[Closed] Car tyres - Budget or Branded?

What make are the budget?

E-tyres quote:

ECONOMY - BRANDS MAY VARY £75

MID RANGE - BRANDS MAY VARY £97

Then generally the manufacturers appear at £100+

With Hankook; Dunlop; Goodyear entering at approx £140

I've always gone for £140 mark, and fronts last about 2years (Toyota Verso 180bh. Wonder if I'm wasting money.

I always go branded now after I bought a budget pair and had side wall failures. Both tyres both at the same time after about 60k km.

I'm sure a chunk of money goes on marketing, have you seen those [url= http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pirelli_Calendar ]Pirelli Calendars?[/url].

Without knowing the brands they're using I can't help. Sorry.
Personally I have Michelin or Vredestiens on mine.

I had some budget tyres put on at a recent service, £60 a wheel. Noisy buggers.
You know that noise that jeeps make on tarmac? That's the noise I get now

try blackcircles they actually tell you what tyre you are buying, usually cheaper than e tyres too.

Costo?

Falken and kumho have always been a good compromise on our cars. Half the price of of Michelin but still offer good grip and wear evenly. Not an area where you want to economise too much!!

Tyres are what keeps me connected to the road, and I never want to be in the position of wondering if better tyres could have stopped me quicker/held on a little longer on that corner/not aquaplaned quite so quickly.

Get the best ones you can afford.

I have Falken ZE912 on mine and I think they're as good as the P-Zero's that I had before.. No complaints and half the price

Would never do proper budget tyres, although I'm tempted by just some of the amazing names, like Linglong

I just bought from Oponeo - polish outfit - faultless service and good price for 4 winter tyres.

Tyres are what keeps me connected to the road, and I never want to be in the position of wondering if better tyres could have stopped me quicker/held on a little longer on that corner/not aquaplaned quite so quickly.

Get the best ones you can afford.

But most expensive doesn't necessarily mean most grip / performance.

Personally, I like Kumho's and BF Goodrich for my 4x4 ( and wouldn't touch continentals with a barge pole )

Dunlops wore too quickly ( despite being at least twice the price ) and had very poor performance in the wet.

Pirelli and and Goodyear I've found to be OK ... but not necessarily worth the extra over a set of Kumhos.

I got mine from camskill.. Had fitted 2 £60 budgets to the front of my focus and they were very poor. Paid the same price per tyre online and the handling, economy and road noise noticably better. Better wear too and a big improvement in the snow. That's what the tyre fitter in my work advised me to do when I asked him- he fitted them for a few quid..
Do not buy budget would be my advice

BRANDED

unless you use the car to go shop and back then budget. if you travel any distant with load, motorway, have kids in the back, then get a set of decent tyres, winter is around the corner !

Aren't Falken Goodyear in disguise and made in Germany?

I bought some Maxxis car tyres which were cheap and are good.

Once bought a car with unbranded tyres on it (previous owner must've been a cheapskate as it was a Mercedes E-Class). One of the tyres blew out on the way to the Alps. Never trusted unbranded tyres since. The car now has Pirelli P6000s all round, which I buy locally for about £80 each.

Which tyres..for a car??

I used Kumhos for a couple of years on both my cars, after the local garage recommended them. However, I reckon they wore pretty quickly, so recently I have gone back to Pirelli's. That said, because I have dull cars, the Pirellis only cost about £60-70 a corner, only £10 or so more than the Kumhos.

All tyres should meet the minimum European standards for safety/grip/wear. After that it's up to you. If you drive in such a way that you push your tyres, perhaps spend more. I'm a 50mph bimbler, so budget are fine for me. I do swap to winter tyres in the winter (this w/e actually) though.

Oponeo is good. Local fitter fits and balances for a fiver for me. Winner.

kumho are good.

The thing you have to remember here is, if budget tyres were perfectly good for every application, why would anyone ever buy higher quality branded ones?

