Cooper ATR after 1 day.

[tkstrong Junior Member Find all posts View Profile Close tkstrong]

Ok how much bad luck is this. This Cooper ATR is just 1 day old. Only an hour or so into a drive ! This happened on a normal dirt / gravel graded road. Plenty of non 4wd vehicles use this road daily, i.e. The average sedan etc. I could not find the rock that caused it and I did have an extensive look. But it was bound to be a rock just sticking up from the surface a little bit.

Oh well - Guess this is either bad luck - or poor tire selection. I very nearly put BFG AT's on it... Perhaps I should have ! They look a bit more "Solid" then the Coopers. Was running 34 PSI at the time. - Perhaps this is too much ?
Anyway - not very impressed with either my luck - nor the tyre's

[Snaga Wishing I was lost Find all posts View Profile Close Snaga]

Ouch!! Interested to hear what Cooper's say...

Must have been a damn sharp rock :shock:

[Chippy Addicted PP Member Find all posts View Profile Close Chippy]

Damn. That's a bugger.

That second pic is showing some chipping on the other tread blocks as well ... similar to what my Safaris look like after 50,000 Km of not-so-sheltered life.

Not what you'd expect from 1 day

Cheers
Chippy

[tkstrong Junior Member Find all posts View Profile Close tkstrong]

Ouch!! Interested to hear what Cooper's say...

Must have been a damn sharp rock :shock:

Yes I don't know how it could happen with a rock... If it was a metal stake etc I could understand but considering there was no definable evidence to point to a particular rock etc ( or any sharp looking rock) I don't understand how it could happen so easily.

I am debating ringing Cooper and explaining the situation - but I am not sure that they would really care too much about it. ( One customer, one tyre etc). This kind of thing " could" happen to anyone I guess, so im just not sure they would be too concerned. Anyway - perhaps I may call tomorrow just to see what they say, but really - what can they do about it.

As for the pitting - yes, pretty bad considering i'd be lucky to have done 50Km on graded gravel roads... and already this pitting ! No doubt I'll be making another Tyre choice sooner rather then later at this rate !

P.S. If anyone knows what I did wrong with posting the pics let me know as they don't appear in the body of the post.

[Guest Close Guest]

I have cooper ATR's and have only done 5000km on them , they could nearly pass for new minus the "hairs" . By the look of that GASH thats been a very very sharp rock and a severe case of bad luck . Personally i wouldnt blame the trye . Thats a big hole!

Did you look for a star dropper too ?

Good luck with the cooper agent :wink:

[Guest Close Guest]

your reply was 2 mins before mine

regarding the pics , you didnt have [IMG] after the link , only at the start .

eg ... [IMG] blah blah blah [IMG]

DEFINATELY try your cooper agent for a replacement :!: without a doubt .

Im a "chancer" but i reckon with the years exp of the tyre guys , theyre going to ask you where the "star dropper is" too :?

[Guest Close Guest]

I helped two ladies change a tyre the other night coming out of Wanbi (SA). 3 week old Cooper ATR that had pretty well destroyed itself and also taken ALL of the trim and plastic off the side of their Prado!!! (90 series).

I couldnt believe the damage!! I used about 30 mtrs of race tape to hold what i couldnt remove back on the thing!!

As a note their is a lot of discussion on Coopers delaminating when too high a pressure. A search here and on 120cool will find them.

Looking at yours I would say depending on the road, the pressure was a bit high. Anything with larger stones should be down into the 20' something PSI range. I run 26-28 nowadays.

[wengnuts Advanced Member Find all posts View Profile Close wengnuts]

Another point worth mentioning is that there are two types of ATR tyres. There is the Passenger construction (265/65/17 or 265/70/17 - 50000k warranty) or the Light truck construction (only in 265/70/17 - 80000k warranty). You would find that most delaminated tyres are of the passenger construction. The LT have a stronger casing.

http://www.coopertires.com.au/tyres/atr_specs.htm

[Rainman Advanced Member Find all posts View Profile Close Rainman]

I had a set of the old Cooper ATs (not the ATR), they had three very wide grooves running around the tyre.

On the beach once I drove over a small area of rock and managed to punch a hole directly into the tyre carcass in the middle of one of these grooves. Looks like you have done something similar in between the tread blocks.

I think its all about luck in most cases, the same ATs went across the GCR, Plenty and Donohue Highways only to get a flat in a car park in Gladstone.

However at the risk of starting a war, a friend of mine did the Gunbarrel in the middle of last year, two vehicles with BFG muddies, one with Coopers (not sure if they were STs or STTs).

When they got to Alice Springs the Coopers were shagged and had to be replaced, the BFG's looked untouched. The tyre shop in Alice told them no one will touch Coopers out that way.

As Team Piggy suggested, tyre pressure plays a big part. Years ago I took my 4wd Camira :shock: station wagon up to Wittenoom. I was getting a flat a day on the sharp stone up there.

