Allegro Club International

[Laurence]

Took my car for an MOT test, a pair of new front tyres & tracking check/adjust.

I watched as the new tyres were plastered with the usual tyre fitting grease & before the wheels were refitted to the car they were treated to a quick wash'n'wipe to clean off the excess grease.

I drove the car home & the front tyres made a squealing noise as I went around a small bend in the road.

I removed the front wheels to do some work on the brakes & noticed the remains of the grease had seeped out from the rim of the wheel & onto the tyre tread. the inner wall & tread of both tyres were covered with tyre fitting grease.

After an hour or so of applying all sorts of degreaser, detergent, solvents & brushing & wiping I had removed most of the dirt etc from the wheels but most of the grease remained.

Luckily the roads were dry when I drove home!

I have bought some wheel/tyre cleaner to try later so fingers crossed.

Has anyone had a problem like this?

[ruSSell]

Thats really bad Laurence, most dangerous too! Neve had it like this, plenty on the sidewalls yes but never on the tread itself. Hope she passed her MOT!!

[Laurence]

It failed on split rack boot, front brakes imbalance & bit of corrosion to front chassis area below driveshaft so it wasn't too bad.

Yes, if the roads had been wet like they have been so much recently, it would have made the tyres really slippery/dangerous!

It looks like the front RH tyre has a puncture as it seems to be sagging a bit, will have a look later & check the pressure.

The tyres are Mohawk, Made in China

[ruSSell]

Not a catastrophic fail then Laurence, small things to work towards Ive had Mohawks before on a car a few years ago: seemed to do the job ok....if not covered in tyre grese

[Laurence]

I removed the front wheels to have another go at cleaning off the dried-in tyre grease using Tyre & Wheel cleaner, it cleaned everything off except for the tyre grease.

Some patches of tyre grease seem immune to my efforts. I have now sprayed the wheel rims & tyre walls with Tyre & Bumper Restorer in the vain hope that next time I clean the tyres, all the remains of tyre grease will magically disappear

I checked the new front tyre pressure & was amazed to find & reading of 39.5psi for the LH & 36.2psi for the RH!

The man who inflated the tyres enquired ''32psi OK sir?'' to which I replied ''Yes thankyou''

Greasey & well over-inflated tyres, dangerous or what

[giz]

sounds like a great garage to go to what an idiot.
as for the grease, could you use a degreaser like gunk? on the instructions it says to avoid prolonged contact with plastics, rubber, tarmac but if your quick i'm sure it's fine.

[Laurence]

I used Holts Powerful degreaser, window cleaner, brake cleaner & wire brush none of which had much effect.

Most of the dried in grease has been cleaned off but the RH tyre looks tatty with the white patches adhereing to some lettering & the grooves in the tread.

I guess if I bought some low profile tyres & had them fitted to alloy wheels the story would be quite different, 'Ooh! look sir, spot of grease there, Ooh! I'll clean it all off for you sir!'

[giz]

probably! it was also probably just a case of 'oh well it's only an old allegro'

[Richard Howe]

That's what I love about my local tyre merchant, he treats everyone the same whether they pull in with a Ferrari or a Fiesta. If anything he seems to like the business of us classic guys more, as (judging by his stories) we're much easier to please & far less likely to haggle after the work's been done!
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...that's why Allegro will look as good 5 years from now as it does today.