply did not avoid.

The right front tire immediately gave up the ghost. So, I pulled over in a grassy spot and started to work. The scissor jack was really hard so I was struggling. An old quarry worker came by and physically shoved in to help, though I preferred he did not

Um, okay, he got the wheel off and the one from Sunday with the old tire on it, back on. Somehow we lost a lug bolt for that wheel. Those are hard enough to buy in the USA, not sure if it’s possible here.

He looked back, and turns out the right rear tire had also gone flat. That is a mystery to me. It didn’t get hit that hard, but I guess it was hard enough to make it go flat.

The only spare left was the bicycle thingie underneath.

He took the lug wrench and went back and started taking off the lug nuts. WITH THE CAR NOT JACKED UP. I kept telling him, No Mas, and he kept nodding yes and kept taking lug nuts off. As he was finishing the third one, the repeated NONONONO finally soaked in. It was scary.

I think this was another example of the Dunning-Kruger effect, where he simply assumed I was some sort of idiot who did not understand those nuts had to come off to get the tire off. No matter what was going to happen to him or the car when it fell.

About then two other quarry worked came along. They did understand how to change tires. But, I couldn’t find the five sided adapter to let the bicycle tire thingie down. Finally success.

They did stiff me for 200 pesos, about $12 USD, for a few minutes of work I would rather have not had help with. But, when I think what it would cost in the USA, it didn’t seem so bad.

Now, decisions. I am taking those two tire sets to the tire place and have him take them off and examine them. I am not sure if one can tell internal damage by visual inspection or if I should just fork out two hundred dollars for two new tires. I know some of you will have some really good opinions with really good logic behind them, but it is still a scary decision to be made. In the USA with a number of 750 mile days on the Interstate, it would be a no-brainer. But, most of my driving here is around 38 mph or less, except 3 or 4 trips a year on the cuota at around 60 mph for maybe 50 miles. My first thought is to buy new ones. When you mess up, you take your medicine.

I will look for a new scissor jack when I am in the city.

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Hmmmm
a piece of curbing right after a sharp curve
another tire mysteriously goes flat
workers happen to show up and forcefully make the repair
why do I smell a set-up


;-]

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I am not that familiar with sidewall, but it looks to be about the same as my bicycle tire.

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I did figure out why I hit a theoretically avoidable road hazard. It is described in another section of this board.

Distracted Driving.

I should have had time to miss it. But, we had big plans for the big city and I was running though them in my mind, instead of 100% concentrating on my driving. So, when that curbing piece appeared out of nowhere I needed a half second that I didn’t have.

There is more to distracted driving than cell phones and texting.Anything you are thinking about hard, can cause a wreck because you are doing a poor job of driving in that minute. Your attention is not focused on your driving.

When I was a young man, I could read a book; hold a conversation; and watch a TV program. When I said this some years ago, we had a discussion here as to whether it was really simultaneous or I was multiplexing fast enough to follow all three. I do think the human brain can parallel process, but have no idea how to prove or disprove that theory. Anyway, my capacity was what I call three.

Now I am well aware it is down to around 1.5. That means when I am driving in heavy traffic, I ask my wife not to talk to me, and we turn the radio off. That gives me some space.

But, if I was heavily concentrating on our plans, that meant only 50% attention to driving when it should be 100%. Shame on me. It was my own fault I smashed those two tires.

We did not make it to the big city as planned
 I am not sure when or if we ever will. But, you will have to see another new thread which I will call, Did I Just Total This Car? when I get time to write it.

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Is the cuota the four lane divided toll highways? In Spain they were called the autovia but I forgot what they were called in Mexico. The speed limit in both countries was 120kph (74mph). In Mexico they were almost deserted (probably due to the toll),