There's absolutely no way in hell they've done this. It could take a couple hours at a shop rate of probably, like, $120ish an hour. It's just not a thing - and certainly not one anybody will do for free for you. And it's totally unnecessary unless there is some actual noise/issue with a large and deeply imbedded rock. They'll just come out of the tires as you drive. It's not like tires go around picking up so many rocks we're all just driving on rock treads. I've had to yank a rock out of a dually before, but in all my years I've never heard of a shop picking out rocks from tire treads. That's preposterous.
I didn't give it any thought until now, but I do recall a time when the desk person said something to the effect of "just clearing out your tires" and explained that was de-rocking them, as I asked what she meant.
I thought it was a frivolous "we go above and beyond our competition", silly sort of gesture, but I guess it is a thing...
As for the level of effort involved, I'd imagine it's simply rotating the tire while on the lift with a screwdriver (or something) in the treads that would take out ~90% of them
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I didn't give it any thought until now, but I do recall a time when the desk person said something to the effect of "just clearing out your tires" and explained that was de-rocking them, as I asked what she meant.
I thought it was a frivolous "we go above and beyond our competition", silly sort of gesture, but I guess it is a thing...
As for the level of effort involved, I'd imagine it's simply rotating the tire while on the lift with a screwdriver (or something) in the treads that would take out ~90% of them
That was my thought, too. I've only ever really used that one shop, so to me it was just standard. I never thought that it was 'required'. I assumed that it was a tedious process, and a job that they gave to someone who was on the bosses sh*t-list that day. I was part of their 'premium service' package, too. Might have had something to do with it.
I never asked them to do it, it was just done. Now I know not to expect it of my new shop. It's not that big of a deal, but it was enough of a change from previous that I noticed it.
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I'm pretty sure I've seen guys dig out rocks with a hooked pick similar to the 45 degree one in this 4 piece set. I recall they used an air compressor to blow out the looser ones first and use the pick on the truly stuck ones.
IIRC it wasn't as tedious as what others are expecting. It takes like 2-3 minutes a tire, 8-10 minutes a full set. I believe the place that did this for me was a tire repair shop that wanted the rocks out before looking for the leak. This was a while ago though.
I'm pretty sure I've seen guys dig out rocks with a hooked pick similar to the 45 degree one in this 4 piece set. I recall they used an air compressor to blow out the looser ones first and use the pick on the truly stuck ones.
IIRC it wasn't as tedious as what others are expecting. It takes like 2-3 minutes a tire, 8-10 minutes a full set. I believe the place that did this for me was a tire repair shop that wanted the rocks out before looking for the leak. This was a while ago though.
I don't understand how it could be done in 8-10 minutes on a tire let alone a set of tires. Are we talking about complete removal or just larger stones? There can be hundreds of little chips embedded in the tight tread lines of a single winter tire and you can't simply spin the tire and use a pick to remove them. Maybe a steel brush can get a lot out while the tire is spinning or there's some fancy process I've never heard of as this is all new to me that you can remove all the stones in a winter tire this quickly and easily.
I don't understand how it could be done in 8-10 minutes on a tire let alone a set of tires. Are we talking about complete removal or just larger stones? There can be hundreds of little chips embedded in the tight tread lines of a single winter tire and you can't simply spin the tire and use a pick to remove them. Maybe a steel brush can get a lot out while the tire is spinning or there's some fancy process I've never heard of as this is all new to me that you can remove all the stones in a winter tire this quickly and easily.
Tire tread could contribute as well, yes the tire was on something that allowed it to spin. I remember the tire was on its side when it turned. I don't recall if it was complete removal, but it certainly was quite clean.
It was also an all weather tire, so I believe it had very few of those squiggly treads. It was majority straight and angled lines. I think if you had a really bad tire with a ton of embedded stones that it could indeed take over 5-10 minutes to do.
IIRC, it was air compressor and spin tire a few rotations, for a few seconds.
Then the hooked pick in a tire groove for full rotation, then next groove etc. until none of the vertical grooves remained. 10-20 seconds per rotation or so?
Then the pick on the angled grooves.
I think there was the occasional rock left after it was done, but the main ones he wanted out were dealt with. Basically he just ran a 45 degree pick through the grooves with the tire slowly rotating away from him and the stones typically popped out with ease. If it snagged slightly, he'd slow the tire, give it a quick tug and have the tire start rotating again slowly. IIRC, a nail in the tire was also removed in this manner, but it wasn't the spot where the air was leaking.
