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Ford pressed on testing
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September 21, 2000: 6:12 p.m. ET
Lawmakers question executives about testing done on suspect Firestone tires
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NEW YORK (CNNfn) - Bridgestone/Firestone executives Thursday blamed Ford's recommendations for lower tire inflations on its Explorers for contributing to accidents linked to the company's 6.5 million tires recall.
Bridgestone/Firestone Executive Vice President John Lampe told a Congressional panel investigating the recall that the company sent a letter to Ford last Wednesday urging the automaker to change its tire-pressure recommendations for Ford Explorer owners from 26 pounds per square inch (PSI) to 30 PSI.
"We as a tire manufacturer have recommended a tire pressure on these tires of 30 PSI," Lampe said. "We believe very strongly that 30 PSI provides consumers with additional safety margin. With 30 PSI, the Explorer can handle over 400 pounds extra load."
Lampe's comments came during a joint House Commerce Subcommittee hearing Thursday at which lawmakers lashed into Bridgestone/Firestone and Ford executives for not recalling tires four years ago when they failed high-speed tests.
Questioning centered on the testing procedures and inflation pressures recommended by both companies on the 6.5 million recalled 15-inch models of the ATX, ATX II and Wilderness AT tires that came mostly as original equipment on Ford Explorers. The tires, which are prone to tread separation, have been linked to 101 deaths, more than 400 injuries and 2,226 complaints in the United States.
The tires have also been linked to 46 deaths in Venezuela.
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration later issued a consumer advisory for another 1.4 million Firestone tires, warning of the same potential problem.
Tire inflation pressure has emerged as a key issue in the investigation since it became known that in order to address concerns about rollovers, Ford decided to recommend Explorer owners keep their tires inflated at the minimum safety level of 26 PSI as a means of preventing rollovers and providing a smoother ride. Firestone built the tires with a safe inflation margin of between 26-35 PSI, Joe Quinn, a Firestone spokesman, said.
But Lampe and lawmakers argued that unless a person routinely keeps up with maintenance, the tires will fall below the minimum safe inflation pressure. And that can cause a buildup of heat on the tire sidewalls from the flexing action, making the tires more vulnerable to blowouts.
In addition, Firestone acknowledged Thursday that a percentage of its tires manufactured in Decatur, Ill., are defective and prone to tread separation. But the reason for that remains under investigation.
Call for "real-world" testing
In 10-minute speed tests Ford ran on the Firestone-equipped Explorers at the request of the Society of Motor Engineers in 1996, the tires failed sooner than engineers expected, yet the company kept quiet about it, lawmakers said.
Ken Johnson, a spokesman for Rep. Billy Tauzin, R-La., who is chairing the hearings, said tires tested for 10 minutes at 112 miles per hour would "literally peel like a banana."
But that leaves unanswered the question of whether the same thing would happen to a family traveling at 75 mph with a heavy load and underinflated tires.
"Our concern is even though these are supposed to be standard engineering tests, there's very little margin for error," Johnson said. "At some point, the rubber's going to come flying off. The point is, the rubber's flying off too soon, and there's little margin for safety....There's little room for error. Even though Ford came here and tried to make all the arguments, we're saying they're not tested under real-world conditions."
Helen Petrauskas, Ford's vice president for environment and safety engineering, told lawmakers Thursday that Firestone went along with its 26 PSI recommendation for a decade.
"For the better part of 10 years, Bridgestone/Firestone repeatedly agreed, and then testified to the recommendations of 26 PSI," Petrauskas said.
But Lampe, who acknowledged that Firestone initially agreed with Ford, said the company ultimately leaves the inflation recommendations to the automakers.
"We agreed with that inflation pressure. Now, in hindsight, let me explain that if any Ford vehicle was to be run at the minimum (PSI) amount, and it would never change, we wouldn't have an objection. But the problem is when the tires are run down to the minimum, we think the minimum was just not enough," Lampe said.
Facing angry legislators
Despite the back-and-forth finger-pointing, which reflected the widening rift between one-time close partners Ford and Firestone, company executives did not escape the angry questions of lawmakers.
Tauzin, who is chairing the hearings, demanded that Firestone officials explain why the company did not recall tires as early as 1996, when it learned that one in 10 production tires manufactured at the company's Decatur, Ill., plant failed the high-speed tests.
"Anyone who looks at that objectively would agree you had a horrible flawed process in place. If those numbers are accurate, why would Firestone not report that to headquarters?" Tauzin said. "How could you possibly have not known in 1996 that you had an obligation to recall those tires...how could you assume that a one-out-of-10 failure rate was not significant enough to issue a recall?"
