Michelin PRO RACE 3 tyre Exploded !

[ww4]

A friend of mine had his Michelin PRO RACE 3 tyre exploded at the front.

Lucky for him he was only doing less than 30km. Imagine if this happen down hill at 80km, scary stuff.

I guess this is one in a thousand tyre that has a defected side wall rubber ripped off, see pics below....wow!

[Gregorio]

Do you know what pressure he was running.
The bead is obviously damaged but did that happen before or after? Meaning was it damaged while rolling to a stop.

[ww4]

100psi..

Not sure if it was damage before the ride or during the ride?

We did notice however that its very hard to install the tyre, it seems quite tight and small compare to the rim diameter because its new perhaps (Ultegra wheelset clinch). You really have to use a force or leveraged to get it in the rim.

[slidecontrol]

ease of installation, as always, comes down to the wheel I find.

my new pro3's went on my mavic rims by hand only, but my hed alps was a fight.

[jimbonnet]

Ive had 2 similar issues with Krylion tires last year. Both on the same Zipp 303 rim... Looked exactly the same where the bead blew out... pretty interesting.

[GrahamB]

Is it possible that he abraded the bead while mounting the tires?

[ww4]

Don't think he had damage the bead wall with the plastic tool tyre installer. He's been installing tyres a lot on soo many different bikes. I do get the feeling that the bead wall had a slight damage during production. I also heard some unlucky riders do experience this on other brand tyres. Its one in a thousand unlucky tyres out there.

[allerge99]

I've had it happen on a PR3 too and the tire had only 100 miles on it. I emailed Michelin and they were more then happy to send a new tire. I haven't had a problem with the other 6 PR3s I've been using.

[geraldatwork]

During a club ride a few weeks ago I heard this explosion, like a bomb went off, behind me. It turned out the tire exploded and actually bent the rim to where he couldn't put a tire on it anymore. I don't know the reason or what tires he was using but the sound of it was pretty scarry.

[rruff]

A friend of mine had his Michelin PRO RACE 3 tyre exploded at the front.

This is not something you want to have happen at 50 mph...

BTW... I think this can happen when you get a tiny bit of tube pinched under the bead. I've had a tire blow a few minutes after it was mounted and pumped up the first time... and I at least thought the busted bead was *caused* by the tire blowing and not the other way around... but I could be wrong.

[The Dimpler]

I guess the obvious explanation that he ran over something and cut the tire doesn't apply?

[ericm]

It's kind of hard to imagine a scenario where running over an object would cut the tire at the bottom of the bead. It usually damages the part of the tire that's near the road.


I had a PR3 do the same thing this summer. It came loose on a steep descent, flapped for a few rotations, then the exposed tube blew. Fortunately I heard it and was able to slow a bit and aim for the road bank instead of the dropoff, and come to a safe stop... and I was only 1/4 mile from home. The damage was identical to this one- the tire pulled away from the fiber bead cords. That's not caused by any road debris or by getting the tube under the bead (that blows the bead off the rim when the tube blows).

I've installed a couple hundred tires and that PR3 on Reynolds DV46Cs was the most difficult tire I have ever installed. I really had to crank on it. So I assumed that I must have damaged the bead area. But perhaps they have a manufacturing issue.

The replacement PR3 I got installed much easier. Could they have changed things in the production run?

[ww4]

yes, we all hear the very loud bang, we thought somebody pull a gun. We had a look at the tube and it look as though it exploded with slices of rubbers everywhere. I would say the tyre exploded and then the tube pop out the side at a very high pleasure and then bang!

Anyway, base on my tests the PR3 is an excellent tyre, rolls fast, smooth, comfortable and most importantly its a weight weenie

[hockinsk]

Are you sure these haven't been removed by sliding the first one or two tyre levers instead of using all 3? Looks awfully like tyre lever damage to me? On ulrtra-thin bead coverings like the Pro3, fitting needs to be a hands-only affair and removing should be 3 levers + with no sliding between bead and rim to remove the tyre.

[ww4]

the tyre was installed once and haven't been removed from a wheel. He only used 1 tool lever not 3 tool levers.