Date: Tue, 09 Sep 2003 18:00:18 GMT From: milt brewster <milt73nopsamc.net> Subject: Tire Complaint
In article <20030907213313.03375.00000716nopsam11.aol.com>, lkrznopsamcomnospam says... > >Actually in the US, there is supposed to be government oversight > >of the design, manufacture, marketing and servicing of tires. > >They are considered to be a critical safety product, and tire > >manufacturers are supposed to be held to a higher quality > >standard than might be reasonable for other less critical > >products. > >My phone calls to tire dealers indicate a lot, but prove little. > > > > How many phone calls did you make to the National Highway Traffic Safety > Administration, which overseas tires? Did you call their hotline and file a > report? Did you visit a regional office? > http://www.nospam/hotline/ > Did you search for the tire -- by tire make and model -- on NHTSA's website to > see if other problems are being reported? > Did you fill out a complaint form at NHTSA? > Ford didn't just decide on their own to recall the Firestones. They were told > to do it by NHTSA. NHTSA found out about it from complaints filed by consumers. > NHTSA tells auto and tires makers to do a recall. > Have you been to Tire Rack and checked out tires and read reviews to see if > others are having problems with the same tire? > http://www.tirerack.com > How much research on the car and potential problems did you do before you > bought the Saab? > Acting like a twit in a newsgroup accomplishes nothing. If you're so concerned > about this "major design flaw" why haven't you taken real action? > Laura, while these are reasonable and intelligent suggestions, it is also unrealistic for you to expect every auto buyer to conduct this kind of detailed study before they make their purchase choice. It almost makes me wonder if you yourself just wanted to vent a little at me... maybe let yourself off the hook for choices you have made in your own past. If that's what you're doing, that's OK. I can deal with it. I'll point out to you now, that in general, USA auto buyers simply don't have enough information available to them to make the kind of detailed, exquisitely informed buying decisions that your response here implies they can. Without good product quality information, we simply must rely to a large part on the manufacturer and the dealer to "warrant" that the car we have just purchased is safely designed, built and equipped. I think you know what I'm getting at. **** I didn't go to NHTSA or the tire rack two years ago because I didn't know I would need to. I thought Saab's choice of Michelins as OEM equipment were probably a good choice for my 9-3. I was more concerned about my brakes, the turbo, the transmission, and the electronics. This is probably a usual and normal concern for most Saab buyers. While my concerns might not meet your precise standards, neither was I a negligent or careless buyer. I took more than a year to pick out my Saab: in fact, it might have been two years. When I originally posted my "complaint" here, I was angry but I was contained. It was not an abusive rant. In any case, I didn't address my post to anyone in this group; where they could logically assume I was attacking them personally. Go back and read that original post. I didn't realize it was a big-deal safety issue at that point. I hadn't collected information yet. Now I have a little more data from other people, and I do indeed believe that Michelin tires on 2001 Saab 9-3s are a safety issue worth reporting. Tires matter: Particularly on smaller cars that are designed to run on low-profile tires that can fail so suddenly under normal use and care. I now believe that at the very least, Saab made an unconsciably poor OEM tire choice for their 2001 9-3s. mb
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