Are tires with cracked sidewalls safe?
Drivers finding visible cracks on older tires cannot easily tell if they are safe to use. This uncertainty causes severe anxiety for people who need to keep driving to afford a replacement but fear making a dangerous mistake.
What people tried
Every workaround mentioned in the threads below. We haven’t tested any of them — and nobody here is claiming they worked.
Found another way around this?
Share your steps and trade-offs so fellow engineers don't have to reinvent the wheel. No account required.
- 1Avoiding the highway and keeping speeds lowDid this help you?
- 2Replacing the tiresDid this help you?
- 3Asking for safety opinions on online mechanic forumsDid this help you?
In their words
Unedited, grouped by where they were said, most upvoted first within each place, each linked to the thread it came from.
“Bought a set of wheels and tires from FB marketplace. These are Falken wildpeak At3s 315/70/17 load range E. All dated from 2019 and 2020 but show these cracks in the sidewall. Are these safe?”source ↗
“I really need to make the money to be able to afford a new tire and i’m having an anxiety attack over all of this and just really need an opinion before I do something very dumb.”source ↗