Check your valve stems!

[hobbit]

After changing the oil today I went around with the pressure
gauge; everything still nicely north of 50. But I was mildly
horrified to notice that my valve stems appear to be cracking
around their bases. That makes me almost afraid to even put a
pump on them, because given past experience with bicycle valves
a crack like this can quickly grow and start leaking.
.
I think what happened was that when I got the Hydroedges put on
just about a year ago, the tire place [Hogan in Woburn, for the
record] replaced all the perfectly good Toyota-sourced valve
stems with some crappola offshore aftermarket ones simply because
they have this policy of always replacing valve stems along with
tires. They shouldn't have bothered. There's a growing body
of evidence that all valve stems are NOT alike and the ones that
tire places tend to buy in bulk are absolute sh!t.
.
The guy on the phone at Hogan was like "well, you've got that
lifetime valve warranty..." to which I retorted "that's not the
POINT! I'm not going to be coming back for an annual VALVE
STEM replacement, that's just silly." And they have no upgraded
options to give me, i.e. they put this garbage on every tire they
mount. Which means I have to go shopping for better stems that
fit these rims [and how to determine the specs, I have no
idea yet] and then take those to Hogan so they can swap them in.
.
I *knew* something was wrong when I immediately observed that
the new stems seemed a lot more flimsy/wiggly than the old ones
after the new shoes went on. Dammit, I should have raised high
holy hell right there and demanded the old stems back, but I
gave them the benefit of the doubt that they knew what they
were doing. Of course these were the same people who left the
car powered on the whole time they were doing the wheels and
then turned it *off* when they went to drive it off the lift.
Right up the hill from a Toyota place, too, and bloody LIED to
me when then claimed that they "do Priuses" all the time and
know all the subtleties.
.
Hogan corporate is in for a jolly ol' earful, lemme tell ya.
I don't want to start a 3000-odd mile road-trip on these things.
.
Why do all my tire issues come up in November?! First year it
was a screw, necessitating a patch; next year it was the new
Hydroedges, and now it's the valve stems. Weird.
.
Oh, and no, I don't think it's a pressure issue. Most stems
are rated for 60 psi [and thus could likely withstand more] and
I think I'm safely under that. But maybe long-term effects on
cheap stems ... hmmmm. Something we should all think about.
.
_H*

[efusco]

Can you buy some good quality stem (?from Toyota?) and have them install those for you? would be worth a few bucks for decent stems.

[JimboK]

Originally Posted by hobbit

Dammit, I should have raised high
holy hell right there and demanded the old stems back ....

They likely would have come back to you in pieces. Unless things have changed since I was in the tire business, they use a specialized tool that grips the stem and breaks it off at the base.

[hobbit]

Toyota is right down the hill from there, and I'm going to swing
by tomorrow so one of Hogan's Honchos can take a look at what's
going on. I'll compare the two brands of valve stems between
Hogan and the Toyota parts dept to see if I can at least pick
the lesser of two evils.
.
Hogan buys them in bulk, the guy said, from Mohawk Rubber. Now,
try googling for "mohawk" and "rubber" to see some really
exemplary keyword spam.
.
_H*

[hobbit]

Okay, I think I've learned more about valve stems today than I
ever expected. There are many varieties of the standard "TR413"
snap-in type:

designed to fit in a 0.453" rim hole, and rated for 65 PSI.
For light trucks and the like, there's a higher pressure "TR600HP"
type:

with a heavier base inside the rim, rated to 100 PSI. The
interesting thing is that these type numbers and pressure ratings
are across all the manufacturers, and the real issue comes down
to what manufacturer produced a given batch of stems.
.
Long story shortish, I have four new TR413 valvestems. The guys
at Hogan were baffled as to why mine were starting to crack but
offered that possibly running at sidewall instead of 32 PSI
might have helped the process along. The funny part is I did
wind up getting stems from Toyota -- the Hogan guy gave me one
of his and I walked down the hill to the Toyota counter to see
what they had, and the parts guy and I stared at the two and
while they did look different, we couldn't determine any real
quality/flexibility/etc difference. I thanked him and started
to walk out and he stopped me and handed me the whole handful
of four, saying "think of us next time", so there I was with
four of whatever the Toyota place would use to do tires. They
did seem just a tiny bit shorter and stiffer than the ones from
Hogan, so I trudged back up the hill to show them all this and
we decided to go ahead with the swap and use the stems from
Toyota. They were cool with it either way, and I even got to
hang out in the bay and natter with the tech and puzzle over
what might have happened. He said he's been using these stems
for a long time and has never seen this sort of issue.
.
I saved a couple of the old ones. There *will* be a full autopsy
and discussion about a possibly hitherto unknown side effect
of running your tires at *really* high pressures. These things
are supposedly rated for 60 or 65 psi depending on which piece of
marketing literature you read. What sort of peak pressure do
you think is generated by taking a 50-something PSI tire over
a nasty bump??
.
Maybe what I *really* need is these:

.
_H*

[hobbit]

I finally put together all the rest of the details on this.
I pretty much know the reason, but it makes me worry about
many of the other rubber parts around any car, especially
aftermarket, that could have similar problems.
.
Y'all will be happy to know that it's not an effect of high
pressure, for the most part, although perhaps part of an "extreme"
setup might be to change to higher-pressure valve stems. It may
be pretty much required by someone changing to 51 psi treads.
.
_H*

[Tochatihu]

Hobbit, your site's pdf was also interesting on the topic of valve 'dust caps'. Lat Jan., I was fortunate to obtain 4 aluminum ones (w/internal o-rings) from Rainbow Tire in WV. All the others seem to be plastic and thus perhaps not so nice. What kind of caps do you have?

DAS

[highwater]

This is nice work H.
Enjoyed the right up on your page.
I would be interested in getting some of these clamp in valves also.
Group buy maybe?

Randall

[-mr. bill]

Valve Stem Recall - pdf

-mr. bill

[trackermpg]

Great info. Thank you.

Originally Posted by hobbit

Maybe what I *really* need is these:

Very prudent idea. Rated for higher pressure, less likely to crack due to flexing. Especially when you consider that the longer life of the tires resulting from higher pressures will mean more rubber components exposed to the elements for a longer time.

I have made a point to let our tire shop know that I am happy to spend as much as $50 or so more for a set of tires with them since their service and advice has been invaluable. They tend to like customers like this, and they have provided very good advice on many of the tougher service jobs I have done myself. Since I get free lifetime balance/rotation with their tires, (and my tires are already lasting ~100,00 before my new max sidewall practice) I have had no problem getting them to change the normal type valve stems out every couple of years for the cost of the stems. I get a (free) fresh N2 fill while I'm at it too which helps evacuate all the regular very humid air I have put in at home.