Goodyear Eagle RS-A's

[Rand]

I had them on my 07 focus the RS-A were good on dry, quiet.

very poor wet traction.. horrid ice and snow traction.


go for anything else.. the kumho kh21 is the new model and is better than the kh16.

I have the kh16's on my 2009 elantra touring. They are much better than my rs-a's ever were.


also dont the police interceptors get the XL load version?


Call me stupid all you want I've had both. I'm not making anything up.

I did notice they seem to differ widely by the tire size.

so it may be an issue of they are better in the size you had.. than the size I had.

 

[daves87rs]

Wow....

 

[mechanicx]

I'll tell you what though. The only tires I had that had horrid and I mean horrid snow or wet traction was a set of Pirellis. You literally could not move one inch up even the very slightest of inclines even into a parking spaces if there was so much as a fraction of an inch of snow on the pavement. And they were all-season M+S rated tires!

Another was a set of OEM Firestone Affinity all-seasons. They weren't even that worn but would slide when lightly braking on the least bit of snow or rain. They didn't even have good dry traction either. About their only redeeming quality was they were quiet and rode good.

As for RSAs, all of them that I seen cut through the snow and did fine on wet. A lot of police use them in the snow belt on RWD cars even! And many have no complaints. YMMV.

 

[wantin150]

Originally Posted By: Rand
I had them on my 07 focus the RS-A were good on dry, quiet.

very poor wet traction.. horrid ice and snow traction.


go for anything else.. the kumho kh21 is the new model and is better than the kh16.

I have the kh16's on my 2009 elantra touring. They are much better than my rs-a's ever were.


also dont the police interceptors get the XL load version?


Call me stupid all you want I've had both. I'm not making anything up.

I did notice they seem to differ widely by the tire size.

so it may be an issue of they are better in the size you had.. than the size I had.


The ones I used were Standard Load (44 psi).

 

[CapriRacer]

It might be time for:

My Lecture on OE Tires

Long version: Barry's Tire Tech - OE Tires

Short version:

As was said above, tires that come on new cars are different. Not only do they vary according to which vehicle they came on - which is basically by size - but they will be different than tires that would be designed for replacement usage.

Many tire manufacturers will set as side a line of tires for OE usage - with the idea that the performance of THOSE tires won't impact the other lines. Goodyear's RS-A is one of those lines.

What is peculiar about the RS-A's is that they have a police pursuit version that they not only supply to vehicle maufacturers, but also many police departments across the US. THESE tires (size specific) are quite different than the rest of the line, so it shouldn't be a surprise that THESE tires (size specific) perform well and are well accepted.

BUT - other sizes of RS-A's would be designed to the vehicle manufacturer's specs - and, as has been pointed out, a vehicle manufacturer will generally specify lower rolling resistance - and they get that with a sacrifice in traction (especially wet traction) and / or wear.

Frankly, it should not be a surprise to find opinions of the performance of these tires to be all over the map.

Part of the problem is that a particular size may be OE on some vehicle, but many other vehicles take the same size. So while the tire may have been purchased through a store (or mail order or some other source of replacement tires), the tire itself is a "downstream" (meaning an OE tire diverted into the replacement sales channel), and they sometimes have great prices!

 

[ATS-V]

I had them as OEM tires and got 40k out of them. Not a good gripping tire in any category. There's much better choice for the money.

 

[wantin150]

Thanks for the link!

 

[joel95ex]

they were ok on my parent's grand am GT as the OE. Except they were LOOOUUUUDD!

 

[Rand]

Mine were 195/60R15's and they were good in dry.. moderate to terribad in rain(they hydroplaned bad after they got to 7/32)

On snow they were poor even when new.

CapriRacer summed up what I was trying to say in a more concise descriptive post.

My size was mediocre-bad.. some others were better.

In fact I know someone who swore by them on his performance truck.