[rajeev k]

Originally Posted by supremeBaleno

And the saga with the crappy JK Tyres Vectras on our Swift continues....(1 OE JK and the rest being Bridgestones & Goodyear that replaced the 3 prematurely damaged JKs). .....The guy puts a plug in and inflates the tyre. Only to see a nearby portion bulging up..... .

The single Jk among the lot spoiled the day for you. The old school lesson to replace in pairs comes in here.
JK Vectras are the worst tires and a pity that Maruti is so fond of them. My 2005 Swift came shod in JKs. I remember reading in Autocar magazine that the Vectra was specially developed by JK for the Swifts.

The tires were almost fine till 18K Kms and the handling worsened by the day thereafter.Changed to Continentals and Yokohawas subsequently.

Another kind of damage is common on these tires, losing shape. This happened twice to me, when it started to wobble abruptly.

[latentpotential]

My JK Vectras on the 2009 Swift ran over 60k kms before it was notable that there was a visual loss of tread. When I went for the alignment balancing to Premjis in early 2014, his guys pointed out the deformation that was starting to occur on the tyres, and we swapped them out for another set of 4 from another brand.

[aswin ajith]

Our 2009 Maruti Ritz Petrol came with JK Tornaedos in 165/80 R14. Have been facing a harrowing time for some time now with these. 3 of the 5 tyres were running with patches and had around 25+ punctures all tyres combined. They made a racket when speeds climbed and I wasn't confident at all doing high speeds. The suspension too I think has taken quite a beating with these. Will have to get everything checked, service is coming up. Things were getting really bad when couple of days back the steel belt came out of rear right tyre while driving. Thankfully I wasn't doing much speeds and managed to stop by the side of the road. Decided enough is enough. Headed straight to the local tyre dealer and swapped four of them with Yokohama AVS dB ES100 in 205 60 R14 size. The previous set had done 37034 kms. Should have done this much earlier. We have a different car now . Drives like its on rails and got leech like grip. Much much more composed the car is now. I am cornering more confidently. I guess I need not elaborate how good these are but its transformed the Ritz completely. Life is much better with these. Will never ever touch this brand again, not even with a barge pole.

[supremeBaleno]

Good to know the change in driving experience on dumping the JKs.
If you have snaps of the JKs (esp. the one from which the steel belt came off), do post here.

[Rahul Bhalgat]

Originally Posted by supremeBaleno

Good to know the change in driving experience on dumping the JKs.
If you have snaps of the JKs (esp. the one from which the steel belt came off), do post here.

I have stock JK Vectra on my SX4 Zxi. The tyres are now 4 years old and done 43000 km so far.

Recently, I took out the tires and measured the groove depth with a vernier caliper (an instrument). I compared this with the groove depth in the new tyre (that I measured in a shop). The proportion shows that my tires shall last for 65000 km till they wear upto the wear-mark in the groove. Of course, the tyres have a shelf life too, whether you use it or not. So let us see.

I regularly align and rotate the tyres, every 5000 - 6000 km. So far I had 7-8 punctures.

[aswin ajith]

Originally Posted by supremeBaleno

Good to know the change in driving experience on dumping the JKs.
If you have snaps of the JKs (esp. the one from which the steel belt came off), do post here.

Sorry for the late reply but here you go.

[anup7649]

Originally Posted by Rahul Bhalgat

I have stock JK Vectra on my SX4 Zxi. The tyres are now 4 years old and done 43000 km so far.

Recently, I took out the tires and measured the groove depth with a vernier caliper (an instrument). I compared this with the groove depth in the new tyre (that I measured in a shop). The proportion shows that my tires shall last for 65000 km till they wear upto the wear-mark in the groove. Of course, the tyres have a shelf life too, whether you use it or not. So let us see.

I regularly align and rotate the tyres, every 5000 - 6000 km. So far I had 7-8 punctures.

Originally Posted by aswin ajith

Sorry for the late reply but here you go.

Rahul - I had the JK tyres in my SX4 and they drove for 6 years and for 55k kms. I believe they had tread for another 2-3k kms, however they started becoming slippery in gravel roads, hence I changed.

Aswin - You should also get the arm/ axle checked, there are cases when they are impacted, you might end up in such scenario with tyres.
I remember having rear axle bend when I had hit a pothole badly, and because of which the tyre ended up giving away the steel inside. There was a bend of axle by 3 degrees and this happened.

[jinojohnt]

Adding my experience:
My A-star's OEM JK tires have completed 3 years/20,000 km. Alignment and rotations done every 5K.
One of the tires had started bulging (on the treads, without my knowledge), and burst while the car was parked overnight.
I was lucky that it was a rear tire, and city speeds were limited to 30 km/hr through out last month.
Sorry I don't have the pics, but the tire looks exactly like ashwin_ajith's tire posted above.
I have now changed the front tires to Michelin XM2, and I feel the steering has freed up so much (rear tires remain the same OEM JK).

[itwasntme]

Rear tyre blowout (38k km run JK Vectra) on my Polo while on the highway at 80 km/hr. Driver controlled it well but tyre totally trashed in the process. Will upload pictures by evening.

[itwasntme]

Originally Posted by itwasntme

Rear tyre blowout (38k km run JK Vectra) on my Polo while on the highway at 80 km/hr. Driver controlled it well but tyre totally trashed in the process. Will upload pictures by evening.

Lucky it wasn't the front tyre; pictures as promised:

[supremeBaleno]

Aw, that's a badly damaged tyre. Good that the driver could control the car inspite of the blow-out. How old is the tyre in terms of years ? Is it a 2011 make ?

[itwasntme]

Will need to check - the model is a July 2012 Polo so it could very well be a late 2011 tyre.

VW should not have skimped on their 'prestigious' small car by offering Vectras in the first place. It is tactical errors like this which takes away their so-called premium positioning and Germanic traditions ;-)

[Manoj2268]

The front JK's of my WagonR also gave up the ghost today. The tread separated on the left and the sidewall blew on the right. This happened opposite birla mandir around 430 am. Dumped all tyres and shares of JK. I will never ever advise anyone to get JK tyres, extremely pathetic quality even after tending to it religiously.

The sidewall on my JK's say 3810 and 3910. Pics will follow once I calm myself down some.

[supremeBaleno]

Originally Posted by Manoj2268

The sidewall on my JK's say 3810 and 3910. Pics will follow once I calm myself down some.

Sorry to hear that. If 3810 / 3910 are the date markings, then the tyres were made in Aug/Sep 2010 ie. 5 years old. How many kms had they run ? And how was the tread condition ?

[Manoj2268]

They had run 38k kms approximately. The tyres go thru rotation/balancing/alignment every service(roughly 7500 kms). Lastt alignment was done about a month ago.