EDIT: It looked something kinda like this without being as fake, but a removed tire on a rotating platform. He also just yanked the tool right through the straight line of vertical and angled grooves and didn't stop to focus on individual rocks like many other videos seem to do.
EDIT 2: Closer to something like this but tire rotates to do next section when done. 45 degree pick allowed pick to be yanked through tread vs having to reset after each stone like this clip.
I decided to look further into this today, as this last page has made me pretty curious about the effort put into rock picking tires.
I have never done it before. I was working on my Hakkapeliitta R3's. I did this in my basement tv room while watching Amazing Race.
After looking around for a good tool close to the 45degree angle hook DoubleF posted, the best thing I could find was an Ikea L-shaped allen key. Didn't seem like a good fit. I ended up using a pair of needle-nosed pliers.
I stood the tire up on edge (as if it was on a car) while I sat on my couch and worked on it.
The first tire took me 18 minutes. The last tire took me 11. I figure I got 95% of the rocks out. There were some that were just too deep in the really small siping for me to get.
I can see a shop not wanting to dedicate a lot of time to it...but it's also not the crazy tediously long job I thought it'd be. It was actually kinda relaxing.
I imagine with a proper tool, a rotating tire stand of some sort and some experience, four tires could be done pretty quickly.
Last edited by WhiteTiger; 09-27-2023 at 08:51 PM.
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I once came on here complaining about McDonalds putting egg on my Sausage McMuffin and overcharging me for it when I say "Sausage McMuffin not the one with egg" to the speaker. And honestly is was a 50% think until 2 years ago when I made that complaint here, and it's only happened once since. I don't get a lot of Sausage McMuffins but when I do they sure taste better without the gross sweaty McDonalds egg on them.
Since complaining to all of you seemed to help with the problem so much. I have a new fast food related complaint.
I don't like paper straws, I would rather just take the flippen lid off and drink from the cup, paper straw suck. And as such I hate the waste of being handed a straw I am going to throw strait in the garbage. And McDonalds is the worst because they hand you a straw, then the put another one in the bag, two unused straws to throw out. We made the switch with ketchup and everyone survived, I think we need to move to a world where crappy paper straws are by request only.
(Up next Drink trays, when I have a car full of people, they are just putting garbage in my car, and wasting my time taking drinks out of the drink tray to distribute all over the car, I don't like wastefulness).
I once came on here complaining about McDonalds putting egg on my Sausage McMuffin and overcharging me for it when I say "Sausage McMuffin not the one with egg" to the speaker. And honestly is was a 50% think until 2 years ago when I made that complaint here, and it's only happened once since. I don't get a lot of Sausage McMuffins but when I do they sure taste better without the gross sweaty McDonalds egg on them.
Since complaining to all of you seemed to help with the problem so much. I have a new fast food related complaint.
.
Oh, they just downloaded their struggling to me then. If I'm ordering drive-thru, they usually get it right. I've started ordering by app lately on the occasion I get McD's breakfast...specifically select the ones with no egg...every time now, I get the egg. Thankfully charged for what I ordered
What’s the point? The next time you roll a tire past your couch it will pick up all the rocks again.
All the little chips they put on the road fill up the tread grooves and sipes that are designed to compress snow and evacuate slush/water which helps provide extra traction in snowy and wet conditions. If your tires are filled with chips, it's always a good idea to remove as much as you can prior to putting the tires back on for winter. It's a little facetious to say that the tire will pick up all the rocks again by rolling it past your couch as it takes a good winter to really do that.
Last edited by Erick Estrada; 09-28-2023 at 06:38 AM.
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All the little chips they put on the road fill up the tread grooves and sipes that are designed to compress snow and evacuate slush/water which helps provide extra traction in snowy and wet conditions. If your tires are filled with chips, it's always a good idea to remove as much as you can prior to putting the tires back on for winter. It's a little facetious to say that the tire will pick up all the rocks again by rolling it past your couch as it takes a good winter to really do that.
I'm not sure I buy the possibility of a slow accumulation over the winter. I assume rocks come and go, and any cleaning you do will be undone in a week of driving. So now I'm curious for the tire cleaners, take a look after installing and see how long before you have a noticeable number of rocks stuck.
I’ve never, ever cleared my tires of rocks and yet they are mostly clear. I have to think doing that by hand is just a giant waste of time. I also think it’s virtually impossible for those rocks to noticeably impact winter tires performance.
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