Retreads.......What's your take/experience.....

If I go the retread route then I use my casings and go thru Les Schwab tires which is out here on the west coast. They are picky about what gets capped and what doesnt and they dont use the spliced caps. Michelin would be the only other ones I would use as they also are very picky and x-ray the casings before capping them. If you keep up on the maintenance on your retreaded tires then you will have a good experience with them and save some bucks.

 

When I bought my truck, they came with Michelin retreads. They lasted about 3-4 months before cracks started to appear. Changed 8 tires to Firestone M726 EL and am very happy with those.

 

I was looking at getting some Goodyear caps for my rears

 

I've got one Goodyear cap on my trailer and I'm really liking it. Goodyear is just as strict as Michelin as far as checking out casings. Either one would be a good retread to go with.

 

I run the Michelin molded caps on my trucks and trailers and have no issues what so ever. The Bandags do not seem as good to me from the ones i have seen. I have bin useing caps for about 7 years now and have had only 2 issues with them. Pretty darn good if you ask me.

 

Caps can be a good thing, or they can be a royal pain. Depends on many variables. Your gross weight, speed,driving conditions, maintenance, temperature, quality of re-capping job, quality of casing, and so on. The lighter your load, the slower you drive, the type road you run on, keeping them aligned and properly inflated, not running in extremely hot weather, from a good capper, on a newer, higher quality casing, can be a good thing. Just depends on your operation.

 

id rather run a chinese crap tire then a recap anyday usa or not....

i just dont like them and as a poster said above, they would have to be my own casings. problem is nowadays any off brand retreaders just dont have the quality control of the larger companys and will pretty much recap any casing they find thus you need to be careful all you find in south florida is a bunch of trucks running caps.

id rather run a worn out regrooved china tire before i run a cap, its just my preference.

Now on a yard dog i would run recap all over even in the front lol.

 

I have 16 recaps on my truck. The only issues I have had with them is a 3/8" bolt in one and a bad bead on another. I replaced two of the 16 recaps. One for the said bad bead, the other because the tire I replaced it with was just tall enough it caused the other to scrub the original tire off.

It's now been replaced with a matched pair of recaps.


I have no issues running them. Next year, I'll be pulling all my drives for new virgins and recapping all 8 of those michelins and putting them onto the trailer.

 

I run fronts all the way around in the summer . They get a little better fuel milage and are quieter . Then I cap my casings with bridgestone BDR-w treads and have them mounted on steel rims. There ready to go right now. I run them only in the winter. Around here that's about 5 months. And I only cap my casings once, and turn them in, or barter them.