Tyres - What is the Truth?

s_b

bigjl wrote: »

You mean up to date with a flawed research study performes by Michelin.

I have read the report and it is a load of tosh.

Only relevant for inexperienced or simply poorly skilled drivers.

as i say it is recommended by the tyre industry body
see here
http://www.btmauk.com/page/manufacturing/
i also recommend new tyes to rear if only 2 fitted

Hintza

mikey72 wrote: »

(Question for Hintza, where are the Coopers for the Panda made now? Any chance of having a quick look and posting back? Ta)

Well the CS2 tyres are from China .

But the ATRs are still made in the USA.

Lum

bigjl wrote: »

I had my WRX adjusted to Prodrive Geometry by Elite and it was transformed.

Well I suspect Rainham is a bit far for me to go for an alignment, and Bridgend is a bit far for you to go for one.

So we're both good

broxiebear1

SueC wrote: »

Of that much I'm convinced...

Over the phone they told me they had the Dunlops in stock, even when I expressed surprise and said that in my experience nowhere, including the VW main dealer, held them in stock as standard. But no, they were insistent. Even when I said "And you're sure they're the extra load ones"? Definitely, they reiterated, come on down.

Got down there (at a crawl as one of my tyres had a ruddy great gash out of it from Lovely Boyfriend driving it into the kerb at speed), and guess what, oh, no, they're not the right tyres after all.

Suddenly I'm faced with waiting overnight for them to be ordered in (not an option as I needed to be the other end of the country for work that afternoon), driving 58 miles to the nearest outlet with the Dunlops in stock (not an option due to ruddy great gash out of existing tyre). Or, guess what, upgrading to the Michelin. Which I did.

From one Dunlop I suddenly found myself upsold to two Michelins.

At this point they obviously thought they were on to a good thing, and tried to persuade me that my rears needed replacing too as they were "deforming" and my car was "dangerous to drive". By now I was beginning to feel more than a bit 'sold to' (girl on her own, clearly not too knowledgeable about tyres, but has the money to drive a nice spenny car), so I declined their kind offer to strip me of another £300.

I've since had two other tyre dealers look at the rears, and both assure me they are wearing perfectly normally, have plenty of tread left on them and absolutely do not need replacing.

Is it really any wonder that girls hate going into these places?


And yes, I realise that is a gross generalisation, and that there are probably a lot of girls who don't feel intimidated in these environments, and plenty of boys who do!

let me guess the garage you went to was kwick fit , great scam in the tyre trade get you in the door yes we have them in stock when you come o sorry someone has just sold them but you are there.
then the dumb blond sry joke , most women will be fooled into buying something they know nothing about a well knowing trick by a certain garage

bigjl

s_b wrote: »

as i say it is recommended by the tyre industry body
see here
http://www.btmauk.com/page/manufacturing/
i also recommend new tyes to rear if only 2 fitted

I take it you have read the Michelin study that started this way of thinking in the trade?

Funny that if a fwd racing car, such as a BTCC car had to have just two tyres changed during a race, you would find that it would be the fronts that would be replaced due to higher wear on the front, i don't remember anybody asking for the rears to be stuck.on the front.

You are also failing to.understand that some people are skilled enough, highly trained enough and experienced enough to.be able to make up their own opinion.

Hence, i don't need a a misleading bit of research to inform.me where I need the grip.

The research was done with one scenario in mind, a scenario of an inexperienced driver misjudging the amount of rear grip due to the perceived increase in front grip caused by fitting new tyres.

This scenario doesn't exist when an experienced and reasonably skilled driver is behind the wheel.

If a driver is so lacking in judgement for the above scenario to.occur then the driver shouldn't be driving outside their skill level anyway.

I have never fitted new tyres to the rear and have never had an accident in this way, i would suspect that very few people have.

Obviously the situation is slightly different in a RWD car all AWD car but since most braking is done by the front and the rear brakes simply keep the car balanced then I think the reasoning to put the new tyres on the front is obvious.

What is more likely to cause an accident, not being able to stop or the above mentioned scenario where oversteer occurs?

pitkin2020

too me this putting new tyres on the rear is more about getting you to buy new ones for the front aswell. I would have thought you would want the best possible grip on the wheels being driven whether it's FWD or RWD would dictate where the new tyres went.

s_b

bigjl...Today 12:09 AM

This scenario doesn't exist when an experienced and reasonably skilled driver is behind the wheel.

im not disagreeing im just passing on what ive read
no ive not read the michelin report but then ive never been a fan of michelin rubber, always too slip slidey away for me in the rain in the 70/80's so never liked them since
However i drive the roads of today and so many drivers appear to drive like zombies and you can see they basically havent got a clue how to drive and i often wonder what it must be like to pass ones test when the instructors standard of driving in general is also truelly abysmal like the blind leading the stupid

ive seen a few cars lately that have had an accident and the front tyres still have new soap on them,maybe the drivers were trying to bed them in quickly into a 32 tonner:D

vikingaero

Just my 2p worth on the tyres to the rear argument favoured by the tyre industry:

I believe that this argument is weak and nothing more than a ruse to increase short term tyre sales. Let's say you buy a brand new car with new tyres. You drive 12k, the fronts are worn to 1.6mm but the rears still have 60% of their tread. Go to a high street tyre dealer and they will fit the new tyres to the rear and the tyres with 60% tread to the front. In 7,000 miles you'll need another set of tyres on the front - kerching! And so on.

