Derek Uzzell Posted March 24, 2015 Share Posted March 24, 2015 EJB - 2015-03-22 5:20 PM Hate to state the obvious but here goes....I assume that you purchased from a dealer.....the dealer is totally responsible for your situation and should be pursued for a resolution! This is the situation as I understand it... In March 2013 Allan bought an Adria Sonic A-class motorhome from a UK dealer. Allan was the first owner of the vehicle that had a mileage reading of 2 at the time of purchase. Later investigation revealed that the motorhome had been built in mid-2012 and that its Continental “Vanco 2” 255/55 R17C 118/116 R tyres had been made in November 2010. Continental has advised that production of the Vanco 2 pattern with the 255/55 R17C 118/116 R specification ceased in January 2011 and research has proved that no other tyre manufacturer offers a same-size tyre with a suitable load-carrying capability. I can’t see it being straightforward to stick the responsibility for resolving the immediate tyre-related problem on the motorhome dealer who sold the Sonic in 2013. This is simply because (as has been pointed out above and as Allan knows) Vanco 2 255/55 R17C 118/116 R tyres are still on sale. The latest date of manufacture of those tyres will be January 2011, but if Allan can obtain a tyre made in, say, late-2010 to replace his motorhome’s damaged tyre, the vehicle would be no worse off tyre-age-wise than if an original tyre had not been damaged. I can fully appreciate Allan’s reluctance to put a tyre that’s 4-years+ old on his motorhome, but the tyre industry does not set a limit regarding tyre age and there is (as far as I’m aware) no legal prohibition on fitting an ‘elderly’ tyre to a vehicle as long as the tyre is in good condition. There’s always going to be a potential problem having unusual wheels and tyres on a vehicle and this will be exacerbated when a spare wheel/tyre is not carried. In the event of the tyre and/or wheel being damaged beyond repair, finding an exactly matching replacement may prove difficult. In Allan’s case, not only is the tyre to an unusual specification and a recently-manufactured equivalent impossible to obtain, but it might also prove difficult to obtain a replacement wheel quickly. The Vanco 2 255/55 R17C is a very wide tyre for a heavy-ish commercial vehicle (I’m a mite surprised that there aren’t wheel-arch clearance issues with a Ducato) and Continental specifies a rim width of 7.5J to 8.5J, with 8J being the recommendation. Adria’s advertising says that “Turemo” alloy wheels will have been combined with the wide low-profile tyre option and the Turemo website is here http://www.turemo-shop.de/ However (just like Continental choosing to discontinue the 255/55 R17C tyre in 2011) there’s no guarantee that Turemo could supply indefinitely a wheel to match those on Allan’s Sonic. There is a (possible) alternative to the suggestion that the Sonic’s present 17” wheels and 255/55 tyres be replaced with 16” wheels/tyres. Continental has a “Vanco 2” tyre to 235/60 R17C 117/115R specification with near as dammit the same outer-diameter/rolling-circumference dimensions as the 255/55 tyre. However - even if that size tyre is still being produced by Continental - I’m not sure about the advisability of fitting the narrower tyre to Turemo 8J rims. Logically, the best way to future-proof the Sonic would be to opt for the standard Ducato “Maxi chassis” combination of 16” steel rims and 225/75 R16C (or R16CP) tyres, as the rim and tyre should both be fairly straightforward to source if a replacement were required. It will interesting to learn what the CAB advise. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Billggski Posted March 24, 2015 Share Posted March 24, 2015 Some time ago a few manufacturers BMW, Ferrari and even BL introduced metric sized wheels, which required special tyres. They never caught on and now production of the tyres has stopped and the wheels have had to be changed to imperial. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tringy Posted March 24, 2015 Share Posted March 24, 2015 Hi just a thought, because you live in south bucks there is a free consumer help radio programme on three county's bbc radio, it the johnathan vernon smith show.this is brilliant for this type of thing.l have used this when l had a massive issue with our autotrail dealer and autotrail themselves, and the show got a brilliant result for us.this show is on 11 to 12 every day. Regards.Tringy. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lennyhb Posted March 24, 2015 Share Posted March 24, 2015 Keithl - 2015-03-23 8:23 PM lennyhb - 2015-03-23 8:10 PM Can't see a problem loads of Conti Vanco's available in that size... But as already pointed out these tyres will already be over 4 years old (Conti ceased production in Jan 2011). So on a MH you will almost certainly run out of life on age rather then mileage!Keith. Found a couple of German sites where they stated date of manufacturer as July 2012 not ideal I would agree, but would keep OP going for a few years. They appear to be for sale in nearly every country in Europe apart from the UK, so could be worth contacting a few dealers and ask manufacturer date. