New tires

You’ll love the Michelins. Have a set of the LTX on my taco now… they have about 55k miles on them and still a decent amount of life left. They have done great in the Florida summers and downpours and I’ll but the same thing again soon.

and contrary to popular comments above, some tires are crap from the factory. Worked as a tire tech in Hs for a few years.

 

I wanted to like the continentals as they were a little bit cheaper than the Michelins. But Michelins ride better so far you can tell immediately. I still think Continental makes good tires. I hope to get 65 70,000 out of the MichelinS

 

Ya just like vehicles there are lemons but 1 in many thousands. I was gm in a multi chain tire group and very few tires are bad from factory.

 

I'm on my 4th set of Defenders on my 99. They are great tires, actually really good in the snow and light offroad as well.

 

The Defenders are the best all around tire...

 

I am liking them so far .. I glad I made the switch.

 

I ran two sets of Michelins on my 1994 SR5 4x4. Average mileage at replacement was 135,000. When the Firestones on my 2020 are done. Michelin LTX's are going on it.

 

Nice to see a thread about regular tires. So refreshing and yet bizarre to see on TW!

 

Technically you still bought a Michelin tire... BFG is owned by Michelin. Its part of the reason why I will never take Falken tires seriously... Sumitomo owns them and in my experience (Sumitomo) are horribly cheap tires and I wouldn't think that the apple would fall far from the tree.

 

I had the MIchelin LTX MS on my Exploder years ago. Those tires lasted at least 70K and that's the problem If they last that long, they are a "harder" compound tire thus may may not have the same traction as a soft compound tire. I had some scary moments with those tires as they aged. Same thing with the KO2s I had on my 3rd gen 4Runner. When I buy tires I actually stay away from tires that have long warranties. I've found that a tire around 50K to 55K is the sweet spot IMO. I also look for deep siping vs siping that only goes half way through the tread.

As far as balancing goes, in my experience with training techs and getting calls for balancing units not balancing tires correctly, that 80% of the time it's operator error. Positioning of the cones in correspondence to the bevel on the rim (almost alway on the back). Using a lug centric adapter and properly compensating for it on the machine. Using severely worn or imporely sized cones. Entering the wrong parameters if they aren't automatically read by the machine. And of course chasing weights , not using the correct weights, or only doing a static balance when a dynamic balance is preferred. Match mounting is another rarely used procedure in the industry. Takes too much time. But you only generally only use that procedure if you are using a lot of weight.

Quick tip, if you get your tires balanced and you see weights close to 180* apart from each other, they probably didn't mount the tire right. Also if you see multiple placements of weight (chasing weights), there is also a problem

 

This is true...

Yeah... but things and times do change... People shunned Japanese cars at one point -because Detroit was perceived as where the 'quality' was.

It is quite different now.

I would have never bought Falkens back in the day. ('cause their tires were perceived as inferior - I did not hear good things about their products.)

I went with the AT3w for the taco because reviews indicated they would perform best for my purposes - and fortunately, I found them quite amazing.

They have provided great traction on and off-road (in snow, ice, dry/wet dirt, gravel...) and they are quiet on the road for an AT tire. They hold together, and wear well in rocky hard pack - albeit a bit faster than I expected. (Soft compound = traction in most applications, that is the compromise, I guess.)

Remember when Goodyear actually made good tires? I remember when BFG All terrain A/Ts were good?
I also remember when Yokohama (Amazing sports car / track tires) and Maxxis did not exist...

 

We used to remove the factory Continetal ExtremeContact on the C classes loaners with AMG packages we gave out at the dealership I worked at when I was younger and put Sumitomo tires on them. They were much cheaper to replace whenever someone inevitably drove over a nail/road hazard and it was difficult to determine who actually damaged the tire. And the car was transformed... for the worse. I guess that experience will always tarnish that brand for me. Maybe I might open up to them at some point but I dont want to justify my purchase as being good because it was cheaper. Michelin Pilot Sport 4S and LTX Defenders have not failed me on prior vehicles. I also did like Toyo.

Hot damn... I always remember Yokohama being around since my Grandpa used to own a tire business growing up. I had to google to see when they came to the US... 1969

 

Wow. Well, I'm not THAT old! (I know Yokohama - the company is some 100 years old...) I recall Yokohama tires achieving a good reputation in the mid 80's - as being the 'new kids' on the scene... Maybe it was just me becoming aware of them for track / sports car tires at that point. (I was a car enthusiast - not connected to the tire industry.)

I gave them a try due to their growing reputation -and was impressed with them. They were very grippy but predictable when they let go... Fun on the track. Had them consistently on my VWs and BMWs back then.

Maxxis make incredible multi compound MTB tires. Their materials, design, build quality, and performance are great. They do a ton of R&D and lead the pack by far in their technology for MTB tires. Car tires are a newer sector for them but I am eager to try their Razr on the Taco now that they make it in 265 75 16. It looks good and has good feedback on TW.

 

I worked it the tire business for many years. In the early 1980's Yokohama decided to put a major push at the US and Canadian markets. They hired many reps from US and Canada and trained them in Japan. Transferred Japanese Managers to new zone offices. Their products were top notch. Not just racing but also transport truck and passenger. They were one of the first to produce an all season that was great in winter, snow, summer, dry and rain. Unfortunately they have never found the formula for large acceptance. My opinion was they wouldn't understand North American culture in their advertising and insisted on management from Japan for NA market.