Worst Tires Ever?

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So we had the first rain of the season in California today, and trying to get to work in the morning, my tires flat out wouldn't grip. I only have 26500 miles on them, and even in light rain, stopping quickly would have been an excersise in how to replicate an ABS system for me.

I have Firestone FR-690's that came as stock on my civic.

What are the WORST tires you've ever owned, why, and what did you replace them with?
 
Goodyear Wranglers OEM on a F-150 4X4 were the worst tires ever, replaced them with Michelin LTX M&S,and had to learn how to drive the truck again! In my opinion these are the best light truck tires on the market. I prefer Michelins for all my vehicle needs.
 
My old Corolla had Goodyear Intergritys which get my vote as the worst tires.They all around suck in all conditions,squeal like pigs if asked to do anything remotely "sporty".

Replaced car,"new" car(GTI)has Michelin MXV4 Plus which are pretty nice.Quiet,comfortable and decent handling.
 
Michelin Pilot HX MXM4.

They have poor road noise (compared to even performance summer tires), poor ride quality, **** poor wet traction, poor to abysmal dry traction, no lateral support, poor tire wear, and they've got an ugly tread to boot.

Their only purpose its getting the car from the dealer to your house, at which point the tires should be burned, so no one else has to experience the utter crap that is a michelin budget tire.

The words "grand touring tire" actually means "may endanger the lives of you and your family."

I replaced these with Falken ZIEX-512's, which cost rougly 1/2 of the price of a single michelin, and were superior in every single aspect of driveability. I've begun to think that the word "Michelin" stands for "Overpriced".

The Michelin MXV4 Plus's on the 16x7 Mazda 6i's were argubly better then the Pilots, but still squeel like a pig and have mediocre levels of dry/wet traction compared to something like a Toyo Proxy4...which still costs less. Thus I wouldn't call them bad, but "meh" tires.

[ October 20, 2004, 08:20 AM: Message edited by: crossbow ]
 
Worst tire I've ever had: Standard cooper 175/70/14s. They wear out soooo fast.(2 different cars driven sanely)

Have heard that original Firestone 500s, among the first radials, were pretty awful back in the day.
 
quote:

Originally posted by crossbow:
I've begun to think that the word "Michelin" stands for "Overpriced".

LOL! My thoughts exactly.
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My worst tire has been Michelin MXV4+ Energy - OEM tire on '00 Accord. Poor dry, wet, snow traction; poor steering response; and squeal like pigs every chance they get. Embarassing. Made me look like a rice boy.
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I sold that car along with the tires, but if I were to keep it, I'd replace them with something like Dunlop SP5000, Bridgestone RE950, or Falken 512.
 
My wifes Honda CRV Bridgestone Duelers..... suck! They ride like they are made out of hard plastic and grip about the same. Twenty thousand on them now and they are well over 75% gone. Honda really messed up putting these on as OEM tires.
I'll never by Michelins though....French brand, need I say more? Plenty of Asian and American brands that will work very well as a replacement. As soon as mid-summer they should be finished, if I can wait!
 
The General tires that came with my wifes 02' Xterra supercharged were dangerous and the only tires I have ever changed before they were worn out. They are in my shed with less than 1k on them and they will become bumpers on my dock next year.
 
What I always find amazing is when you look at some of these car's with utter CRAP stock tires (like the mich's mentioned above) and they STILL post a really high skidpad score.

Makes you wonder what type of #'s they'd pull on the skidpad with actual performance tires.

I mean heck...the mazda 6 pulls about a .82-.86 (depending on mag) on the skidpad with freaking mich pilots...which are roughly equivilant to 20 dollar budget tires.
 
quote:

Originally posted by crossbow:
What I always find amazing is when you look at some of these car's with utter CRAP stock tires (like the mich's mentioned above) and they STILL post a really high skidpad score.

Makes you wonder what type of #'s they'd pull on the skidpad with actual performance tires.


Skidpad numbers don't tell you much about tires. They way tires behave and feel as they approach their limit make a bigger difference on the road than ultimate limits. There are a lot bigger differences in tire behavior below their ultimate limit than there is in the ultimate limits.

How tires hande irregularities in the road, dirt on the road and wet surfaces makes big differnece too.

Several years ago someone ( a car rag I think) took a Corvette and installed 4 mini spares on it instead of regular tires. It's skid pad numbers were a lot better than they expected.
 
It is hard for me to say which of 2 sets of tires was the worst. Maybe in 1976 I bought a set of Jetzon radials. I had back slid and had been running Firestone bias belted tires. The Jetzons rode, handled, and stuck the the road as well or better than the Firestones. I think they were wearing fairly well too. Then the sidewall cracked and blew out at 75 on the interstate. While trying to come to a controlled stop, my wife expected answers about what I was doing. Went to NTW and put a set of Strattons, made by BF Goodrich. Great tires. Later, bought a couple of more sets.

Then there was a set of Falcons by Cooper I had on my truck. Wore like Iron. They rode and stuck to the road like iron too. Several times I was sure they were going to last the rest of my life.

