Tire Pressure Could Have Led to Problems

Aug. 20, 2000 -- Ford Motor Co. is coming under fire for telling its customers to deflate their 15-inch Firestone tires to levels that could have caused them to overheat and fail, in order to prevent rollovers.

An internal document obtained by ABCNEWS last week, showed that Ford considered recommending a higher tire pressure but decided against it after computer simulations showed the tires with higher pressure increased the risk the Explorer would roll over.

Bridgestone/Firestone Inc. recalled 6.5 million tires earlier this month, used mainly on sports utility vehicles because they are prone to losing their treads at high speeds. Federal investigators are looking into whether 62 deaths and 100 injuries are linked to tire failure.

Tab Turner, an attorney who supplied the Ford document to ABCNEWS, said Ford is partly to blame for the tires’ failure.

“This is a combination of a tire and a vehicle problem,” Turner said today. “This is not just unique to Firestone. Ford is up to its chin in this problem.”

Ford insists the lower tire pressure is not dangerous and that the documents have been taken out of context.

Ford: Not in Danger Zone

The Explorer tires are designed to be inflated to 35 PSI. But because of the computer tests which found the risk of roll-over higher at 35 PSI, a notice to Ford Explorer drivers telling them to inflate the tires to only 26 lbs per square inch (PSI) has been included inside every automobile sold since 1990, when the Explorer hit the market.

“The Ford Explorer has an exceptionally safe record over 10 years and is exceptionally safe at all of the tire inflation pressures we recommend,” said Tom Baughman of the Ford Motor Company. “The 26 PSI level recommended by Ford has absolutely nothing to do with the Firestone tread separation issue.The danger zone is well below 20 PSI.”

Ford said the documents released this week were a work in progress. They pointed out that subsequent tests in December 1989 showed that the Explorer did not experience those kinds of stability problems when the tires were inflated to 26 pounds per square inch.

But since the recall began, Bridgestone/Firestone has urged consumers to fill15-inch tires on Explorers to 30 pounds per square inch.

A Ford spokesman said blaming Ford for faulty inflation instructions in its Firestone tires is merely a distraction from the real manufacturing problem.

Still, Ford executives have said they are investigating whether the deflated tires could be a factor in the recall of 6.5 million Bridgestone/Firestone tires on Aug. 9th.

But Turner wonders why it has taken Firestone so long to look into the problem.

“They should have redesigned its tires,” Turner said.

Design experts say a lower pressure could have easily caused further damage to an already weak tire.

“Tires will flex more at lower pressure,” said car engineer Wade Allen. “So if there’s a manufacturing defect, then that flexing and the heat generated from that flexing could cause a problem,”

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration has said that 80 percent of the accidents cited in the recent problems with Firestone tires occurred when the tire treads came apart, causing the vehicles to roll over or spin out of control.

ABCNEWS’ Jim Sciutto and the Associated Press contributed to this report.