Date:         Mon, 2 Jul 2007 23:37:26 -0400
Reply-To:     The Bus Depot <vanagon@BUSDEPOT.COM>
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From:         The Bus Depot <vanagon@BUSDEPOT.COM>
Subject:      Re: Recall on LT Tires
In-Reply-To:  <84224B71-4A81-4BA8-93E2-877A6330FCA1@knology.net>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"

> This total BS. If it were tainted dog food we were talking
> about (and it was, remember?) the media would have listed
> every variation and brand name and where it was sold. But
> this is about people... and everyone is acting like they
> can't say for sure what brands the tires are sold under.
> Baloney. Who is protecting who here?


I think the situation here is that the same Chinese factory (Hangzhou
Zhongce Rubber Company) supplied multiple U.S. importers under various
private-label names. (It is not uncommon for a single off-brand tire to be
sold under 15 or 20 different brand names; the factory will put any name on
the sidewall you want them to.) But only one of these importers has
discovered the failures and announced a recall.  According to the article,
the Chinese supplier is not cooperating with the recall. (With no U.S.
presence themselves, they are somewhat insulated from legal/financial risk.)
So that U.S. importer really can't tell who else might have sold these tires
and under what names; they can only speak for the ones that they sold.

If you read the importer's website, they seem to believe that even those
tires sold to other private-label brands will carry similar sidewall
markings (one of which does denote the factory of origin, as per U.S. D.O.T.
requirements, so that makes sense).  Hopefully more information will become
available.

This one small private-labeler alone is recalling 450,00 tires. How many
other small importers just like them also sourced their tires from Hangzhou?
This could end up being a lot of tires!  What's more, a lot of these small
importers come and go. I wonder what happens if some of them are no longer
in business (or just don't step forward) - especially given that the actual
factory is so far not cooperating with the recall.

- Ron Salmon
  The Bus Depot, Inc.
  www.busdepot.com
  (215)  234-VWVW

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