Maybe I will eventually try another set of tires by Cooper. After all, I am fairly happy with the Uniroyals on my truck now. I hated the Uniroyals that came on my 1968 Chevelle. Last bias ply tires I ever owned, went sideways too many times in the wet. Entirely different car on Pirelli Cinturados. Most dramatic improvemt ever for new tires.

In defense of OEM tires. The Goodyear Eagle GA's that came on my 1991 Grand Am were as good or better than anything else I ran on it. The Firestone Firehawks I replaced then with had a harsher ride and much poorer wet traction. I don't think the Kelleys I replaced them with were as good as the Goodyears.

Frankly over the last 20 years, I think the quality of what is available has seriously deteriated. Too much of the Cooper and Michlin rocks.
 
I had a set of OEM goodyear wranglers "RGL" raised gold lettered, as oem on my 98 nascar edition f150 pickup.

Man those things went about 45k miles and still had some tread, but they gave terrible traction and were dangerous in any kind of snow.

When i got a slow leak in one, i coughed up money to get a set of firestone destination LE's.

Great tire, and good deal. Firestone is giving away tires almost now, and they quality is through the roof.

JH
 
XS650,

You contradicted yourself in your own counter statement. I think then you can agree that skidpads would definitely improve (possibly substaintally) if you moved from an all-season touring tire, to a high performance summer tire, like a Falken Azenis Sport, given that the tire was the limiting factor in the skidpad score. (Which in the case of the aforementioned car (the mazda 6)) its been shown to be.

I do agree that its not "just" the tire thats determining the skidpad #'s...but in the case of some cars, it weighs heavily on their overall scoring.
 
It has been pouring rain for the last few days. I was in San Diego on Sunday and Monday and really expierienced it.

The Yokohama AVS dB S2 tires on the BMW handled it with ease. I highly recommend them for rain and dry.

The OEM Uniroyal Laredo tires on my Chevy truck were the worst I ever owned. No grip and lots of noise. They did last a long time, which just irritated me more because I did not want to replace tires with plenty of tread.
 
Given how soft the suspensions are on most stock cars, putting very sticky high performance rubber on them might just increase the risk of rollover, and most car manufacturers don't want to be associated with a rollover. You put on some crappy grip-less tires on, and the car will just slide sideways, but will not roll over.

So, grippy tires are good, assuming you have the right chassis to take advantage of them.
smile.gif
 
quote:

Originally posted by Jimbo:


The OEM Uniroyal Laredo tires on my Chevy truck were the worst I ever owned. No grip and lots of noise. They did last a long time, which just irritated me more because I did not want to replace tires with plenty of tread.


My 95 GMC S-15 came with Uniroyals, Laredos I think. I agree they were lousy tires. They also had sloppy response to steering input, even at low cornering forces. I also had the same frustration waiting for them to wear out.

I replaced them with some good passenger car tires with a more than adequate load rating. They actually made the S-15 fun to drive on twisty roads. The Bilstein shocks helped to, but I put them on the first month I had the truck because the factory shocks were worse then the factory tires.
 
quote:

Originally posted by Quattro Pete:
Given how soft the suspensions are on most stock cars, putting very sticky high performance rubber on them might just increase the risk of rollover, and most car manufacturers don't want to be associated with a rollover. You put on some crappy grip-less tires on, and the car will just slide sideways, but will not roll over.

So, grippy tires are good, assuming you have the right chassis to take advantage of them.
smile.gif


True Dat. I'm running with a Neuspeed strut bar and will soon be putting on a lower X-brace for that... which makes the crappiness of my stock tires even more apparent.

From several boards I've heard good things about the Falken 512's. Another aside question:

Would you guys, if you had the whereithal, get new rims (NOT ricer rims.. something tasteful and not flashy) and run a larger size tire by 1 inch.. I'm running 185/70 R14's now, was thinking about saving some cash and getting maybe a 195/60 R 15...

Worth the money, or stick with the stock steel rims at 14 inches?
 
quote:

Originally posted by Quattro Pete:
Given how soft the suspensions are on most stock cars, putting very sticky high performance rubber on them might just increase the risk of rollover, and most car manufacturers don't want to be associated with a rollover. You put on some crappy grip-less tires on, and the car will just slide sideways, but will not roll over.

So, grippy tires are good, assuming you have the right chassis to take advantage of them.
smile.gif


Why would really sticky tires cause a car to roll over? As far as I know, roll over is mostly caused by high center of gravity or hitting something. Sticky tires aren't that sticky. I don't think most cars would have a problem with this, and it should be perfectly okay to upgrade to performance tires with a stock suspension...
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My worst tires I have owned are Bridgestone RE92's and second time owning..... They are horrid in the snow and slippery when wet. Unfortunately these are OEM from factory on my new 04 WRX as they were on my previous car a 95 Honda Civic. I actually bought snow tires/rims for the Civic due to these, I thought it was the car not tires. Anyway I dread the first snow although the car has AWD, the problem though is stopping not going
 
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