Found a bulge after parking at Bicester Village, or a slash in the sidewall after scraping a kerb on Stratford Road? Show us a photo, hear frankly whether it should be driven, and get it replaced where it sits.
Plenty of tyre damage is only noticed with the engine off. A car park entrance kerb at Bicester Village, a tight frontage bay on Stratford Road in Sparkhill, or a lump of debris struck on the trunk road near Kidlington can each leave marks that appear only when you walk round the car. A bubble on the sidewall means the inner plies have failed. A cut exposing cord, or a split near the bead, means the tyre is finished.
Send the photo and the size. Where the rubber is merely scuffed and no cord is involved, a careful short drive to somewhere sensible could be acceptable. A bulge, a deep cut or visible cords get a plain answer: leave the car where it is, and certainly do not take it back onto the A34. Any replacement is costed during the call and goes on wherever the car is standing, whether in Kidlington or Walsall.
Related help from the same Brent Cross team covers emergency tyre replacement on the A34 and new tyres fitted on the A34.
Bicester Village car parks, where allowed, the Orchard Centre in Didcot, Newtown's shopping centre in Aston and Crown Wharf in Walsall are all fine to work in. Skip the Stratford Road shop bays for a side street, and if a tyre gives way on the A34 itself, call 999.
| Road | A34 Oxford to Chieveley and Birmingham Stratford Road |
|---|---|
| Operator | National Highways (Oxfordshire section); local councils (Birmingham section) |
Damaged tyres: drive on it or replace it? →Broken tyre replacement on the A34 page
A broken tyre near Walsall is safest handled off the A34 itself. Pull into a side road off Pleck Road or the Wolverhampton Road, or into the Tesco Extra Car Park at Birchills if the store is happy for the car to wait there. Tell us the road number you were on and which of those spots you reached, and we bring a tyre in the matching size.
To judge the tyre, run your eyes and a gloved hand round both sidewalls. Swelling, a slash that reveals threads or wire, cracking beside the bead or a shiny flattened area all spell replacement, as does tread down to the legal minimum. A tyre carrying any of that should stay away from the lorry traffic between Abingdon and Didcot. In Birmingham, the kerbs and potholes along Stratford Road and Birchfield Road are a common source of the damage.
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Found a damaged tyre along the A34? Send a photo for a straight verdict.
