Why the hate for Rugged "Fails"

I have a little over 18K miles on mine and plenty of tread left. They do have a tendency to spin in the rain even when I'm light on the throttle. I wanted to make it through one more winter and possibly to 30K before switching to Duratracs but think I might upgrade sooner. It just seems like throwing money away because there's still so much tread left.

 

LOL!

my BIL is running on them..still a bone stock tacoma 4x4. he loves them. he is an avid skier/snowboarder in Denver. he drives carefully and has zero issues. he was unaware of the hate, and that is probably why he likes them. he has never checked into TW to find out what he is supposed to hate on.

when i got my truck, the stock fails were so bald. i never got to experience them.

 

Thats a lot of tire spinning

Yeah they just don't hook up all that good offroading when compared to other AT tires. Nice for on the road though just like the PS DLs I had. DLs were really bad in the dirt, worse then BFG RTs, and felt like slicks.

 

The tire spinning
The lack of traction
The tissue thin sidewalls...
Ripped a 4" hole on a rock that wasn't even worth taking a picture of.

Dry asphalt,
Great.
Anything else,
Fail hard.
I replaced at 15k with 285 wrangler with Kevlar so ill never have to worry about em again

 

I have been using mine in 4wd on solid ice this weekend and have not lost traction at all.

 

The Rugged Fails are a passenger rated tire and never should have been sold on these trucks imho. They're by far the worst i've ever had... got rid of them with only 15,000 miles. The tread was so far gone i didn't trust them for the upcoming winter.

 

Too bad they came stock with my truck, I won't be doing a lot of off-roading though. Maybe 2-3 times a month due to work schedule.

 

Got rid of mine when the truck had just over 20K on it. They were wearing down too fast and developed cracks in between the treads around the entire circumference. POS tire! Replaced with Firestone Destination A/T's and could not be happier.

 

Pretty decent tire for something that's put on at the factory, and so far i haven't had any problems with mine, tho i always air down off road. But to hell with it, you've all convinced me, i'm gettin new shoes!

 

I basically broke the truck in on the dirt... the whole time on Rugged Fails.



I never had any issue with them... yet threads like this made me upgrade to some Goodyear MT/R Kevlar for our huge (mostly solo) road trip coming up through the back country.

I ran them off road just about every weekend to go shooting in cactus filled, rocky, sandy, muddy areas. They definitely spin in the mud but I never got stuck. We went fishing up a REALLY bad trail and they were a little sketchy there since it was pouring rain (truck was sliding downhill with the brakes/wheels/tires fully locked). That was the only time I was really nervous about them.

I also thought they were fine up at our cabin in the snow... maybe I was just really lucky.



I had 9/32" tread left after 22k miles. Sold them on Craigslist for $200 tonight

 

This. The Rugged Trails are pretty good on pavement, quiet and stable at 100+ mph. Good cornering grip, too.

 

Now that I've run the Rugged Trails through a few snow storms in the mountains of New Hampshire I gotta say they're not as bad as I expected from all the comments I've read about them.

 

They're not "horrible" as in dangerous or completely useless off pavement though this thread would convince you otherwise.
You'd be surprised how well you can do with bald Craigslist tires if you're careful & air down right.

I think most of the hate here comes from upgrading & realizing how shitty they were after you get a new set.