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Brian Kirby Posted March 24, 2015 Share Posted March 24, 2015 There are two problems as I see it. Allan bought a stock van that was offered complete with these wheels and tyres. He did not, as I understand what he has said, ask for this option, and was not aware that they were an option on this model. He was not at that time aware, or made aware, that the tryes were even then out of production, nor that no other manufacturer produced an equivalent. I can only imagine his probable reaction had this been made clear, but were it me, I think I should have asked for the lot to be changed before delivery to avoid future problems. Especially so as I should have also wanted a fully usable spare wheel, and not one that limited the van to 40MPH when fitted. The second problem, as Lenny is illustrating, is that presently available tyres (from Germany, not UK) are nearing the end of their generally reccomended lives. I appreciate that this varies depending on how the tyres have been stored before fitting, and that there is no legal "use by-date" on tyres. However, the tyre industry themselves tend to advise 7 years max in UK, though I understand this gets stretched to 10 years from date of manufacture, if correctly stored before fitting. Whatever the date of manufacture/fitting, therefore, it is foreseeable under present circumstances that at some time during the lives of all these vehicles, the wheels will have to be replaced in order to change the tyres. If a vehicle owner removes his standard wheels and tyres, and replaces them with wacky ones, and then finds replacements are no longer available, he has made a rod for his own back. He may complain that either should not have ceased production, but that is about as far as he can get. However, in this case it was the manufacturer who fitted the wheels/tyres, at a time when the tyres had already been out of production for two years, and the only source was a finite pool of ageing stock. To me, that is a quite different set of circumstances, in that the buyer was not in a position to accept or reject these time-limited items. As it is, the buyer faces an unreasonable cost for replacing a single tyre, which would in any case have become an inevitability when, as it must, the time came to replace all the tyres. I can't comment on the legailty of fitting two standard steel wheels and tyres to one axle of a vehicle that carries the original alloys and their tyres on the other axle, but would imagine it is at least highly undesirable to do so. In effect, this seems to mean that any tyre damage that cannot be repaired will necessitate the replacement of all four wheels and tyres. To me, that is highly untrasonable, and warrants support from those responsible for manufacturing and selecting these items. Unfortunately, under consumer legislation, the onus for providing that support falls on the dealer who sold the van. It is for him to then argue with Adria, who in turn need to address the issue with Continental and Turemo. It is not fair on the dealer, but as the customer has no recourse to the manufacturers, it is all he can do - apart from grin and bear it. It is a mess. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Alloywheels Posted February 24, 2016 Share Posted February 24, 2016 Hi there, Don't know if you are still monitoring this forum for an update, but your local tyre dealers and the vehicle manufacturer and Continental should have told you that a suitable replacement tyre size is readily available, they are 235.60.17 C tyres made by Continental. the load rating is 117/115 which is close enough to the original tyres that the difference is negligible. Your original tyres will carry 2.64 tonnes per axle and 235.60.17 tyres will carry 2.57 tonnes per axle. I am sure you will find this capacity is greater than the max vehicle axle loads. regards, Duncan, TYRESAVE, 01244 813030 if you need any more help. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Alloywheels Posted February 24, 2016 Share Posted February 24, 2016 Hi there, Don't know if you are still monitoring this forum for an update, but your local tyre dealers and the vehicle manufacturer and Continental should have told you that a suitable replacement tyre size is readily available, they are 235.60.17 C tyres made by Continental. the load rating is 117/115 which is close enough to the original tyres that the difference is negligible. Your original tyres will carry 2.64 tonnes per axle and 235.60.17 tyres will carry 2.57 tonnes per axle. I am sure you will find this capacity is greater than the max vehicle axle loads. regards, Duncan, TYRESAVE, 01244 813030 if you need any more help. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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