Have you made a new car purchase or tire replacement lately? It might be time to check your rubbers. Continental Tire is one of Europe’s top passenger and light truck tire manufacturers with an outstanding excellence record that spans over 140 years.
The company has a quality promise for its customers that is firmly built on a foundation of unparalleled automotive expertise and severe testing for safety and performance. On Thursday, it announced a voluntary recall program that involved approximately 94,000 Continental tires.
The tires were either sold directly to consumers who fitted them on their new vehicles or auto manufacturers as standard equipment. These tires include General, Continental, and Barum tire brands made in their Mt. Vernon and Illinois plants. At least 203 tires from a batch manufactured at the Illinois branch were found defective.
According to Continental Tire, the problem resulted from a manufacturing defect where the tires were cured for too long. As a result, they may experience a carcass break in the sidewall and sudden air loss or a belt edge separation that might lead to a partial or complete tread/belt loss leading to a possibility of high-pressure loss.
The tire tread loss purportedly increases the risk of car crashes or accidents. So far, Continental Tire says it has not received any news of crashes or injures related to the defaults.
Continental Tire notified the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) of the recall details and the company currently intends to replace all tires for the affected customers for free. The company will send e-mail communication to those that purchased any of the tires either from the after-market or through a new vehicle. The company has announced that it will begin the recall program starting April 5th, 2021.
Both Mercedes-Benz and General Motors have individually also issued recalls for vehicles equipped with a particular Continental tire model. Approximately 2529 Mercedes-Benz SUVs and 33,838 GM vehicles had original factory-fitted equipment, replacement tires, or full-size spares fitted.
GM and Mercedes-Benz provided a list of the affected car models as follows. For Mercedes-Benz, models include the 2018 GLE 43, GLE 350, and GLE 400. The tire replacement task will begin on April 27th, 2021. The customers will not be required to pay any additional fees. For GM, Car owners will be advised by April 12th, 2021. Tire replacement will be done by taking the affected cars to a GM dealership. The service will be done free of charge.
The affected GM vehicles include the 2020 Buick Enclave, Cadillac Escalade & Escalade ESV, Cadillac XT4, Cadillac XT5, Chevrolet Suburban, Chevrolet Tahoe, Chevrolet Traverse, GMC Yukon, and the GMC Yukon XL. Other models include the 2018-2021 Chevrolet Express and GMC Savana, 2019-2020 Chevrolet Blazer, Chevrolet Silverado 1500, GMC Acadia, and GMC Sierra 1500.
Affected Tires will be identified by the size, brand, and Department of Transportation (DOT) codes. Consumers who need more information, instructions, or assistance can seek further help from Continental Tire through its website.