Methodology

Who maintains this site

TruckTireGuide.com is maintained by a small independent editorial team. The site was started in 2023 by a former fleet maintenance coordinator with over a decade of hands-on experience managing tire programs for regional Class 8 trucking operations — work that covered procurement decisions, dual-tire matching, retread approval cycles, pre-trip documentation, and preparation for DOT roadside inspections. That background shapes the site's approach: conservative on safety claims, explicit about what varies by carrier policy, and focused on the practical field question over the textbook ideal.

Content is supported by a part-time editorial contributor with a background in transportation regulatory research and commercial vehicle technical writing. Neither contributor is affiliated with any tire manufacturer, tire retailer, fleet services company, or carrier. The site accepts no advertising, affiliate referrals, or sponsored content of any kind.

Source priority

Content works through a defined four-tier source hierarchy. Government and regulatory publications take first priority for safety and compliance topics — primarily 49 CFR Part 393 (Federal Motor Carrier Safety Regulations), FMCSA publications, NHTSA data, and CVSA out-of-service criteria. Specific regulation sections are cited where possible rather than general agency references.

Manufacturer technical resources — load and inflation tables, application guides, casing approval criteria — are used for tire-specific specifications. Industry organization publications (USTMA, RMA, CVSA) provide context for practices not directly regulated. Original editorial content is written only where none of the above provides a clear, applicable answer, and is labeled as such.

Research process

Each page begins by identifying the controlling source for the topic. For a compliance question, that means locating the applicable CFR section. For a tire specification, that means finding the manufacturer's published load and inflation table. For a general maintenance topic, that means checking whether any government or manufacturer guidance exists before falling back to industry sources.

Claims are then written at the confidence level the source supports. A federal minimum is written as a minimum. A manufacturer's recommendation is written as a recommendation for that manufacturer's products. A rough field estimate — such as an approximate pressure rise during operation or a typical retread cost range — is labeled as a rough estimate, with that qualifier visible in the text.

Handling uncertainty

If a topic depends on current enforcement criteria, a specific carrier's policy, a paywalled industry handbook, or varies too much by equipment to give one reliable answer, the page avoids hard approval language. Those pages cite a conservative source, point readers to the controlling document, or carry a visible source-review notice that explains the limitation.

When a topic is genuinely contested or rapidly evolving — for example, retread approval standards by position, or TPMS threshold requirements — the site states the range of practice rather than picking one answer as universal.

Writing rules

• Do not reproduce or closely paraphrase proprietary manuals, PDFs, or paid inspection handbooks.
• Do not state price, legal, or brand claims that are not supported by a cited source.
• Label examples as examples and estimates as estimates — do not let field rules of thumb appear as specifications.
• Use conservative language on safety and compliance topics: err toward caution when uncertain.
• Do not present regulatory minimums as operational targets; they are legal floors, not recommended service thresholds.
• Update source notes and review dates when a page is substantively revised.

Review and update schedule

Pages are reviewed when a source changes (regulations, manufacturer tables, industry guidance), when a correction is submitted and confirmed, or when a periodic review flag is triggered. Pages covering topics that change on a regular schedule — federal inspection criteria, CVSA out-of-service thresholds, retread approval standards — are prioritized for earlier review.

The review date shown on each page reflects the last time the content was checked against its sources. It does not guarantee that every linked external source is still current — regulations and manufacturer data can change between the site's review cycles. Readers using content for compliance decisions should verify current versions directly against the governing agency or publisher.