CJs and Tire Failures

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Anyone heard of any CJs losing tires on landing with no normal indications of tire loss until taxi except a fairly hard pulling moment to the failed side during rollout? Then, upon inspection seeing one or both sidewalls turned into shredded, reverted rubber with no indication of damage to the rolling surface of the tire. I've heard of three of these now (all CJs) in as many weeks. This seems a very odd way to lose a tire as well as an odd CJ cluster. Note: in all cases, the tires were fine and inflated properly at preflight inspection.
Here's a pic...
IMG_9439.jpg
 
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I had a similar circumstance a few years ago with a King Air E90. The tire would be either very low or flat after long flights at altitude. I was witness to it once landing in Jackson Hole, since I was on board I can assure the pressures were fine before we left. Had the wheel overhauled twice and it still would end up low or flat after a long flight. I scrapped the wheel, the owner wasn't happy but it never happened again. I suspect it had a crack that wasn't easily visible during NDT and must have opened up a bit when the wheel got cold.
 
@Crop Duster,
I've had this discussion with one of Cessna's top Flight Test Engineers and I've personally seen this very thing only once in 8 years of flying CJs.

Fortunately I wasn't at the controls but was sitting in the back so my boss could sit up front for the landing. We were landing St. John's, Canada with about 30 knots of direct left-side crosswind. As we got in ground effect, the plane side slipped to the left. The tire hit the ground with a sideward movement and this movement "popped" the tire bead off of the rim. It only takes a few rotations to start shredding the tire! The center of our tire looked brand new but both side walls were confetti..

Interesting note: Upon touchdown, the audio "Landing Gear" sounded. It seems the side loading on the gear makes the Warning system attached to the WOW sort of "run home to momma"!

I'm curious if there was a cross wind at the time of these occurrences or if the pilot(s) recall side slipping..
 
I do know that there are two approved tires for the CJs. We always used Michelen and after 12 years and 4000 hours in them...never lost a tire. The tire may seem perfect from the outside but if you have internal issues...now are these retreads or new?
 
Crop Duster said:
Anyone heard of any CJs losing tires on landing with no normal indications of tire loss until taxi except a fairly hard pulling moment to the failed side during rollout? Then, upon inspection seeing one or both sidewalls turned into shredded, reverted rubber with no indication of damage to the rolling surface of the tire. I've heard of three of these now (all CJs) in as many weeks. This seems a very odd way to lose a tire as well as an odd CJ cluster. Note: in all cases, the tires were fine and inflated properly at preflight inspection.
Here's a pic...
View attachment 42728
Click to expand...
PWK?
 
dustoff17 said:
@Crop Duster,
I've had this discussion with one of Cessna's top Flight Test Engineers and I've personally seen this very thing only once in 8 years of flying CJs.

Fortunately I wasn't at the controls but was sitting in the back so my boss could sit up front for the landing. We were landing St. John's, Canada with about 30 knots of direct left-side crosswind. As we got in ground effect, the plane side slipped to the left. The tire hit the ground with a sideward movement and this movement "popped" the tire bead off of the rim. It only takes a few rotations to start shredding the tire! The center of our tire looked brand new but both side walls were confetti..

Interesting note: Upon touchdown, the audio "Landing Gear" sounded. It seems the side loading on the gear makes the Warning system attached to the WOW sort of "run home to momma"!

I'm curious if there was a cross wind at the time of these occurrences or if the pilot(s) recall side slipping..
Click to expand...
Yeah, based on runway/wind combo, there was a light crosswind from the right, and I'm told there was a slight leftward drift at touchdown. The pic does not appear to show that the bead departed the rim, however. The tearing is between the bead and the sidewall. Now... if the sideloading caused the bead to be displaced just long enough to allow some deflation at touchdown and spinup...???
 
Sorry, when I stated "bead", I'm referring to the raised ridge on the inner-most area of the TIRE that is held against the rim by pressure. These are pressurized in the 134-140psi range so it really doesn't take much side loading in a drift touchdown to relieve enough Nitrogen to cause an issue. Also, after the "bead" pops out of place, it would be a fluke for it to go back where it's supposed to be; which means it just bleeds out......

The shredding that occurred in the picture you posted was caused by the rim cutting it against the pavement during the roll-out. [follow the cut line around to the rim, you can see the cut aligns pretty well]. This is NOT a tire sidewall material failure (IMHO).

(edit) P.S. @Crop Duster, I'm curious: did the "Landing Gear" warning sound?
 
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dustoff17 said:
Sorry, when I stated "bead", I'm referring to the raised ridge on the inner-most area of the TIRE that is held against the rim by pressure. These are pressurized in the 134-140psi range so it really doesn't take much side loading in a drift touchdown to relieve enough Nitrogen to cause an issue. Also, after the "bead" pops out of place, it would be a fluke for it to go back where it's supposed to be; which means it just bleeds out......

The shredding that occurred in the picture you posted was caused by the rim cutting it against the pavement during the roll-out. [follow the cut line around to the rim, you can see the cut aligns pretty well]. This is NOT a tire sidewall material failure (IMHO).
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Yeah, I'm pretty sure we mean the same thing by "bead". I initially thought you were referring to the bead in terms of the bead rolling itself off the wheel rim; that's not what happened to the tire in the pic, the bead is still within the rim. But when I considered a small displacement of bead that would allow some amount of deflation - even if not complete deflation - that resonated.

Scenario: The tire loses a bit of air due to sideloading at touchdown which results in a momentary leak around the bead. The bead has now lost some of its pressure contact with the rim making it more susceptible to additional displacement. So during rollout, subsequent bead displacement occurs and leads to further deflation. Cycle repeats. Tire deflates more and more. That would comport with the statements by the pilots that there was no typical indication of a blow out during landing or rollout (loud bangs, thump-thump-thumps, etc). The tire was slowly deflating as the plane decelerated down the runway. The increasingly degraded structure would lead to increased heating and weakening of the rubber. Finally, the already hot tire fails, deflates entirely, and the rim eats the rubber during taxi. Sounds very plausible.
 
