Thorough preflight inspections of aircraft tires are critical, as subtle damage or irregularities can be serious, requiring expert evaluation and potentially leading to a "no-go" decision.
Aircraft tires differ significantly from automobile tires, lacking wear bars and requiring specific inflation pressures (found in the POH/AFM) to be checked daily to prevent common issues like improper inflation.
Changing an aircraft tire is a complex procedure, far more involved than car tire changes, requiring specialized tools, precise steps, and ideally guidance from an experienced A&P mechanic.
Pilots must never fly with known tire issues like flat spots or exposed chords, should always report problems, and can use methods like the "chalk trick" to verify reported maintenance.
This is not what a CFI wants to hear when the learner is doing the preflight inspection. The learner was looking at the nosewheel of the Cessna 150, specifically, at a scalloped pattern on the side of the tire. She’d never seen this before—and frankly, in my more than 30 years of flying, neither had I. But I knew ugly when I saw it.
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Meg Godlewski has been an aviation journalist for more than 24 years and a CFI for more than 20 years. If she is not flying or teaching aviation, she is writing about it. Meg is a founding member of the Pilot Proficiency Center at EAA AirVenture and excels at the application of simulation technology to flatten the learning curve. Follow Meg on Twitter @2Lewski.