Buy the best you can afford, it's the only part of your car that is in constant contact with mother earth!

i find budget tyres are
A:cheaper to buy,
B:last about half as long,
C:are noisier,
D:dont grip as well,
as branded tyres.
branded for me, hankook seem to give decent grip and last a long time.

The thing you have to remember here is, if budget tyres were perfectly good for every application, why would anyone ever buy higher quality branded ones?

Perhaps they are suitable, but we're suckered into paying extra to cover the advertising costs of the 'branded' ones? After all, they're all branded - it's just we're more familiar with some brands than other.

FWIW I have some Continental Vanco tyres on my motorhome that wheelspin alarmingly easily on wet summer tarmac. Other, cheaper, tyres are much better.

I used to swear by michelins

But my local fitter surgested that because I admit to not driving like a er "racer" try Prestivos

To which I found
Half the price
twice the life+ 30k and loads left
grip in any conditions sorry but not noticed any issues
now fitted to both my car and the wifes

superb warranty the wife hit a pot hole, bottomed out the suspension and blew a tyre replacement tyre £15 due to 25% of the tyre life being used

Brilliant will happily use em.

And some 'budget brands' are actually made by the 'Branded' group. Accelera are the UK budget brand of Vredestein, and I swear by Vredestein winter tyres, so I'm confident in their groups' summer offerings.

BF Goodrich are part of the Michelin group

Barum are part of the conti group

Khumo's are being fitted to premium marque cars such as Mercs as OEM these days.

The cheapest I'd personally go are Khumo's or Barum's.
Just looking at replacing the front tyres on our car and with Barum's at £90 a corner and premium makes starting at £150 it's an easy choice.

I've just ordered 4 Falken something or others from Black circles. £62 fitted for 205/60/15
Same tyres on online tyres were 70+

Need to order the winter ones now!

You do need to order the winter ones. The tyres I wanted for my m'home went from £108 to £192 overnight...

@akysurf, what kind of driving will you be doing?

City driving and the odd motor way drive - Go Falken or BF Goodrich- good balance of grip in the wet but the tread won't last as long as a premium tyre (12k instead of 20k).

If you do lots of miles and wet weather driving, go for a medium quality at least.

I bought Bridgestones as I have nearly died using budgets in the wet. I won't be driving that much till Feb otherwise I would buy winter tyres.

If you're saving pennies - go for the best you can afford and avoid the pub for a month and you have your money back.
It's your life (probably others too).

make sure you get nitrogen air in them when you get them fitted, had an "interesting" [s]argument[/s] discussion with chap next door when I told him air is 78% nitrogen he who told me

"the nitrogen in the tyres is 100 per cent pure and inert. Pure nitrogen molecules supposedly bigger than oxygen and carbon dioxide molecules so won't escape out of tyre as quick. Standard air lines also inject water vapour which affects tyre performance."

I asked when his F1 car is arriving, he flounced off in the huff. 😆

He has a point though.

Yeah, cos the outside of tyres doesn't get exposed to any oxygen or water, does it... hang on...

mike-at-dialledbikes - Member
Once bought a car with unbranded tyres on it (previous owner must've been a cheapskate as it was a Mercedes E-Class). One of the tyres blew out on the way to the Alps. Never trusted unbranded tyres since. The car now has Pirelli P6000s all round, which I buy locally for about £80 each.

Premium price, mediocre tyre, IMHO. Immediately noticeable change for the worse once I had those fitted. Waste of cash 👿

Kumho here, 215.45.16 on a Mazda.
Excellent tyres and reasonably priced. 😀
I've had budget tyres on numerous occasions though, and never really had any notable problems.
I'd also never buy Michelins, my car came with them 6 years ago when I bought it, and they were awful!

Yeah, cos the outside of tyres doesn't get exposed to any oxygen or water, does it... hang on...

