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• Alleged tyre offences by Parceline involving the tread pattern on Michelin XCA tyres have been dismissed by the Reedley, Accrington magistrates. The company denied having a tyre with no visible tread pattern through 75% of its circumference and having a tyre with less than lmm of tread depth over 75% of its circumference. A police officer told the court that on the front tyres of one of the company's vans there was no visible tread pattern and the outer edge of one tyre had insufficient tread depth on the inner edge of the other. He agreed with John Backhouse, defending, that there was adequate tread depth on the three centre grooves of the tyres.
Backhouse said the three central grooves formed the main tread pattern on this type of tyre which was specially designed for collection and delivery work. On the shoulder of the tyre were a series of vertical slots of varying depths which were not connected and were designed to enable the tyre to flex and cool down. Between those slots and the central tread pattern were a series of small narrow grooves unconnected.
They were there to allow the tyre to articulate without distorting the rubber when the tread pattern was deep. It was those grooves, (known as sipes) that had worn away together with some slight wear of the cooling slots on the shoulder. Evidence was given by Parceline's Transport Mana ger, Christopher Ogg, that it was policy to regard the central grooves as the tread pattern and to change the tyres when these grooves were 3mm or less in depth.
Michelin's area technical advisor, John Steele, said that the wear as described did not affect the tread pattern of the tyre because the sipes and the shoulder grooves were on the surface of the tyre and were designed to wear out substantially earlier than the rest.