Here is a lengthy article about unsafe (Chinese) valve stems that may turn up just about anywhere. My experience (and that of friends) was that tires bought at Costco seemed to have valve stem failures previously unknown. Now it seems that the market has got lots of bad stuff, including OEM parts. So it is not just Costco.

http://www.abc2news.com/content/investigators/story/Some-Tire-Valve-Stems-Could-be-Deadly/MaoLe0Wcp0m46FGdoi6qIA.cspx

It's nearly impossible to find any USA made valve stems anymore (or anything else for that matter).

JWagner... THANK YOU for posting this!!! Your post prompted me to look at the tires on my 2005 Chevy Colorado tonight, and what I saw had me heading straight to teh tire store. You may have saved my tires, my truck, and possibly my life! Pictures to follow....

A month ago, I had a tire go flat in a few seconds while I was on the expressway in my 97 Chevy truck. It turned out the valve stem was split open. Besides ruining my day, it ended up ruining a tire with less than 1000 miles on it. By the time I could pull over safely to the shoulder, I was rolling on a completely flat tire, causing the rim to chew up the inside of the tire. I checked the other valve stems and most of them had a cut beginning to show up in them too.

Check them stems! :yes:


Mike

Here's what I found. :eek:

http://home.comcast.net/~john.sm/valvestem.jpg

Reading this thread probably saved me from replacing an expensive 235/55R17 tire, or worse!

The company bought a 2007 Ford pickup, and the other day, we got a notice in the mail from Ford to check this very item.



Rocky

Holy crap. About a month ago we were at a show and shine and a there is a 67 Satellite sitting in the row of cars across from us. A couple of kids are standing by the car and suddenly the right front tire goes flat! Scared the kids since they thought someone would think they did it, but it turned out the valve stem had split just sitting there! New tires and stems. It would have been scary to have it happen on the highway. I'd better check my vehicles.

When you flex the stem on the ones I had replaced, the problem looks much worse than the picture above shows. All 4 were bad. New stems installed when I bought tires in 2007. Tires are removed in the winter months and stored in a dry, dark space. The stems never hit a curb, or saw other abuse, they just started to fall apart.

Sure glad the company saved a few pennies by manufcaturing in a location with poor quality control. :mad:

That's another reason to run the metal valve stems. Quite a few racing series require them, probably for reasons just like this. Unfortunately, I can get metal stems on my Dakota, the stem is in a recessed hole in the rim and the same metal stems on El Camino don't look like they will fit.

There was an accident on the interstate last week where a car reportedly had a "blowout" and crossed the median hitting another car head on. Both drivers were killed. I wonder...

Tom

This isn't a matter of quality control, it's companies deliberately making products with cheap, inadequate materials to save money. In all my years of driving, I've never had a valve stem go bad, and some were pretty old. I'll be doing the check on all of our vehicles in the morning.

I've had one go out already, check the others, pulled the four wheels off and had all the valve stems replaced, hopefully the new ones are better.

About a year ago our daughter and son-in-law took a new Saturn out for a test drive. Out on a four lane highway a valve stem let go. Fortunately there was no accident. The problem is real.

If one was paranoid, one might believe the ChiComs are selling us defective, dangerous products to see how many Americans they can kill. Lead in children's toys and on and on ... :angry:

This isn't a matter of quality control, it's companies deliberately making products with cheap, inadequate materials to save money. In all my years of driving, I've never had a valve stem go bad, and some were pretty old. I'll be doing the check on all of our vehicles in the morning.

Up until 2 weeks ago. Me neither, then one day I find my tire flat in the driveway. Stem was bad, but it was on the car for 3 years.

I also seen a guy have a blowout right in front of me on the freeway one night a few weekends ago too.

That's another reason to run the metal valve stems. Quite a few racing series require them, probably for reasons just like this. Unfortunately, I can get metal stems on my Dakota, the stem is in a recessed hole in the rim and the same metal stems on El Camino don't look like they will fit.

I was going to make this same post! I just upgraded to all metal stems based on what I read in a few rule books, but I don't think I'll ever run another non-metal stem now.

Discount Tire sent me a letter last year to come in and get my valve stems replaced.

Bumped into one of my trailer tires the other day, and same thing, barely touched the stem and it nearly came completely off, tire went flat immediately. The other 3 appear to be ready to do the same.

I was thinking of this very subject a couple of months ago, I was buying some valve stems at the parts store and couldn't help but wonder how you can tell if you're buying junk or not. Valve stems aren't really something most stores have a variety of, you're basically stuck with whatever you get.

Really, we are at the point now where every small piece is made in China, so even if you ante up for the "good" or "expensive" parts they are basically the same part in another box.

I've noticed an incredibly high failure rate on electrical parts too. When it comes to sensors, etc., (just about anything anymore) I go to the dealer. Not that that is a guarantee of any better quality, but I have zero faith in anything from the typical big box parts stores. Then after their part fails out of the box, and you waste your time trying to diagnose the same damn problem/ part again, they try to pull that "no returns on electrical parts" crap.

Ok, rant off. It's just beginning to borderline on rediculous how cheap and crappy everything has become.