On one occassion I pulled into the garage with a flat to be repaired,only to hear another tyre going down on the vehicle. They told me to drop the pressure down to 22-24psi and no more flats after that.

[craig Member Find all posts View Profile Close craig]

the Light truck construction (only in 265/70/17 - 80000k warranty).

They also come in 275/70/R17 LT, I have had mine now for around 70000 km and are still in good condition, I also run them at 40psi

[tkstrong Junior Member Find all posts View Profile Close tkstrong]

I am keen to know if the failed tyre was a LT or a passenger tyre :?:

Cheers,

I believe the tyres are the passenger type. To my knowledge you can't get a 265 65 17 cooper in LT format .. ?? So - with trying to stick with the silly NSW rules of tyre size and not going over that 15mm.. or was it 13 mm larger - I had to go the 3 Ply option. ( Although the 70 series profile goes pretty close to legal).

Just out of interest I did call up Cooper today. Not real sure why I did - must have been bored at work... anyway nicely explained the situation and got the answer I was expecting all along..

" Yeah well its not really a tyre manufacturing error is it mate - so yeah, just unlucky mate aye !"

--- Well, this was to be expected I guess. Lets look at the big picture here. I'm just one person and one tyre. No real big deal to them and in reality - it probably is just bad luck. 1 hr old, 1 day old or 1 year old... It wouldn't really matter. It would be very hard to blame the tyre construction.

I also mentioned that the "general vibe" going around about their warranty was that it was not much good (Although I did say it nicer then that).
Well I shouldn't have. That fired them up big time and they started the saga of how if you live in a capital city, rotate, balance and align as required then it doesn't matter if you spend 1 day per year out on the dirt or 365 days of the year out on the dirt. The warranty will still be good - as stated by them. It apparently all comes down to your address. i.e. Live in city - bound to spend most time on paved roads. If you don't drive paved normally - then your a small % and probably worth warranty replacement as most would never need it. I guess that is the logic.

Anyway thats my bad luck for the week. Off to get a new "spare" on the weekend.. ( Hope the rest hold out till then !! )

P.S. Yes from now on I think I'll be running 26PSI when off road and about 34PSI on road. This appears to be what most people run. Although I suppose the rear needs a bit more - especially if loaded.

[speedcomm Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close speedcomm]

Its funny you mention bad luck with tyres, I had a set of BFG muddies on the work truck, they did about 70k, they are a great tyre, I only had a puncture once and it was as I was turning around on a hill top, bumped at a micro speed, barely moving, into a stump which had a sharp bit sticking out, went straight thru inbetween two lugs and trashed it :evil: Im now running Cooper ST on the new one and have done 62k with no flats and heaps and heaps of gravel and rock always loaded, look like they will do 70k, not bad for a tyre that runs 38psi with nitrogen and just ignored :roll: The ATRs on the Prado have done 50k now and still well above half worn, will definately go straight past the 80 k mark.

[andrewh Junior Member Find all posts View Profile Close andrewh]

I've been running my ATRs for just over 50,000km. They are the passenger construction. They will do another 10-20,000km. As a road tyre they are excellent. Low noise, good grip in dry and wet. I have taken them offroad many times, in the mountains and central Aust. They do chip on the rough tracks .... quite badly, but they're not designed for that sort of work. More recently I've forked out for a second set of wheels and Cooper STT's. They have done some hard work on rough tracks. No chipping or damage on those, but noisey on bitumin. In my view it's horses for courses. The ATR's have treated me well. I'm expecting my new Prado in a couple of weeks. I've ordered it with ATR's fitted again 8)

[Jacto Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close Jacto]

Hi tkstrong

Without having a close up look at the failed tyre I would say that it is too high a pressure and has suffered from an impact damage. The problem with this type of injury is that you may never see the rock that you hit because it could have happened 5 minutes into your trip or yesterday or as soon as it let go. If the tyre pressure is too high then the carcass of the tyre is under too much tension and doesn't allow the rubber to envelope itself around rocky objects. The result then is that the tyre tends to be stretched to breaking point and tends to burst outwards.

Or it could have been a rock that was just too sharp!! I mentioned in a previous post about light truck tyres that my son in law let his ATR's tyres down to 24psi to prepare for off road and we only got 15 minutes into the trip before he suffered from a 75mm cut through the shoulder of the tyre, which destroyed it. He got the same answer from the Cooper rep as bad luck and they are now arguing the point. Knowing tyre reps, I don't think he will win and he is fortunate that his tyre had already done 18,000kms.

You should have heard the girls (wife & daughter) going off though about how stupid we were to deflate the tyres and expose the sidewalls to more susceptible damage.

It would be interesting to do a poll of Cooper users to see who has destroyed tyres at low life and had a win with Mr. Cooper.

Oh and for all of the guys thinking Coopers are crap and are thinking of going to Mickey Thompson, they are made by Cooper but under licence to Mickey T, so what else is there? :twisted:

[speedcomm Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close speedcomm]

Seen some forklift tyres at the local tyre joint last time I was there. Puncture them with a rock :shock: