[Jim Goose]

In keeping with the tyre theme.... several years ago (2008) two of our trucks in our section (RAAF) had front tyre blowouts in a quick succession.
The tyres were both the same brand and the manfacturure of the tyres was notified.
The manufacturer sent a rep to see of all our trucks (Mack R series) and then also recommended more reps to see a few more defence vehicles.
They found a few startling things....

A lot of the tyres on our Macks were considered "old".... 5yrs and older.
A lot of the tyres were also dangerously under inflated.
And to top it off, a lot of our vehicles sat idle for too long.
They concluded that the blow outs were caused by a number of factors, not a manufacturing fault.
Tyres which sit under inflated for too long causes damage to the tyre sidewalls and the tyre then becomes "out of round".
Eventually the sidewall gives way.
Having old tyres sit for too long (as someone stated in this thread) dries them up and they become brittle etc...

Defence then directed all of our truck tyres on ever vehicle and in our warehouse be audited. Anything over 6yrs old (from memory) was to be removed and disposed off.