Tires - Give me a break!

This morning when heading out to work at 7:10 AM with temperature at 12 degrees (F) a tire was low. An attempt to fire up the compressor ensued. When temperatures are below 15 the compressor tries to start up and then promptly trips a circuit breaker. Now the house must be unlocked and a descent to the basement to flip the breaker follows. Then the compressor operates normally – every time. It’s like a ritual. Below 15 degrees? Compressor on, breaker off, reset breaker – everything returns to normal. Even when it’s 10 below zero you only have to try once. The compressor is like a sulky little kid that wants a piece of candy before doing what you want. It’s just one of life’s little annoyances.

The part that puts a burr under my saddle is the whole tire problem. Hold up your hands if you have tires on your vehicle over a year old and none of them have a slow leak. No one? I thought so. This is a case where “if they can put a man on the moon, why can’t they…” actually applies. We have had self sealing suits for our astronauts since the first space walks back in the 1960s. Is it too much to ask that this kind of technology be applied to tires? What good is a 50,000 mile tread warranty if the tire starts to leak after 10,000 miles and you are told “it can’t be repaired, it’s a break in the sidewall “ or some such nonsense? It’s a boatload of crap the size of the raft of the frigate Medusa. Just try and find a tire store that will actually repair a tire. There is always a reason why they can’t. Back when all I could afford to drive was a beater, when a tire leaked I bought a two dollar plug kit, stuck a plug in a leak myself and went merrily on with tires as bald as Uncle Fester and as old as the car itself. What changed? Now all you have to do is brush the curb and the next day you’re lucky if there is enough air in the tire to get out of the garage. We’re not talking about fly by night “Tires by Guido” black market specials either. These are Michelins or the equivalent. The tire industry seems to be the mac daddy of built in obsolescence.

Give me a break!