Trouble with MT ET Street Radials
I am starting this thread to document the problems I am having and hopefully come to some sort of resolution with MT or Summit Racing.
Last week I bought a pair of MT ET Street Radials P325/50R15 and also a pair of Center Line Competition series Qualifier wheels 15X10 from Summit Racing. The wheels and tires arrived promptly and appeared to be in good shape, although one of the wheels came in a plain cardboard box (more on that later) and the other came in a CL wheel box. Here is a pic showing the two different wheel boxes on my front porch at delivery.
I took one of the wheels (the one out of the plain cardboard box), and one tire to work today. I work at a major Lexus dealer and have the proper Hunter tire machine and balancer to mount and balance the tire without any damage to either wheel or tire. I don't work as a mechanic so I had my buddy mount the tire to the wheel for me. It mounted up without a hitch. We put the dot on the sidewall that indicates the lightest part of the tire next to the valve.
When we put the wheel/tire combo onto our Hunter wheel balancer, my buddy tried to balance the wheel as we do with any other aftermarket wheel. We try to balance them with all of the weights being taped to the inside of the wheel and not visible from the outside. When the machine was done, it said that we needed to add over 300 grams of weight to balance the wheel!! We tried rotating the tire 90 degrees each way, but with similar but not exactly the same results. After messing with it for almost an hour and calling 3 other mechanics over to look at it, we decided to walk away from it for now and to make a few calls to MT and Summit to see what they thought.
When I got home I called MT and spoke to someone on their tech line, I wish I would have gotten his name, he basically blamed Center Line and said that I should dismount the tire and spin the wheel by itself and see how out of balance the wheel is by itself. He had never heard of those tires taking more than a usual amounts of weight to bring them into balance?!? I didn't want to call him a liar, but I have found numerous threads on numerous forums sighting quality control problems with these tires. He said any refund or exchange would have to be handled through Summit.
I immediately called Summit Racing and spoke with Rex in their customer service dept. He suggested trying to flip the tire the other direction and also spinning the wheel by itself on the balancer. He said to mount the other wheel and tire and see if we have a similar problem with that pair. He said if we determine that there is a problem with either the wheels or tires, he will send me a return packing label and I can ship them back to them for an exchange or refund. I explained to him that I am not looking for a refund just a good usable wheel/tire combo that I paid for. I commend Summit for it's great customer service!
I do question why the one CL wheel came in a plain cardboard box and not a CL logo'd box like the other. Was it returned to Summit because of a problem and then reboxed and sold to me?!? I guess we'll find out more when I spin it up without the tire on it.
I will take the other wheel and tire to work on Monday and see if we have similar problems with that combo. Sorry for the long thread, but I am documenting everything to cover my ***! I saved a long time working side jobs to buy these wheels and tires, and thought I was buying a good quality product. Here is a picture of the wheel/tire combo sitting under the Christmas tree!!
I am starting this thread to document the problems I am having and hopefully come to some sort of resolution with MT or Summit Racing.
Last week I bought a pair of MT ET Street Radials P325/50R15 and also a pair of Center Line Competition series Qualifier wheels 15X10 from Summit Racing. The wheels and tires arrived promptly and appeared to be in good shape, although one of the wheels came in a plain cardboard box (more on that later) and the other came in a CL wheel box. Here is a pic showing the two different wheel boxes on my front porch at delivery.
I took one of the wheels (the one out of the plain cardboard box), and one tire to work today. I work at a major Lexus dealer and have the proper Hunter tire machine and balancer to mount and balance the tire without any damage to either wheel or tire. I don't work as a mechanic so I had my buddy mount the tire to the wheel for me. It mounted up without a hitch. We put the dot on the sidewall that indicates the lightest part of the tire next to the valve.
When we put the wheel/tire combo onto our Hunter wheel balancer, my buddy tried to balance the wheel as we do with any other aftermarket wheel. We try to balance them with all of the weights being taped to the inside of the wheel and not visible from the outside. When the machine was done, it said that we needed to add over 300 grams of weight to balance the wheel!! We tried rotating the tire 90 degrees each way, but with similar but not exactly the same results. After messing with it for almost an hour and calling 3 other mechanics over to look at it, we decided to walk away from it for now and to make a few calls to MT and Summit to see what they thought.
When I got home I called MT and spoke to someone on their tech line, I wish I would have gotten his name, he basically blamed Center Line and said that I should dismount the tire and spin the wheel by itself and see how out of balance the wheel is by itself. He had never heard of those tires taking more than a usual amounts of weight to bring them into balance?!? I didn't want to call him a liar, but I have found numerous threads on numerous forums sighting quality control problems with these tires. He said any refund or exchange would have to be handled through Summit.
I immediately called Summit Racing and spoke with Rex in their customer service dept. He suggested trying to flip the tire the other direction and also spinning the wheel by itself on the balancer. He said to mount the other wheel and tire and see if we have a similar problem with that pair. He said if we determine that there is a problem with either the wheels or tires, he will send me a return packing label and I can ship them back to them for an exchange or refund. I explained to him that I am not looking for a refund just a good usable wheel/tire combo that I paid for. I commend Summit for it's great customer service!
I do question why the one CL wheel came in a plain cardboard box and not a CL logo'd box like the other. Was it returned to Summit because of a problem and then reboxed and sold to me?!? I guess we'll find out more when I spin it up without the tire on it.
I will take the other wheel and tire to work on Monday and see if we have similar problems with that combo. Sorry for the long thread, but I am documenting everything to cover my ***! I saved a long time working side jobs to buy these wheels and tires, and thought I was buying a good quality product. Here is a picture of the wheel/tire combo sitting under the Christmas tree!!