Lampe answered that the tests were designed to push tires to their utmost limits in order to be able to study when the tires fail and why.
"Please remember we're talking about a test that we agree to do that we do on our own. It's not a required test. That's a very, very severe test. It's a high-speed test, it's designed to take tires right up to their limits," Lampe said. "If we don't have tires that fail tests, then what value are they?"
Rep. Edward Markey, D-Mass., also questioned company executives about why they did not flag the failure of tires in speed tests after just 10 minutes at certain speeds, since motorists often drive for hours at a time at high speeds on the nation's highways. He also wanted to know why no tests were conducted on older tires that have weathered some wear and tear.
"How can any of you justify no testing of these tires after two years? I want to hear you justify to American families with two kids strapped into the back seat: How can you justify that you have not done the tests?" asked Markey.
Rep. Barbara Cubin, R-Wyo., whose son was involved in a Ford Explorer accident, said she wants to see more realistic testing of tires that takes extreme air temperatures, as occurs in Wyoming, into account. She also urged Ford to re-examine the design of the Explorer, since most of the accidents with the recalled tires took place on the Explorer.
Cubin's son suffered a tire blowout on his Explorer three summers ago while traveling on Interstate 25 at 75 mph on a hot summer day.
"Well, if you want to sell Ford Explorers ever again, and frankly I would just park mine along the side of the road and not even mess with it anymore in this current environment, I should think you'd want to change it to make sure it is safe," Cubin said.
Lawmakers grilled Sue Bailey, administrator of the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, the federal agency in charge of such matters, about why the agency failed to act on data it had as early as 1993.
Documents revealed NHTSA had data from State Farm Insurance Co. about more than 60 accidents involving Ford Explorers equipped with the recalled tires, and additional reports of fatalities in its own database, but failed to launch an investigation.
"I will say I think we need to do an intensive analysis of our ability to integrate the data that we do have," Bailey said. "That is clearly a budget issue for us -- we are looking at over a million dollars needed in order for us to update that database."
Bailey was referring to the agency's unanswered calls to Congress for increased funding for the agency.
"We need to overhaul our system, which is at least 10 years old," she said.
Ford officials add some details
At a hearing earlier this month, Ford CEO Jacques Nasser said Ford had requested Firestone tires be tested by Bridgestone/Firestone, Inc. at Ford's recommended inflation of 26 PSI.
But in a Sept. 19 letter to two House subcommittees, Nasser said his answer "bears clarification," saying Ford, not Firestone, had performed such  tests. He said the tires were subject to "high-speed testing" at 26 PSI at Ford's training grounds in Arizona.
In a conference call with reporters Wednesday, Ford officials said the tests were conducted on what the industry calls a "mule," a vehicle that can be modified to emulate an Explorer.
Tauzin grilled Helen Petrauskas, Ford's vice president of environmental and safety engineering, about why such "mule" or "slave" vehicles were used instead of actual Explorers.
Petrauskas said the loads on those mule vehicles were adjusted to simulate the feel of an Explorer, even though some of the tests were conducted using frames for the F150 pickup, which is a larger vehicle.
She said the company switched to using actual Explorers in their tests in 1998.
The Wall Street Journal reported that the problems with the recall have blunted automakers' long-held opposition to some tougher auto-safety regulations, making passage more likely.
Tauzin has proposed legislation that would require the industry to test tires on the actual vehicles.
Following Thursday's hearing, the joint subcommittee discussed amendments to the legislation that would include an early warning system requiring automakers and other companies to immediately report any product defects or problems to the government. Lawmakers are also considering increasing the civil penalties against any company that fails to report such information from $800,000 per violation to $4 million.
"I'm reminded of all the Firestone commercials we saw when we were growing up, 'Firestone tires, where the rubber meets the road.' Obviously they met the road a little too much," Rep. Eliot Engel, D-N.Y. said. "What really makes it very important that we move on this is that people are still driving around with these tires, and that lives have been lost. And the question is: How many more lives are going to be lost? I certainly support the legislation. I hope we can make it more comprehensive."
On Wednesday, the U.S. Senate Commerce Committee, chaired by Sen. John McCain, passed similar legislation.
Thursday's hearing is the second before the House Commerce Subcommittee this month. The Senate Commerce Committee has also held hearings into the recall. U.S. Department of Transportation Secretary Rodney Slater, who declined to testify at the first round of hearings, also testified. 
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