Pothole Season: Why Knoxville Roads Break Up in February

East Tennessee is close to the worst case for road surfaces. Winters are cold enough to freeze repeatedly but mild enough to thaw between events, and that cycle is what breaks asphalt apart. Water gets into a crack, freezes and expands, widens the crack, melts, and goes deeper. Enough repetitions and the surface fails — usually all at once, in February, across the whole city.

Hitting one is not the problem

Most drivers judge a pothole strike by whether the tire went flat. It usually doesn't, and that is what makes this expensive. A hard hit pinches the tire between the road and the rim, and the rim is softer than the road.

Alloy wheels bend on the inner lip, which faces away from you. You can walk around the car, see nothing, and drive away with a wheel that no longer seals properly against the tire bead.

The symptoms arrive later

A slow leak is the common one — a tire that needs air every couple of weeks, which people top up for months without asking why. That is a bent rim letting air past the bead, not a puncture.

A vibration through the wheel at highway speed is the next. And a pull to one side, or tires wearing unevenly on the inner or outer edge, points at suspension rather than the wheel: a hard enough impact can shift alignment, and on an older car it can bend a control arm or damage a strut outright.

What to do after a bad hit

Check the pressure within a day or two, not just immediately. Look at the inner rim edge as well as the outer. If the steering wheel is not sitting where it used to, or the car tracks differently than it did that morning, get it looked at rather than waiting for tire wear to prove it.

A bent rim can often be straightened for far less than replacement, but only if it is caught before it damages the tire it is holding. Left alone, the usual sequence is bent rim, slow leak, underinflated tire, ruined sidewall — and by then you are buying both.

If a tire has been losing air since winter, it is worth checking the wheel and not just the tire. Call Knoxville Auto Repair on (865) 606-6602 — we're on Lovell Road in West Knoxville, open 9 AM to 5 PM Monday through Friday.