When your trailer tire passes you by......

[AGRIMAN]

It happens. My father and I had the tractor, hay mower, and rake loaded on our tri axle gooseneck one morning. We were headed across town to cut a hay field. I was slowing down to stop at a redlight at the bottom of a hill (in the middle of town) when a tire came rolling past us. My father said " Hey someone lost a tire".

I agreed but then looked back and noticed is was our tire. Luckily, we were almost stopped (and the tire was rolling slow) so I jumped out of the truck and ran it down.

The funny thing (afterwards) was there were 4 cars in front of us at the light, so the tire rolled past them followed closely by me running after it. When I finally caught it the light was still red, so I had to carry it back past all 4 cars. You should have seen the looks I got.

 

[PILOON]

Heck one day driving on a divided highway I saw a wheel slowly pull away from a semi, head for and cross the median, bounce and head for me dead on.
Do I stop? speed up? swerve left or right?
I bounced clear over the top of my car and landed in the ditch.
After cleaning my drawers I backed up and loaded it into my car and promptly sold it at the next truck stop for $50.00.
Paid for my dry cleaning.

 

[ovrszd]

Once upon a time, when I was about 8 years old, I was riding the ole school bus. It had Bud wheels. I was sitting on the driver's side, window seat, just behind the driver. As we started down a hill, I was staring out the window. Something caught my eye. Yep, it was the outside dual rolling down the road, passing us. Now, understand, I'm one of the youngest kids on the bus. I ain't saying nothing!!!! When it went by the driver he slammed on the brakes and stopped. Then as he got off the bus he gave us all a good cussing for not telling him about it sooner.

 

[Dftodd]

I was following half of a double wide getting hauled down a two lane road. Tire came loose just as a car was coming the other direction past the trailer. Tire hit a pontiac fiero dead center in the front bumper and launched about 60' in the air I slammed on the brakes. Tire landed around three feet in front of the truck. Bounced, and cleared the truck and went out into the brush. I thought for sure it was gonna get the hood or widshield :sweatdrop:

 

[ovrszd]

Great stories.

Couple weeks ago I was on I-35. Putzing along like an old man. Semi was passing me. Way up ahead in the road straddling the lane divider stripe was something large but I couldn't tell what it was. The truck was going to be past me by the time we got there so I wasn't too worried yet. He moved as far left as he could to miss it. I moved right. It was a dual wheel setup from a semi trailer, brake drum and all. Laying face down, straddling the line. I called 911. They said, yeah, we got a patrolman in route. Made me wonder how many dodge and weave maneuvers was made to avoid that when it came loose.

 

[Dftodd]

My other experience was on an old service truck I had. Had a tire shop stretch the threads on the rear passanger side tire. Started getting a slight shimmy in the back end. Stopped, double checked the tires, torque and all. Figured I would double check and tear into it at the shop. Was just about to merge onto a toll road. Was in the center lane where I could either go east or west. Felt a dip in the back end. Looked back in the mirror and didn't see anything but figured I had a blow out. Looked up just in time to see one of the passanger duals merge west bound Found the tire a mile down the road

 

[zing]

I was driving along a double lane road (2 lanes each way but not divided by median and with a slower speed limit) when a half-size bus coming toward me lost its outside wheel from the dualie rear end. It looked like it was going to dead center my front end, but half way to me it glanced off the side of a 1/4 ton pickup in front of me. Flew easily 50-60 feet up into the air and a couple hundred feet along before it landed back on the same side of the road it came from and went on into the ditch. I heard a bang and my windshield was busted with a "rock-chip" style circle, but spider webbed and about 6-8 inches in diameter. Never even saw what hit it. I pulled over and went up to see if the guy in the 1/4 ton was all right. Even though we weren't travelling highway speeds, it wasn't that big of a tire (16 or 17 inch rim) , and it was a glancing blow, it was incredible the damage it had done with that 110 mph impact speed of the tire and the truck both doing about 55 mph toward each other. The tire had hit right at his driver's side front tire. The front tire was flat and the whole wheel looked crooked, then the sheet metal from the fender behind the front tire was peeled away all the way along the door and to the back tire. There was even coolant pouring out of the truck although I have no idea how it managed to cause damage inside there. When I got there the guy was still sitting in his truck with eyes the size of dinner plates looking out of his window, which had been rolled down. Amazingly from the inside the door looked perfectly fine and the guy was totally unhurt even though there was about 8 feet long and almost three feet high of metal peeled off of the outside of his truck. All I could think was that if it hadn't have hit the glancing blow off of his truck, it would have demolished mine dead center and probably killed me and/or my friend who was on the passenger side.

 

[orezok]

I know of 2 similar incidents. The first happened to a friend of mine. He was driving on the freeway in rush hour traffic when suddenly the whole bogie axle assembly from a class 7 truck came loose and started bounding down the road toward him. Being rush hour he could not move left or right. Just as he got to it hard on the brakes, it bounded up in the air and completely clear his car. Unfortunately the car behind him got wasted.

The second incident I was on the freeway and noticed a small car stopped in the middle lane of the freeway with people swerving around it. As I got to it I saw that the car was high sided on an 18 wheeler tire with all four tires off the ground! :laughing:

Passed a semi about 1/4 mile down on the shoulder. Don't know if it was a running tire or spare.

 

[Old Junk Man]

Been there DoneThat

 

[PILOON]

Once driving on a divided highway I saw a wheel depart an oncoming semi, hop the median, cross over to my side and come directly at me.
Both our vehicles were at highway speeds so an impact would have been horrendous.
Fortunately the runaway hit a pothole and jumped over my car.
The only damage was the brown stain on my driver's seat.
My reward was that I collected that tire and rim and sold it at the next truck stop.