Previously had bridgestones on my Honda and put some khumo winter Tyres on last year
Good Tyres for the cash and lasted fairly well

Gone back to bridgestones again
Streets ahead on ride / quality / wet grip

Figure it's 4 Tyres that connect you to the road
Check out bridgestone a001 , good summer / winter tyre

I never pay more than about £75 per tyre branded, but then mine are more standard 205 tyres. What car is it?

My car has Toyo brand or something like that. They were the cheapest at the garage. Haven't exploded yet, but then again it's not a 29er.

Khumo here too, used them on my 90 and the range Rover now wears them.
Toyo on the Focus though, only because I got them cheap from a friend on a set of wheels.

I think the answer here is "good" tyres, not "branded or not" - there are a few cheaper tyres that are very good despite not being Contis or such like. Likewise there's some brand name rubbish, I've never met a michelin I liked. Don't go off what the local tyre seller tells you - mine ALWAYS try to sell me some rubbish plastic guff that the taxi drivers buy - last 60K easily but have the cornering capability of a train. I can only assume the majority of people just go and buy whatever is offered to them - there's about 10 local tyre places and they all seem very confused when I ask for a specific *model* of tyre. One even ordered in a random tyre from the same manufacturer because "they're all the same". 🙄

Personally I'd go with uniroyal rainexperts, conti sport contacts are /ok/ and expensive but grip well, toyo proxes 4 are not a bad cheap-ish tyre and good in the wet. Their T1-S are not bad but not as good as the Federal SS595 which are classed as budget tyres, though the federals will wear faster. T1S better in the wet, 595 better in the dry.

All above advice gathered from 215 40 17s and 185 50 15s, if that helps.

One of the tyres blew out on the way to the Alps

More likely to be casused by under-inflation than the brand of tyre. A lot more likely......

Tyreshopper.com cheapest for my tyres

If you live in Surrey there is a fitter in Knaphill that is as cheap or cheaper than the mail order places, with fitting and balancing as well.

paid 99 a corner for Goodyear Eagle F1 asymmetrics which I realy like. Also liked some Dunlop sports I had previously. Never liked any of the Michelins (P6000/7000/ZeroNero) I have had (the zeros seemed to be dodgy in the wet), nor the Bridgestone Potenzas.

I also find that the tyres pressures in the car manual are not too much of a guideline - so best to experiment. Probably better to run a cheap tyre at the right pressure than a good tyre at the wrong pressure.

i put 4 cheap tyres on my car last time they needed it as i was going to sell it shortly afterwards, but ended up keeping it.

Anyway, i cant tell any difference between them and the Pirellis it had on before. But i dont drive like a loon!

Fronts were Sava, and cant remember the rears but they were random unbranded cheapos from Black circles.

[url=www.tyretest.com]Tyretest.com[/url]

Useful site started years back in Germany.

Personally I stick to the premium end of the market. That said, many of the 'lesser' brands seem just as good but the real test can often be in an emergency situation. Not sure I'm comfortable finding out how good my tyres are when needing to avoid an accident.

I needed 4 new ones recently and ended up getting 2 Radar and 2 Nexens for 40 quid each fitted, quite a difference from the 120++ a corner on previous cars.

I'm used to driving pretty quick cars but now have "transport" in the shape of my HRV. I drive 60 miles a day on motorways and A/B roads.

I cannot notice a major difference between what I have now and the Dunlops they replaced. I have needed to stop quickly in the wet and had no issues, cornering is fine and well suited to the car and wear seems good.

I think that were I in a faster car I'd most likely spend a little more on Toyo or Yokis but for this car they are working perfectly well.

Replaced 2 of my usual Michelins with some Nexen CP641's ( Half the price) - All I can say is, so far so good. Can't say I've noticed any issues in the last 2 thousand miles - But, then again, I don't drive like a boy racer.

Chris

On the one hand it's your connection to the road, fairly important don't scrimp, on the other all the cars I've had have had cheapo tyres fitted I've never heard of and I've never ended up in a hedge.

