When you click on links to various merchants on this site and make a purchase, this can result in this site earning a commission. Affiliate programs and affiliations include, but are not limited to, the eBay Partner Network.
So, I recently did some research and came upon a company called Treadwright Tire, out of Texas. They have been in the retread tire business for 40 years and have since taken up remolding tires as well. First, I want to say, if you think you know all there is about retreads because you have used them once or twice and/or you have seen some carcasses on the side of the road (that you really didn't know to be new or retreads) I am not asking for your opinion. If, however, you are open-minded and wish to explore new avenues then this will be for you.
The remolding process is similar to retreading in 1 way and that is that they do use the carcass of an old tire. Treadwright does not use a tire that has been remolded or retreaded before. This is where the processes cease to be the same. A remolded tire is skinned down, from bead-to-bead, to a point just above the belts and steel bands in the bead. They wrap the tire in a continuous strip of new rubber, from bead-to-bead, and then put it in the same type of machine that is used to vulcanize and mold new tires. In this process the tire is basically made new.
For those that are environmentally "green" conscious, a new tire takes about 18 gallons of oil to make and a remolded tire takes about 6 gallons of oil to make.
For those of you that are pocket "green" conscious you can get four 35x12.5 tires shipped to your door for about $700-800.
They were having a sale and I got 4 of their Claw II 35x12.5r18s shipped to my door for just under $700. I mounted them on a new set of Hostage 18x9s with 1mm offset. I think they look great and went on nicely.
I currently have just over 1K miles on them and here is what I think so far.
The ride, volume level, is very similar to any mud tire this size. They have a nice tread pattern that sheds mud easily. I have taken them off-road once and had them in some tire-deep mud and when I got out of the mud and pulled onto the side it looked like they hadn't even been in mud (clean tread). They handled well in the mud and on the concrete as well. I will get more off-road experience with them as hunt season gets under way here. If I had to it to do over again, I would gladly get these tires again. I will continue with updates every so often to let interested parties know how they are doing.
The name "Claw" i was hoping for a similar design to the Mickey Thompson Baja Claw...leaving disappointed. Not a bad looking tire either. Keep this thread updated for all of the doubters you've pointed out. I've always been skeptical but am open to your report on their longevity.
I ran two sets of tread wright's and a set from tire recappers in Nashville on my land rover discovery and beat the hell out of them off road. They always worked well for me on a recreation vehicle. All the ones I have usedone were pryor to the bead to bead tires so these should be better.
That's a good lookin truck! $700 is very reasonable for those tires.
We shall see how they wear. I am a bit spoiled considering my last set of tires (295x70r18 Terra Grapplers) gave me a solid 75K miles and still had 5-7K left in them. Of course, I know these are true mud tires, so my expectations are around the 40-50K range. We shall have to see.
Well, almost 2000 miles on the tires and going strong. Usually I won't update this every 1000 miles, but I had some new fun with the tires. This past Saturday I spent about half the day off-road doing some scouting for tree-stands. Little mud/sand and some washouts. They handled everything very easily and I never had to do more than take off traction control and engage the ELD. Very nice tires.
I have a single question. What does bead to bead mean? Most of the rubber old removed and replaced? even on the sidewall?
I guess I'm just wondering more on how the sidewall is effected.
Here is a good video on how remolded (b2b) are made.
Bead-to-bead means they rasp the old rubber off until they are just above the belts in the tread and steel cable in the beads. On a traditional recap they just do this on the tread and leave the sidewalls alone. On a remold they then (after a few different prep steps) wrap the tire in new rubber from bead to bead (again different than new tread being glued on, more or less, on a retread). This whole unit is then put in a vulcanizing machine (same process to make a new tire) and the whole tire is cooked into 1 single unit.
Here is a good video on how remolded (b2b) are made.
Bead-to-bead means they rasp the old rubber off until they are just above the belts in the tread and steel cable in the beads. On a traditional recap they just do this on the tread and leave the sidewalls alone. On a remold they then (after a few different prep steps) wrap the tire in new rubber from bead to bead (again different than new tread being glued on, more or less, on a retread). This whole unit is then put in a vulcanizing machine (same process to make a new tire) and the whole tire is cooked into 1 single unit.
Definitely is interesting. but I'm out I got a nail in one of mine haha
09-13-2016, 01:29 AM
New tire review
