This is part 2 to my original thread found here: Link
Hope it’s OK to start a second thread, I have a bit different selection of tires I’m interested in. I'm trying not to rehash the same ground we covered there. I’ve also gotten educated and learned that my wife’s 2009 Rav 4 has a 225 65 17 tire, and an H speed rating is required. That limits tire choices a LOT.
To recap my buying criteria:
1) I work within a mile of a Discount tire and Costco. I’ll be buying from one of them. I lean a bit to Discount, because it’s closer and I can drop my car off for a free rotation and walk to work. Costco requires a trip, and sitting around waiting. All the tires on my short list can be had at one of both of these stores. I had some recommendations for other brand tires in the original thread – while I think they were valid suggestions I really like the service and ease of use that Costco and Discount provide me. And the free rotations are also nice.
2) We live in the country, in WI. The road to our house is known for drifting. I understand a Rav4 is not a drift busting machine but some drift busting will be happening, so snow traction is a decision factor. We aren’t looking to buy dedicated snow tires for this vehicle. I do have a pickup that we would use in extreme weather. But my wife still needs to be able to make it home from work in the snow, etc...
Anyway – on to my list. I’ve put my thoughts around each tire below and I’d appreciate any other feedback that people might have that would let me differentiate between the five of them. Prices are from Tirerack and are only for tires, but at least it gives a comparison.
Front Runners (in rough order)
1. Bridgestone Alenza: $544 Solidly reviewed, and is what she’s got currently. She got about 40K out of the set, but did not rotate them. We’ve had a chat about that, and she is going to give me her car the day after each oil change so I can take it to Discount and get the tires rotated. Been around for a while and has lots of miles in the survey results. I thought these were a solid pick when I put them on last time, and they still seem to be one.
2. Bridgestone 422 Ecopia: $556 Solid tire, low rolling resistance. My understanding is the 422 prioritizes mileage while the Alenza prioritizes traction. If that’s the case, I’m leaning Alenza because they seem to be pretty similar across all the ratings. Tread depth is also less.
3. Firestone Destination LE2: $520 People love them, but they are new and their performance is unknown over the long term. FIL also has an obsessive hatred of Firestone, and I’m putting these on his daughters car. Last night I mentioned that I was thinking about putting Bridgestones on it and the first comment was “Those are Firestones, aren’t they?” In short, they will need to be a head and shoulders better choice before I’m going to go there. I don’t know if they are.
Maybe?
• BFG Long Trail T/A Tour: $598 Hokiefyd, you recommended this tire in a different thread. My wife had the prior version on her Escape and liked them. I had the OEM version on my Nissan Frontier, and they were OK. TireRack reviews are very harsh on these tires, and their snow traction is much lower than the rest. Treadwear rating is also low. I want to like these, but the ratings just don’t seem to bear it out.
• Cooper CTS: $524 Only sold through Discount Tire direct, so not much data out there. Forum reviews seem to indicate they are a decent tire. Price is OK. FIL swears by Coopers, so I would get some positive PR there.
I’m going to attempt to post my chart of the relevant TireRack survey results for comparison, but no guarantees I can get it to work…..
Appreciate all the help! Even if I can just work it down to a short list of a couple closely comparable tires I can always try to negotiate on price between them.
Hope it’s OK to start a second thread, I have a bit different selection of tires I’m interested in. I'm trying not to rehash the same ground we covered there. I’ve also gotten educated and learned that my wife’s 2009 Rav 4 has a 225 65 17 tire, and an H speed rating is required. That limits tire choices a LOT.
To recap my buying criteria:
1) I work within a mile of a Discount tire and Costco. I’ll be buying from one of them. I lean a bit to Discount, because it’s closer and I can drop my car off for a free rotation and walk to work. Costco requires a trip, and sitting around waiting. All the tires on my short list can be had at one of both of these stores. I had some recommendations for other brand tires in the original thread – while I think they were valid suggestions I really like the service and ease of use that Costco and Discount provide me. And the free rotations are also nice.
2) We live in the country, in WI. The road to our house is known for drifting. I understand a Rav4 is not a drift busting machine but some drift busting will be happening, so snow traction is a decision factor. We aren’t looking to buy dedicated snow tires for this vehicle. I do have a pickup that we would use in extreme weather. But my wife still needs to be able to make it home from work in the snow, etc...
Anyway – on to my list. I’ve put my thoughts around each tire below and I’d appreciate any other feedback that people might have that would let me differentiate between the five of them. Prices are from Tirerack and are only for tires, but at least it gives a comparison.
Front Runners (in rough order)
1. Bridgestone Alenza: $544 Solidly reviewed, and is what she’s got currently. She got about 40K out of the set, but did not rotate them. We’ve had a chat about that, and she is going to give me her car the day after each oil change so I can take it to Discount and get the tires rotated. Been around for a while and has lots of miles in the survey results. I thought these were a solid pick when I put them on last time, and they still seem to be one.
2. Bridgestone 422 Ecopia: $556 Solid tire, low rolling resistance. My understanding is the 422 prioritizes mileage while the Alenza prioritizes traction. If that’s the case, I’m leaning Alenza because they seem to be pretty similar across all the ratings. Tread depth is also less.
3. Firestone Destination LE2: $520 People love them, but they are new and their performance is unknown over the long term. FIL also has an obsessive hatred of Firestone, and I’m putting these on his daughters car. Last night I mentioned that I was thinking about putting Bridgestones on it and the first comment was “Those are Firestones, aren’t they?” In short, they will need to be a head and shoulders better choice before I’m going to go there. I don’t know if they are.
Maybe?
• BFG Long Trail T/A Tour: $598 Hokiefyd, you recommended this tire in a different thread. My wife had the prior version on her Escape and liked them. I had the OEM version on my Nissan Frontier, and they were OK. TireRack reviews are very harsh on these tires, and their snow traction is much lower than the rest. Treadwear rating is also low. I want to like these, but the ratings just don’t seem to bear it out.
• Cooper CTS: $524 Only sold through Discount Tire direct, so not much data out there. Forum reviews seem to indicate they are a decent tire. Price is OK. FIL swears by Coopers, so I would get some positive PR there.
I’m going to attempt to post my chart of the relevant TireRack survey results for comparison, but no guarantees I can get it to work…..
Appreciate all the help! Even if I can just work it down to a short list of a couple closely comparable tires I can always try to negotiate on price between them.
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