The oversteer problem is weak. How many oversteer accidents do you see? Where I've seen accidents all of them have been a car ploughing into the back of another car or driving front first into the side of one. I argue that frontal grip in the rain is more important. If the motorway ahead comes to a rapid standstill I want the grip at the front to be able to stop quickly and safely - oh great I've rear ended a car because my front tyres are at 2mm. Maybe if I had new boots on the front I could have avoided this.

The other thing is that the UK is a wet damp temperate climate. I want wet weather grip over dry grip. I want deep tread at the front to resist aquaplaning. Driving in the snow? Do you want your worn tyres at the front or 8mm of new deep tread at the front? Dry weather handling is pretty irrelevant on new UK tyres - there's very little percentage points between a premium and cheap tyre. In the wet the grip differential between a premium and cheap tyre can be huge.

SueC_2

broxiebear1 wrote: »

let me guess the garage you went to was kwick fit , great scam in the tyre trade get you in the door yes we have them in stock when you come o sorry someone has just sold them but you are there.
then the dumb blond sry joke , most women will be fooled into buying something they know nothing about a well knowing trick by a certain garage

No, it was ATS. And all the time the guy was trying to get me to buy something I didn't need he was busy slagging off Kwick Fit (or !!!!!! Fit as he was calling them)...!

bigjl

s_b wrote: »

bigjl...Today 12:09 AM



im not disagreeing im just passing on what ive read
no ive not read the michelin report but then ive never been a fan of michelin rubber, always too slip slidey away for me in the rain in the 70/80's so never liked them since
However i drive the roads of today and so many drivers appear to drive like zombies and you can see they basically havent got a clue how to drive and i often wonder what it must be like to pass ones test when the instructors standard of driving in general is also truelly abysmal like the blind leading the stupid

ive seen a few cars lately that have had an accident and the front tyres still have new soap on them,maybe the drivers were trying to bed them in quickly into a 32 tonner:D

The only report that suggested this was done by Michelin several years ago.

Some UK companies have adopted this as policy due to the fact they can pretend to be safety orientated when you need to consider that statistically you can prove almost any claim you want.

But I have ten years Front Line Ambulance experience in the busiest area of the busiest ambulance service in Europe, and I have not seen a single accident such as they suggest is caused by putting new tyres on the front.

They could statistically analyse the figures for rear enders and state that fitting new brakes on the front is dangerous, due to people misjudging the amount of braking force they have when bedding in the brakes.

The situation they base these guidelines on is such a rare occurance that it is not worth bothering about.

And it really does only affect drivers that shouldn't really be pushing their cars to the limit of the tyres grip anyway.

It does annoy that this misleading research could actually cause an accident when a well meaning garage puts tyres with 3mm on the front and brand new ones on the back and the driver of the car understeers into the path of another car or is unable to stop at a pedestrian crossing.


I have seen many accidents, one fatal, that was caused by a driver being unable to stop in time in the wet.


I must admit I agree with viking on this, seems like more of a ploy to get the rear tyres worn out quicker to increase sales in the short term.

When did you last see a motorcyclist want to put the new tyre on the back and the old rear on the front.

You never will, if you ignore size differences, the rider will simply replace the tyres as they wear.

And also the research makes a mockery of tyre rotation, as the rear tyres with the most tread arre continually put on the front.

Also if you own an AWD Subaru they advise keeping the tread depth the same front to back, hence why rotation of tyres is common on Subarus , never having owner any other AWD car I can't answer for things like Evos, but agian this is only a consideration in cars with permanent AWD not those where driver is sent to the all wheels when traction is lost and otherwise the car is a FWD or RWD vehicle.

It is certainly a subject to cause disagreement.

But the London Ambulance Service don't fit the new tyres on the back of any vehicles, including the responce cars.

Now that cost is an issue it is rare that they replace axle sets, though they have a supply of nearly new tyres fitted to wheels that have had punctures repaired and they do try to match up tread wear come service time.

The most important consideration is quality tyres.

Formally Good-Year and now Michelin, which have proved better in all areas, including longevity.