Nankang mission tire failures: what 30 owner reports say

Every complaint filed with NHTSA against the Nankang Mission, read and classified: which failures owners actually describe, how that mix compares with all tire complaints on file, and at what mileage the tire let go.

By Mark Bishop · Last verified 2026-10-07

The evidence base

30Written owner reports

2Reported crashes

Crash, injury and death figures are the counts owners themselves reported to NHTSA when filing.

What owners described

Blowout or sudden deflation appears in 53% of these reports; about 2.6× as often as across all tire complaints. Percentages are shares of the 30 reports filed against the Nankang Mission across every vehicle it was fitted to that include a written account; a single report can describe more than one problem, so they do not total 100%.

Reported problem	This subject	All tire complaints	Relative
Blowout or sudden deflation	53%	20%	2.6×
Tread or belt separation	40%	13%	3.0×
Bubble or bulge in the tire	17%	6%	2.8×
Sidewall failure	13%	15%	0.9×
Loss of control, rollover or collision	10%	8%	1.2×
Cracking or dry rot	7%	9%	0.7×

Mileage at failure

14 of these reports state an odometer reading. The middle report is at 3,000 miles, with 8 in 10 falling between 1,680 and 6,000 miles.

In owners' own words

Verbatim excerpts from complaints filed with NHTSA about Nankang Mission. Reports are published by NHTSA as filed and are lightly cleaned here only to remove intake codes.

DT: 2004 KEYSTONE COUGAR. MISSION TIRES, ST225/75R15. THE CONSUMER STATED THE DRIVER'S SIDE REAR TIRE SEPARATED WITH LESS THAN 5,000 MILES WHILE DRIVING AT 35 MPH. THE TIRE HAS NOT BEEN INSPECTED TO SEE WHY THIS OCCURRED. MISSION WAS SENDING HIM A NEW TIRE. THIS HAPPENED ON SEPTEMBER 17, 2005. IT CAUSED NO PROPERTY DAMAGE OR ACCIDENT. THESE WERE THE ORIGINAL TIRES FOR THE TRAVEL TRAILER.

NHTSA complaint 555332

DT: THE CONTACT PURCHASED A 2005 MONTEREY BY KICK TRAVEL TRAILER. ONE OF THE TIRES ON THE FIFTH WHEEL TRAILER BLEW OUT. UPON INSPECTION IT WAS DETERMINED THAT THE TIRES WERE DATED 2003. ALSO, ANOTHER TIRE WAS COMING APART. THE TIRE DEALER SAID THE REASON FOR THE PROBLEM WAS THE AGE OF THE TIRES. THE TIRE BRAND NAME IS MISSION.

NHTSA complaint 561840

THE CONTACT OWNS A 2008 HEARTLAND CYCLONE, MODEL 3795. THE VEHICLE HAS MISSION TIRES, SIZE ST2257515 (NA). WHILE DRIVING 60 MPH, A PASSENGER SEATED IN THE REAR NOTICED SMOKE AND RUBBER FLYING PAST THE WINDOW. THE CONTACT DISCOVERED THAT THE PASSENGER SIDE REAR CENTER TIRE BLEW OUT. THE VEHICLE WAS PULLED OVER AND THE CONTACT REPLACED THE FAILED TIRE WITH THE SPARE. THE CONTACT DROVE SIX MILES TO THE NEAREST REPAIR SHOP. WHEN HE ARRIVED, THE TIRES HAD BUBBLES AND WERE VERY SOFT. ALL SIX TIRES WERE REPLACED. THE DOT NUMBER WAS UNKNOWN. NO VEHICLE INFORMATION WAS AVAILABLE. UPDATED 02-01-08. *KB UPDATED 02/01/08

NHTSA complaint 633610

THE CONTACT OWNS A 2007 (NA) SUNLINE TRAVEL TRAILER. THE VEHICLE HAS NANKANG MISSION TIRES, SIZE ST/205/75/R15 (NA). THE CONSUMER NOTICED THAT ALL FOUR TIRES, INCLUDING THE SPARE, HAD ABNORMAL TREAD SEPARATION. THE CONTACT IMMEDIATELY REPLACED ALL THE TIRES AT THE COST OF $596.12. HE SENT THE MANUFACTURER THE TIRES ALONG WITH ALL OF THE SUPPORTING DOCUMENTS PERTAINING TO THE FAILURE. THE TIRE COMPANY SENT THE CONTACT PARTIAL REIMBURSEMENT IN THE AMOUNT OF $224.59. HE STILL HAS PICTURES OF THE FAILED COMPONENT. THE FAILURE AND CURRENT MILEAGES WERE 6,000. UPDATED 12/11/08. *LJ THE TIRES ALSO LOST AIR. UPDATED 12/11/08.

NHTSA complaint 696307

How to read this

Complaints are voluntarily submitted to the NHTSA Office of Defects Investigation and are not verified by NHTSA. They are owner-reported problems, not proven defects, and volume tracks how many of a tire were sold as much as how often it failed. What is comparable is the mix: which problems owners describe here versus across every tire complaint on file. That comparison, the mileage distribution and the mode rankings on this page are our analysis of the public record.

Related analysis

Blowout or sudden deflation; 2.6× the corpus rate here; see which other tires over-index
Tread or belt separation; 3.0× the corpus rate here; see which other tires over-index
Bubble or bulge in the tire; 2.8× the corpus rate here; see which other tires over-index

All Nankang tire failure analysis

FAQ

What goes wrong with Nankang Mission tires?

Across 30 written complaints, the most common description is blowout or sudden deflation, in 53% of reports; about 2.6× as often as across all tire complaints. A single report can describe more than one problem.

Is the Nankang Mission recalled?

Complaints are not recalls. A complaint is a voluntary, unverified owner report; a recall is an official campaign requiring a free remedy. Check the current recall status by DOT date code at the NHTSA recall lookup; that is the only authoritative answer for your specific tire.

At what mileage do Nankang Mission tires fail?

Of the owners who stated an odometer reading, the middle report is at 3,000 miles, with 8 in 10 between 1,680 and 6,000 miles. These are failures, not typical tire life; nobody files a complaint about a tire that wore out normally.

Have Nankang Mission failures caused crashes?

Owners reported 2 crashes when filing. NHTSA publishes these as reported and does not verify them.

Sources

Last verified 2026-10-07 against the sources below.

NHTSA Office of Defects Investigation; owner complaints dataset (unverified owner reports, US federal government work, public domain).
NHTSA Recalls database, nhtsa.gov/recalls.
Corpus baselines computed over 58,390 complaint narratives longer than 200 characters.