Connie and I just got back from Manasota Key beach today and we were about 10 miles from home when the DIC started flashing a low tire pressure warning on the driver's side rear tire. When I checked the pressure reading, it was at 23 psi but quickly dropped down to 1 psi. Backing up a bit, not long before this we heard a sharp pop and the car jerked momentarily to the right. We thought we had run over something, but we are really pretty vigilant about watching for road hazards in front of us, and neither of us saw anything before we heard that noise.
Luckily these were run flats, and we were really close to home, so we just slowed down and took it easy the rest of the way.
So I yanked off the wheel to inspect it when the car was safely back in the garage, and here's what I saw...
And oddly enough, when I roll the wheel, I can hear something rolling around inside of the tire.
No idea what happened, but it looks like the tire just exploded at that spot, blowing the tread off with it. I'm thinking the inside of the tire blew off also, and there is a chunk of rubber bouncing around in there.
I guess I'll be running the car over to the local Goodyear tire dealer tomorrow to see what they say. It was on Connie's 2007 C6 and it's the tire that came on the car when we bought it with 4 miles on the odometer. It's now got 19K miles on the ticker. I'm pretty sure I will need a new tire, but wonder if Goodyear will prorate it as a factory defect? I want to stick around and watch them break the tire down so I can see what is rattling around inside of it.
You know, I'm REAL glad this was a run-flat tire, otherwise we would have been dead alongside the road waiting for a tow truck. No way any sort of "fix-a-flat" inflator would have sealed that big darn hole. I don't have run flats on the C5Z, and I am SERIOUSLY considering changing that fact ASAP. Yeah, I know they are noisier than the non run-flats, but I think I would prefer that peace of mind knowing I could at least drive somewhere where I could get some help with replacing a tire if something like this happens again. I can live with the increased noise, if I would even hear the difference over the exhaust on that car.