Picked up the car from the tire shop this afternoon and promply put the new rubber to the test. On my 15 minute ride to a job I took the scenic route through some sparsely traveled back roads lined with woodland and eventually opening up to farmland. There are plenty of quick, tight turns along the wooland section and the Firestones handled it all without any protetst. Dry traction is suberb! Much improved over the OE Michelin Pilot HX all seasons. Very nice!
A few hours later. on my way home from the job, it was raining. THe rain was coming down hard and steady so I took the more well lit way back aling a county road to the interstate. Mostly a straight run to the interstate but when I approached the nearly 90 degree turn for the on ramp I couldn't resist and went way wide in hard (sounds sort of x-rated, don't it). The car stayed on track without the slightest loss of traction. In fact, that may just be the fastest I've ever taken that on ramp! Suffice is to say, I'm impressed!
They is a bit of road noise transmitted into the cabin but I expected that (the Micheline were almost silent). Ride firmness seems about the same. They also have a very stout sidewall with a ring that extends outward from the tire which I'm guessing is for rim protection?
Now the sad part.....something I also noticed within a couple hundred feet of pulling out from the tire shop was that the car is pulling to the right and fairly hard. The more I drove it, the more I noticed t to the point where I quickly called the shop. When I dropped it off last night it tracked straight and true! As luck would have it, it was 5:50 pm and they close at 6:00 but he offered to switch things around to see if it was possibly a bad tire. Aside from switching tires around he couldn't do anything until the morning so he offered to let me in 30 minutes before they open at 8:00 am to check it out completely. Since I have to be at Pocono Raceway at 7:30 am it will have to wait. Mostly I just wanted to tell him about it before I went to the track so he couldn't say that something was damaged while I was out there.
So my enthusiasm over the new tires and my first track day event is tempered knowing that the car will not be at its best and I'll be feeling and fighting that pull to the right all darn day.
New Firestone SZ50 ZR17s are on.
- Thread starter mikep
- Start date
- Status
didn't they stop making that tire a long time ago?
quote:The SZ50 is a current model although the latest ones have an EP RFT suffix. Sorry you had trouble mikep. I've been very happy with the set I have on my Mustang. Other than incorrect inflation, I've never seen a bad tire cause a vehicle to pull to one direction. I wonder if you don't have an alignment issue that's effect is exaggerated or just made more noticeable by the new tires. Tire flaws and road force variations typically show up as vibrations that are impossible to balance out, not as a steady pull or drag on one side of the vehicle... [ June 18, 2004, 10:45 AM: Message edited by: jsharp ]
Originally posted by Thomas Pyrek: didn't they stop making that tire a long time ago?
quote:I have my doubts about an alignment issue since the car tracked straight with the Michelins on. But, as you say, there could be a slight alignment problem that is being exacerbated by the sticky rubber. There is no vibration or noise being transmitted back so I really will have to go by what they say. I'll know for sure tomorrow when I bring it back to the tire shop. Thomas......this tire is being phased out by Firestone (both the SZ50 and the SZ50 EP versions) which is why I got such a great deal on them. They'll most likely make some small change and call it something new. They also might just rebrand the tire under the Bridgestone name which is what Firestone did with the FT70 I had on a previous vehicle. That tire is now called Bridgestone BT70. My guess is they are moving more and more into the Bridgestone brand name because of all the bad press they got with the Explorer debacle.
Originally posted by jsharp:quote:The SZ50 is a current model although the latest ones have an EP RFT suffix. Sorry you had trouble mikep. I've been very happy with the set I have on my Mustang. Other than incorrect inflation, I've never seen a bad tire cause a vehicle to pull to one direction. I wonder if you don't have an alignment issue that's effect is exaggerated or just made more noticeable by the new tires. Tire flaws and road force variations typically show up as vibrations that are impossible to balance out, not as a steady pull or drag on one side of the vehicle...
Originally posted by Thomas Pyrek: didn't they stop making that tire a long time ago?
quote:Thanks for asking
Originally posted by jsharp: Any update of this problem? I'm wondering if they managed to make things right for you...
![[Smile]](images/icons/smile.gif){kind=icon}
. It turned out to be a bad tire. When they swapped the fronts with the rears, the pull was gone. The best part is instead of just replacing the one bad tire, they are replacing both fronts so they match evenly in wear.
If I hadn' taken the car to the track for a whole day and beat the beejeezus out the tires they would have just replaced the one. Needless to say I'm extremely happy with this local tire dealer.quote:Glad you got it worked out and it's a nice dealer you've found. This is one of the reasons I now avoid Goodyear/Dunlop. The dealers for those brands in the area are crap. After all of them refused to warrantly an almost new Dunlop tire just becasue it wasn't purchased from them originally I decided I'd go with Bridgestone/Firestone or BFG whenever possible...
Originally posted by mikep:quote:Thanks for asking
Originally posted by jsharp: Any update of this problem? I'm wondering if they managed to make things right for you...
Any update of this problem? I'm wondering if they managed to make things right for you...
- Status