IMO, the bottom line is the pilot(s) let the aircraft drift during touchdown causing. This might be a painful revelation......
 
Crop Duster said:
Yeah, I'm pretty sure we mean the same thing by "bead". I initially thought you were referring to the bead in terms of the bead rolling itself off the wheel rim; that's not what happened to the tire in the pic, the bead is still within the rim. But when I considered a small displacement of bead that would allow some amount of deflation - even if not complete deflation - that resonated.

Scenario: The tire loses a bit of air due to sideloading at touchdown which results in a momentary leak around the bead. The bead has now lost some of its pressure contact with the rim making it more susceptible to additional displacement. So during rollout, subsequent bead displacement occurs and leads to further deflation. Cycle repeats. Tire deflates more and more. That would comport with the statements by the pilots that there was no typical indication of a blow out during landing or rollout (loud bangs, thump-thump-thumps, etc). The tire was slowly deflating as the plane decelerated down the runway. The increasingly degraded structure would lead to increased heating and weakening of the rubber. Finally, the already hot tire fails, deflates entirely, and the rim eats the rubber during taxi. Sounds very plausible.
Click to expand...

Do aircraft wheels not have bead locks?
 
I know more about the situation, so we will put a few things to bed. Not a side load issue....good landing. No evidence of underwing damage or flap damage. So the tire did not come apart upon landing, high speed. It was either flat or became flat upon landing and the rim ripped it apart.
 
I know more about the situation, so we will put a few things to bed. Not a side load issue....good landing. No evidence of underwing damage or flap damage. So the tire did not come apart upon landing, high speed. It was either flat or became flat upon landing and the rim ripped it apart.
 
SFLAX said:
I know more about the situation, so we will put a few things to bed. Not a side load issue....good landing. No evidence of underwing damage or flap damage. So the tire did not come apart upon landing, high speed. It was either flat or became flat upon landing and the rim ripped it apart.
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I'm not stating that the tire was in good shape or properly inflated but based on the OP, the tire was relatively new.

I do disagree with your assessment though. This is not a common occurrence but it has happened several times over the years. Part of flight test is to perform side-loaded landings. Not all of them result is a tire coming "unseated" from the rim but when they do, this is the result. The flight test pictures look remarkably similar to that of the OP(also with no damage to the flaps or wing).

When I experienced this very thing, we had a left side drift landing that resulted in damage exactly like this. We had NO damage to either the flaps or the underwing area; we had the rim/tire replaced and were on our way the next morning. Our tire and rim looked almost exactly like the one shown above. [I'm going to search for my photos]

We would expect damage to the flaps and underwing of the tire were to explode or if the tire shreds along the tread/cord lines during a landing sequence. However, the damage here is solely the result of the rim cutting the tire sidewall as it rotates. AND the damage to the tire and then the rim increases as the airplane slows down (unlike an exploded tire wherein the damage to the airplane is reduced as it slows).
 
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dustoff17 said:
I'm not stating that the tire was in good shape or properly inflated but based on the OP, the tire was relatively new.

I do disagree with your assessment though. This is not a common occurrence but it has happened several times over the years. Part of flight test is to perform side-loaded landings. Not all of them result is a tire coming "unseated" from the rim but when they do, this is the result. The flight test pictures look remarkably similar to that of the OP(also with no damage to the flaps or wing).

When I experienced this very thing, we had a left side drift landing that resulted in damage exactly like this. We had NO damage to either the flaps or the underwing area; we had the rim/tire replaced and were on our way the next morning. Our tire and rim looked almost exactly like the one shown above. [I'm going to search for my photos]

We would expect damage to the flaps and underwing of the tire were to explode or if the tire shreds along the tread/cord lines during a landing sequence. However, the damage here is solely the result of the rim cutting the tire sidewall as it rotates. AND the damage to the tire and then the rim increases as the airplane slows down (unlike an exploded tire wherein the damage to the airplane is reduced as it slows).
Click to expand...

Just talked to a colleague who mentioned that he had almost exactly this same thing happen to him. Also in a CJ (a CJ2). He described it exactly they way you did except for the side-load at touchdown. In his case, he set down normally (no side-load). When he started braking, he experienced a continuous smooth pull to the left (much like one might experience rolling out uncorrected for a crosswind). According to him, the consensus conclusion in his case was that plane landed with the tire already deflated - at least somewhat. Again, the tire was correctly inflated during preflight. Why the tire would lose pressure in flight is a whole different question. In any case, I've now heard about 4 incidents of this very similar type that have happened in just a several month time span.
 
I’m gonna be the witch in church and say that maybe our collective skills have degraded to the point where “yep, good straight landing” can actually have a significant sideload.
 
Crop Duster said:
Just talked to a colleague who mentioned that he had almost exactly this same thing happen to him. Also in a CJ (a CJ2). He described it exactly they way you did except for the side-load at touchdown. In his case, he set down normally (no side-load). When he started braking, he experienced a continuous smooth pull to the left (much like one might experience rolling out uncorrected for a crosswind). According to him, the consensus conclusion in his case was that plane landed with the tire already deflated - at least somewhat. Again, the tire was correctly inflated during preflight. Why the tire would lose pressure in flight is a whole different question. In any case, I've now heard about 4 incidents of this very similar type that have happened in just a several month time span.
Click to expand...
I'd start tracking the wheel assy. If your airplane is not part of a fleet it's easy, if the wheel is a rotable spare it's still not that hard. If it happens again to the same wheel it deserves some extra attention.
 
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