What Tyres do you have on your car "LIKE OR NOT"

[Cryistic]

After a discussion with the works idiot today about tyres, he was telling us all that we have been wasting money on expensive tyres and we should use the Rotellas he has on his scabby r P plate Mondeo Verona as they never wear out ( they are 7 years old now  ) though they can be a bit dodgy in the wet   

 

This prompted a discussion on weather we would prefer to use a set of part used premium tyres or a set of new "high quality" WangKung Ditchfinders.

 

My own view is that cheap tyres are a liability and I've always replaced any no name tyres on a car I've brought with good quality rubber as soon as I can.

 

My experiance of cheap tyres on an XR4i is that they are good in the dry but any kind of dampness on the road or inclement weather and they become dangerous with greatly increased breaking distances and wheel spin and understeer/Oversteer at very low speeds.

 

I paid £800 for my coupe and then went out and spent £340 on new tyres the next weekend as i felt it wasn't worth risking the old tyres on the car which were 2 no names on the back and an old set of P6000 on the fron (hate Pirellis anyway  )

 

I have Bridgestone all season A001's on the Coupe.

 

http://www.bridgestone.co.uk/auto/ranges/weather-control/a001/?oem=Honda&model=Accord%20Coupe&version=Accord%20Coupe%203.0%20V6&year=1998

 

Very good so far, covered 5000 miles with no sign of ware, sure footed in the wet and they handle well when I'm giving the coupe some beans. Haven't had to test them in the snow yet thankfully.

 

 

 

S2000 has Hankook Ventus V12

 

http://www.hankooktire-eu.com/tires/tire-presenter-single-view/view/singleView.html?aoetirepresenter%5Btire%5D=11&aoetirepresenter%5Bback%5D=194&cHash=925cfd0485

 

Went for these over the Standard Bridgestone RE050 as the MZ fitting RE050 had become scarce.

 

The side wall on the Hankook is softer than the RE050s which makes the S2000 a nicer place to be as it softens the suspension a little but the grip is excellent and they last longer than 9000 miles  .

 

 

So what do you have on your car?

 

[hughezee]

Brimstone on the Shuttle and Dunflop on the Coupe   some mid-rangers can outshine the top dog tyres but its all about application in my book, but cheap is cheap never had any good out of cheap tyres and why do people ask about budget tyres at fitting places       granted they will sell you ones with higher side walls if your lucky    so they look like they are lasting well so in 2 years time you will be back with an advisory off the MOT happy to part with another 150 squid

 

Mid-range up to the most expensive tyres last longer simples 5-12 years 

[Brett]

Iv been running Falkens on mine and are great in the wet.

Also not to bad of a price and last well.

I paid £120 a corner 2 years ago on 18" wheels but are almost ready to replace now after rotating them from front to backs

[hughezee]

Wasn't with it last night m8,  agreed decent tyres will last, but the newer the rubber the better, best to be safe than sorry   although new tryes do blow out more these days, one chap hadn't covered 500 miles on his 8th Gen Accord with four new Michelin's and one went bang 

 

Brimstone on the Shuttle and Dunflop on the Coupe   some mid-rangers can outshine the top dog tyres but its all about application in my book, but cheap is cheap never had any good out of cheap tyres and why do people ask about budget tyres at fitting places       granted they will sell you ones with higher side walls if your lucky    so they look like they are lasting well so in 2 years time you will be back with an advisory off the MOT happy to part with another 150 squid

 

Mid-range up to the most expensive tyres last longer simples 5-12 years 

[Laird_Scooby]

I currently have Falken Ziex ZE-914 Ecoruns on my Sterling (205/55R16 91V) that i paid £57 each for on Amazon. Annoyingly they dropped to £49 each the next day!

Anyway, these replaced a set of part-worn P6000s that i fitted about 12,000 miles ago with 7mm on the fronts and5.5-6mm on the back. The backs are now at about 3.6mm and the fronts are about 2.5mm and have found their way onto my coupe with a front to back swap so the coupe now has P6000s with 3.6mm on the front and 2.5mm on the back. This is a temporary situation while i refurb the wheels on the coupe (the original Sterling wheels - this is a long story ) at which point i will fit the same sort of Falkens to them.

 

Why? Because although the Falkens were a budget tyre by comparison to the Pirellis, they are a damned sight better than the Pirellis on every level. Considering that since i was 19 and had some budget radials develop carbuncles on the sidewalls within a few thousand miles i have insisted on Pirellis whenever possible it went against the grain somewhat to buy the Falkens in the first place. However i had to balance the fact that i don't spend as much time driving the car to its limits as i once did against cost and potential longevity.

I'm now very glad i did! The first (and most obvious) point is the Falkens are much quieter than the P6000s despite being noisier on the labelling system (72dB over the Pirelli 71dB) and the ride is much more comfortable too. Next is the grip. Wet or dry they grip the road like a terrier with a bone. Even if i'm severely brutal in the Sterling i haven't been able to provoke wheelspin, broken traction or any of the other "nasties" often associated with cheap rubber. Even taking roundabouts from a standing start to exiting them at 50+mph like i did recently (not on the first exit either! ) they didn't scrabble for grip, feel unsafe or even chirp, just glued my car to the tarmac.

[V6vtec]

I have Michelins on both Honda's (V6 coupe and Hrv) I used to have Goodyears that I found to be rather skittish on hard cornering lol. 

[Cryistic]

Well I can confirm that the All Season tyres on my coupe are excellent in the snow, breaking and cornering have been good in the snow and the recent icy conditions.

 

I'm a full convert to all season tyres now, cant see the benefit of owning 2 sets of wheels and tyres and changing once a year.

