Seems like every highway I drive, I see innumerable chunks of tractor-trailer retreads littlering the roadway. Curiously however, I have never seen one of these things actually delaminate and come off a tire casing.

Now I have to figure that if you're driving behind or next to one of these rigs when a tire decides to puke off one of these rubber roadkills, it must be pretty exciting if it's all-of-a-sudden flying through the air, headed for your windshield.

Anyone have any near-death experiences with these things, seen one nail another car or have a story to tell?????

 

Truckers call them aligators.

Anyways... my husband was driving home from Delaware last summer in his 300M and ran one over. He couldn't avoid hitting it, as there were cars on both sides of him. The tire-tread shot up, put a hole in his door and flattened his tire. He had close to $1000 in damage, and no one to blame.

And to top it all off, he had just snapped his achilles tendon the day before.

Jenn in MD

 

Was in my friends Toyota Celica in the passenger seat on our way to Dodge Stadium and we were next to a semi truck when one of the tires blew and the tire rolled into/along the passenger side of his car and left black rubber melted on the whole side of his car, the trucking company paid for everything...no problems.

prety scaring going 75mph and looking out my window and seeing a tire there the size of his car...but no truck with it.

 

When I was a little kid I was riding in my Dads little Datsun pickup truck, when a huge piece flew off of a truck in front of us. It came up and smacked across the windshield, completely blocking us from seeing anything. We managed to stop without hitting anything, but sure had a few scary moments and a very cracked windshield! We'll just say I didn't like riding in Dad's truck for a while...