On to Missouri with New Tires

Friday, March 14, 2014

Slept fairly well last night and didn’t worry about tires too much.  At 7:30 am, and while Dolly and Fergie slept, I unhooked the jeep and went into Claremore, OK looking for a Tire store.  Found one right down town, about 7 miles from our RV park.  Went in and told them my situation and they said they could fix me up this morning.  They were a friendly group of guys.  I told them I would be back with the motorhome in about an hour and headed back to wake up the bunch and get on the road.

Drove the motorhome slowly south on hwy 88 back into Claremore without any troubles.  I was afraid the other tire would blow, leaving me stranded, but luck was still with me.  Pulled up, and they told me it would be about a half hour before they could take a look at it, so I made coffee and wrote my blog from yesterday and got it published so I wouldn’t get too far behind.

Out came Terry, a red-headed young man, and with two jacks he got the tire off the ground and removed it.

When Terry got it off and we looked at the backside of the tire, there was a big hole in the side of it. No wonder it would not hold air when I tried to inflate it last night.  We then looked at the inside tire and it had an indention in it that the other tire had caused while rubbing against it, so decided to replace both of them.  So off came the inside tire and were we in for a surprise. The whole inside tire was separated at the rim.  I don’t know how that tire did not blow with the entire weight of the passenger side of the motorhome on it.   I thank my lucky stars we did not have a blow-out during our 400 mile trip yesterday.  And part of the time, Dolly was sleeping on the sofa with no seat belts.

With that surprise, I asked that they check the other side as well.  Don’t know what we will find.  OMG!!! It looks like someone sliced the inside of the tire with a switchblade. The rubber is peeling away.  We looked at the made date of the tires and they are three years old.  Not that old!.  I am guessing that while the motorhome sat in the Houston heat, the tires had dried out.  I bought the motorhome in Houston, TX.

We looked at the inner tire on the driver side and it looked fine.  Early on, Terry had taken the spare tire out of the bay compartment and found it was flat and had a small hole in the side of it too.  So, this tire will now be my spare and I am putting four new tires on the motorhome.  Thank goodness, the front tires are still new and don’t need to be replaced.

After over 2000 miles of no maintenance on the motorhome, I now have four new tires at a cost of $612.  I feel this is a very reasonable price and they did a great job at Robertson Tire. 

I now know why we were staying at the Christ Out Post RV Park. We had “Him” watching out for us and sent us to this RV park to let us know.  Who are we to question!

Around noon, we thanked the tire crew with a credit card and headed for Missouri.  Luckily, the drive was again uneventful.  We only had 200 miles today, since I had gone so far yesterday.  I was determined this time to stop at the RV park I had planned to stay at several days ago.  We drove the remainder of I-44 toll road to Joplin, Mo.We had driven the entire length of Oklahoma and it was a long one.  Glad to be in Missouri.  It is a gorgeous afternoon and after about two more hours, we arrived at our new home around 5 pm and checked in.Happy Trails RV Park in Phillipsburg, MO is a very nice treed park in the hilly southern Missouri area.  Glad to have a flat site with full hook-ups.  We even have a southern view through the trees, so I hooked up the TV Dish.  Will be able to watch “Gold Rush”.  Tomorrow will be our dash for home before the weather turns cold.

See you later.