 

I now need to save up and get some on the Lexus, might be a while at £150 a corner!

 

Reviews here

 

http://www.tyrereviews.co.uk/Article/2013-Auto-Bild-All-Season-Tyre-Test.htm

[hughezee]

Thanks for follow up comments m8y, just so happens I’m looking at new tyres for the coupe

[hughezee]

Just ordered some Avon ZV5's at a silly price, they have some good reviews but we shall see how they fare on my travels next week

[Cryistic]

the new Uniroyal Rainsport 3 and all season tyres are on offer on tyreleader.co.uk at the moment

 

£40 a tyre for 205/55 R16s

 

http://www.tyreleader.co.uk/car-tyres-205-55-16/?m=10

 

Snap em up while you can!

[hughezee]

Cheers for that buddy

[blackstreet62]

Hey Cryistic

 

went to the site and wow its too good to be true ? top makes at discount prices, is the delivery free too? what would advise for tyre size 195/65R15/91H ? would an all weather be preferred?

 

cheers

 

Edwin

[welland99]

I've just fitted four new firestone roadhawks to mine.  Grip seems very good in the wet compared to the old Avon zv5 tyres that I had.  Not saying that the Avons were worse: just that they had had their day. In fact i was very happy with the avons and when i get the time, I'll check how long and how many miles I had them for.  

[hughezee]

There are mixed views on the Avons these days, Retro Rich had some ZV5's and they were poor performers, but I was happy with my ZV5's while I had them...

[Retro Rich]

I’m wondering if they were part worn or something and I was charged new price. The 

7 hours ago, hughezee said:

There are mixed views on the Avons these days, Retro Rich had some ZV5's and they were poor performers, but I was happy with my ZV5's while I had them...

I’m wondering if I was robbed with those ZV5’s Stu. Perhaps they were cheap imitations or something.

The Pirelli ones fitted before (can’t remember the model) were fantastic and lasted a great deal longer. 

[PTR200S]

As this thread has come to the fore again i thought i would mention these Davanti tyres I have had on the Coupe for a while now (another thread headed Davanti) very impressed with them for the money...seem to be wearing evenly too.

[welland99]

Avon may not make zv5 any more- think the latest model is zv7.

One thing I particularly liked with the zv5 is the very large lip to protect the rim from kerbing.  

[hughezee]

59 minutes ago, welland99 said:

One thing I particularly liked with the zv5 is the very large lip to protect the rim from kerbing. 

yeah I missed that too, looked better as well IMO

[Kelvin]

Anyone running all season tyres?

[Laird_Scooby]

I've always found that term confusing. Does it mean summer tyres with winter capability or winter tyres with summer capability? Or a totally different tyre that's a better compromise for all seasons than either of the first two options?

Are they just a figment of the marketing mans imagination, dreamed up to sell mroe tyres?

[Kelvin]

Totally depends on which ones you buy - my mud and snow tyres on the van, vredstein, were genuine rated snow tyres that allowed legal access to roads at ski resorts etc. So in that sense, they were certainly winter tyres but in summer I noticed no difference in grip or wear to the summer tyres I had previously. The added bonus was the deep cut tread to clear mud, which proved useful in many a field or off road parking spot.

 

I've no experience of the car types however and wondered if anyone had - my car goes off road more than many a 4x4. The roads to climbing crags in Europe are often not dressed and the extra tread can be helpful even in summer.

[Laird_Scooby]

22 minutes ago, Kelvin said:

my car goes off road more than many a 4x4.

You'd probably be better off with a Honda Ridgeline than a Honda Accord Coupe then!

[PaulS]

I have a set of Mitchelin Cross Climates on my E-Class Merc, but Alpins on my C-Class.  The coupe has winter Nokians.

Can't see any real difference in any of them, but they all give better grip in winter than summer Bridgestones I use on the E-Class,  summer Michelin Primacy on the C-Class,  and all weather Michelins on the  Coupe.  

That said, I used to run my old front wheel drive Renault Laguna on Michelin energy tyres year round without any major problems and that got up hills that found many rear wheel drive BMWs etc slithering sideways.

The deeper the tread, the better everything seems.  But I always put on my winter wheels & tyres in November and summer tryres again around Easter. Yes, I do have a wheel & tyre storage issue but get a good chance to check over all tyres at changeover time when I wash & dry the removed sets before storing them away for the season. 

I have winter tyres because I go to Germany often in winter (where it is not actually illegal to use summer tyres, but I am told their insurance companies and police seem to find you guilty in an accident if you have the wrong type of tyres as they believe you should not have been there!)  And as Pete says, the winter tyre  (whatever the make) do grip better than the summer tyres.  The Cross Climates are not (in my view ) quite as good in the real deep snow as the Alpins but are better than the Alpins if it suddenly warms up whilst abroad.... as it often does before the end of the winter in Germany.

 

[Laird_Scooby]

I lost all faith in Michelin tyres at the tender age of 7 or 8 years old when they were proved to be as grippy as a Teflon-coated ice cube on a skating rink on my little old pushbike.

Sadly adult experience with Michelin tyres on cars did nothing to change that.

[Kelvin]

15 hours ago, Laird_Scooby said:

You'd probably be better off with a Honda Ridgeline than a Honda Accord Coupe then!

Totally. What I ended up with by chance was the coupe, I'm not one for changing vehicles unless I have to, and whilst it's completely impractical for my lifestyle - it doesn't complain at all.

I gave a lot of thought as to lowering the car, seeing as it'll go off road, and decided I'd just have to be rather more aware when I do. Some of the dust roads into the mountains in Spain can be interesting but generally the Alps are fine.