12" Gash in tire??

Ok, about a month ago I put some 17" Cobra R's on my Mark VIII and have been loving them. I bought them used with tires on the wheels. Two of the tires were bad which I replaced and threw on the back, the two good ones I reused and put on the front knowing that eventually they'd need replacing as they were just starting to show some wear. The wheels had 255/40/R17 BFG G-Force KD's on them already. When I put the wheels on I also sensor lowered the front, but ran out of daylight for the rear. ...So yesterday I brought my car into the shop at school to use the lifts so I could easily lower the back. Got the car up in the air and noticed some cuts on the inside shoulder of the right front tire, the longest being about a foot long! Both of the front tires inside shoulders are bald/balding, but the right one has a cut that goes down past the cords. There is nothing even close to this on the left one. Im so confused. An inspection of everything up front didn't reveal what cut the tire. So now I need new tires but don't know what caused this. I will be getting an alignment done to hopefully fix any camber and toe issues it may have. That size tire should fit right? I'm thinking about going smaller width up front to try to avoid this. No pics right now. I'm posting from school and the car is in the garage, isn't moving till I have new tires. I'll try to remember to get pics when i get home tonight. Any help is really appreciated.

I am having a hard time understanding what your exact question is...

Are you asking if your Mark cut the tires? Or are you just stating the fact that they are completely unusable?!

What is the offset of the wheels? And how wide are they?

I'm more just confused at how it happened, and am wondering if that size tire should fit. I know something on the car cut the tire, I just don't know how.

I don't know the offset as I bought the rims used. They're were mounted on a Thunderbird, and another Mark VIII before I bought them. They're the 17's with the correct bolt pattern, I don't know the width either.

Maybe some pics of the damage would help us understand the problem better.

Is the cut along the edge of the tire between the sidewall and the tread? I have see that before on older tires but not newer ones.

I'll go get pics right now.

Ok, my car was already parked so you could see the big cut, there is at least one other small one that I noticed, but could not see it where the car was sitting.




Thats the large cut.^^

This is from behind the tire showing some other wear.


Here is the front left. Its balding on the shoulder which that area was worn more than the rest when I got the wheels/tires but not worn nearly as far. I knew this would need replaced and I expected this type of wear as it wasn't aligned after swapping from stock to these and after lowering. Its balding, which the other tire is doing, but has no signs of any damage like the other.


I know my posts earlier may have been confusing. Really what I'm wanting to know is, has anyone else had similar problems? These have been on both a Tbird and sensor lowered Mark before. Are my tires too wide for the front? I know not knowing the width or offset doesn't help at all. Anyone ever see something like this before? I really just wanna know if it was the tires being too wide, that way I can order some skinnier ones. If not then what can be done to make sure this doesn't happen again. I wish I had more info to give but I really can't see any reason for this.

Sorry if that was confusing too, I just don't understand why that happened. I'm hoping maybe someone will know so I can know what to do to avoid that. Thanks for any help.

I'm not a professional tire man but I don't think your problem was from either of your cars. I have seen tires split there before on bone stock cars. Most of them were not as bad as yours but it looks like the tread is starting to separate.

It is time for some new tires. How old and how many miles on on the tires in question?

They certainly look like age related seperations. Check out the DOT manfactured date on the tie. Bet they are over 7 years old. Dry rot.

After taking a closer look it looks like it might be related to an alignment issue. The 2nd to last picture is showing excess wear where the other tires are having the separation issue.

So it looks like the insides of the tire were worn down (due to alignment or other suspension issues) leading to premature separation of the tread.

CHANGE THOSE TIRES!!! No one/thing cut it... it was because the damn things are so old and you have some serious alignment wear.

BTW OEM tires on this car were 225-60R16. Not sure what tires will fit, but I doubt the different tire size had anything to do with this but anything is possible I guess.

maxmk8 said:

CHANGE THOSE TIRES!!! No one/thing cut it... it was because the damn things are so old and you have some serious alignment wear.

Click to expand...

Are these the used ones you put on the front? They aren't the new ones your just bought are they?

If they are the used ones, it it just time for new tires and alignment plus front end check.

maxmk8 said:

CHANGE THOSE TIRES!!! No one/thing cut it... it was because the damn things are so old and you have some serious alignment wear.

Click to expand...

I concur completely.
Definatly not a "cut tire", that is a tire that is about to "blow up in your face".

I wouldn't go near that tire again, until you let ALL the air out of the tire...that thing is just about to "crap the bed".. hopefully your not under there with a camera when it occurs.

"you've been warned".....

P.S. That is too large of a tire ran with the wrong alignment settings as Max said.

seriously i had the same thing happen to me a few years ago i used to have a 2001 singlecab toyota tacoma slammed with my old mitsubishi eclipse rims and tires on it the tires were in perfect conditon when i put them on then in like a 3 months i had the same thing happen the tire dude said it was because of my camber and allignment i had a 3 and a half inch drop in the front without changing a-arms or anything and i had a massive tire blowout thank god it was right in front of my work and not on the freeway 20 min before that i was doing like 100 cuz i was late to work.

sdund1sputed said:

seriously i had the same thing happen to me a few years ago i used to have a 2001 singlecab toyota tacoma slammed with my old mitsubishi eclipse rims and tires on it the tires were in perfect conditon when i put them on then in like a 3 months i had the same thing happen the tire dude said it was because of my camber and allignment i had a 3 and a half inch drop in the front without changing a-arms or anything and i had a massive tire blowout thank god it was right in front of my work and not on the freeway 20 min before that i was doing like 100 cuz i was late to work.

Click to expand...

You don't check your tires on a regular basis?!

Thanks guys, those are the used tires that are doing that. The new ones are doing just great.

I don't exactly know how to read the year on the tire, but I did find a couple separate numbers that might be the right one. First is 31552, second is (E)4 0212682. The E was in a circle.

Thanks for the help everyone. I've never seen a tire dry rot like that before, and it looked too clean of a cut to be solely from alignment. Now that I know its just an old tire plus not being aligned, I'll order another set of tires and get it aligned a.s.a.p. Thanks again everyone.

Date code should also be in a circle. It'll be a 4 digit code. Year and week of year.

Hmm, didn't see anything like that I'll have to check again tomorrow.

yeah i do check my tires often now back the i was like 18 it was my first ride and i diddnt really know much about cars now im 23 a father of 2 and my car always get's serviced and i check my tires every other week i dont really drive all that much just when i wanna cruise around

jbird97 said:

Thanks guys, those are the used tires that are doing that. The new ones are doing just great.

I don't exactly know how to read the year on the tire, but I did find a couple separate numbers that might be the right one. First is 31552, second is (E)4 0212682. The E was in a circle.

Thanks for the help everyone. I've never seen a tire dry rot like that before, and it looked too clean of a cut to be solely from alignment. Now that I know its just an old tire plus not being aligned, I'll order another set of tires and get it aligned a.s.a.p. Thanks again everyone.

Click to expand...

It looks like a clean cut because you are seeing where the tread ends and the sidewall begins which like the other members said where due to the alignment issue.

As for your date code, look for this on your tire.