Those who say "XXX has no grip" what are you doing and how does the lack of grip manifest itself? just wondering, can't say I've ever really found the limits of my tyres, with the exception of a little spinning on heavy footed starts....oh and that exit slip road near sedbergh with a cattle grid halfway along, whoops! ABS didn't like that.

+1 for Prestivo, got them on my Focus*, 10k in and they're looking good for 30k+ easily on the front.

*Which I was told would eat front tyres.

Aquaplaned once, but that was during one of those balmy summer days we had so many this year this year where 2inches of rain fell in an afternoon. Can't blame them, there were 3 cars in the barriers/ditch on that bit of DC when I passed it on the way home!

Firestone F-590 are fun tyres for the midget, which definately doesn't get 30k from a set of tyres :-p

Those who say "XXX has no grip" what are you doing and how does the lack of grip manifest itself?

Understeer on wet/damp corners at a fraction of the speed of dry cornering, fast braking situations caused by leaving braking a tad late for the tyres (people pulling out on me on a 60 zone after pausing until I'm 40ft away - even having slowed to 40 when they pull out and slowly amble up to 20mph it really only leaves heavy brakign and swerving as an option). Had one entertaining incident where I was coming off a motorway onto an A road in a large traffic procession, at ~30mph (a sliproad and stretch I'd normally happily cruise at 50 in my other car) and while everyone else went round teh corner nicely I was slowly drifting outward due to the poor fronts. Same car with new tyres will do it at 40 in the wet without blinking. Ultimately you can say someone is driving too fast, but any speed is too fast if you have ice tyres. It's about time someone came up with a minimum grip standard for all tyres on sale.

However you don't have to be driving "fast" to require good grip - the cheapo plastic nonsense I had on my car when I bought it was so poor it triggered the ABS left right and centre just slowly approaching lights and later was found to be disintegrating /inside/ - the tyre rattled when shaken! Going from a nippy car with nice tyres to a normal car with normal tyres does tend to leave you expecting too much of it but really highlights the poor performance of cheapo tyres. Switching from the no-name trash on the 306 diesel (heavy nose) to Proxes 4's was night and day different, especially in poor weather, and the ABS rarely triggers these days unless a grid is present.

Those who say "XXX has no grip" what are you doing and how does the lack of grip manifest itself? just wondering, can't say I've ever really found the limits of my tyres, with the exception of a little spinning on heavy footed starts....oh and that exit slip road near sedbergh with a cattle grid halfway along, whoops! ABS didn't like that.

Pretty easy to find the limit of grip on an empty roundabout - if you are so inclined! People pulling out of side junctions often has you testing the limits of your tyres under braking too.

IMO good budget tyres are Khumo, Vredstein (amazing), Fulda (German).

Bad ones- too many to name. Shop around OP. I've had a couple of cars that came on budgets and they were unpredictable.

People pulling out of side junctions often has you testing the limits of your tyres under braking too.

You wouldn't put some nasty cheap tyres on your road or mountain bike would you?

I got Halfrauds to put some hoops on the front after my Goodyear summer tyres finally failed. The Goodies were awesome, even in snow. The Avon replacements are shite. Me and the missus have both had it hugely sideways in the damp. 'it' being an exciting diesel Vectra. 'exciting' meaning very dull but comfy.

This winter will be fun 🙁

I always buy branded ones. I can feel the difference in grip and road noise.

Balfour Beatty who run a very large fleet of cars only lets you put premium tires on as they think there is a large difference

@akysurf, what kind of driving will you be doing?

I haven't decided on [b]my car[/b] yet, but today got my wife's car (Yaris) fitted with 2 Ovation's on the front and got it MOT'ed also - I'd never heard of that make before but they were the cheapest the garage had - I feel a bit guilty now!

Partworns. I got some Goodyear ones for £35 each with only 1/4 less tread than an new one.