Back on the Road With Two New Tires - 2015 Volkswagen Golf GTI Long-Term Road Test

Edmunds.com

Back on the Road With Two New Tires - 2015 Volkswagen Golf GTI Long-Term Road Test

A large gash in the tire of our 2015 Volkswagen Golf GTI was beyond repair. Rather than change just one tire, we did two.

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kirkhilles1

Nothing like a $620 tire bill on an economy-level car with only 10,000 miles on it. Geez. That was more than it cost me to replace all 4 tires on my Miata + 4 wheel alignment (and that's with the low profile tires). At a rate of $1,235 for 4 tires, that's 20% more than it'll cost us to replace the tires on our mid sized Pilot, at the dealership having over 40k on the tires. I mean, wow, now before too long you'll have ANOTHER $615 bill to replace the other two by the time the car is a year old.

fordson1

That ain't a bad price - these are $258.22 a pop at Tire Rack. Since these are replacing the rears, I assume you will rotate them now - ? VW will do it for free, since it's within 2 years/24k miles, but you are regular customers at Stokes, so they'd probably do it for nothing, since the car is already up in the air and the rears are off it already.

fordson1

kirkhilles1 said:

Nothing like a $620 tire bill on an economy-level car with only 10,000 miles on it. Geez. That was more than it cost me to replace all 4 tires on my Miata + 4 wheel alignment (and that's with the low profile tires). At a rate of $1,235 for 4 tires, that's 20% more than it'll cost us to replace the tires on our mid sized Pilot, at the dealership having over 40k on the tires. I mean, wow, now before too long you'll have ANOTHER $615 bill to replace the other two by the time the car is a year old.

MSRP on this car was $32k and change, if I recall - ? That's around $1,500 above ATP for cars sold in the U.S. Don't see that as being an economy-level car.

smrtypants44

Its only because they bought ridiculously overpriced OEM tires (probably since the car is on loan). They could have bought higher rated tires like (prices per tire rack):

Michelin Pilot Super Sport: 190/per
Bridgeston Potenza S04 148/per
Continental DW 133/per

They could have bought 4 new DW's (excluding installation) for less than they paid for two of those oem tires installed

saulster

Bad luck with the gash in the tire. My experience with the Mark VI GTI was that it was hard on tires in general, low profile wheel protectors on the very heavy VW wheels is not a good combination for longevity if your roads have any regular bumps or irregularities.

After "bursting" one tire on a residential street at less than 25 MPH with less than 4K miles on my new car and paying almost $300 for the replacement, I bought a set of OZs from Tire rack with Continental DWs mounted ( I lived in the wet Eugene, OR at the time ). And, heresy, I downsized to 17s with a slightly higher profile for the same rolling circumference. The results: About 14 - 15 pounds per wheel / tire combination lighter! Smoother ride. Allegedly should accelerate faster with that much unsprung weight relieved but I couldn't tell the difference. If I wanted to maintain stock wheel size, the 18" OZs would still have been significantly lighter than stock. But I had other main goals, mainly improved ride and less vulnerability to the rough roads. As a bonus, the OZs looked great and my GTI didn't look like everyone else's.

I know that the Edmunds test is only 20K miles so you probably won't wear out a complete set of tires. But this is a "mod" you might think about if you are looking for something to do. If you stay with 18s, just the new wheels with the same tires...........

fordson1

saulster said:

Bad luck with the gash in the tire. My experience with the Mark VI GTI was that it was hard on tires in general, low profile wheel protectors on the very heavy VW wheels is not a good combination for longevity if your roads have any regular bumps or irregularities.

After "bursting" one tire on a residential street at less than 25 MPH with less than 4K miles on my new car and paying almost $300 for the replacement, I bought a set of OZs from Tire rack with Continental DWs mounted ( I lived in the wet Eugene, OR at the time ). And, heresy, I downsized to 17s with a slightly higher profile for the same rolling circumference. The results: About 14 - 15 pounds per wheel / tire combination lighter! Smoother ride. Allegedly should accelerate faster with that much unsprung weight relieved but I couldn't tell the difference. If I wanted to maintain stock wheel size, the 18" OZs would still have been significantly lighter than stock. But I had other main goals, mainly improved ride and less vulnerability to the rough roads. As a bonus, the OZs looked great and my GTI didn't look like everyone else's.

I know that the Edmunds test is only 20K miles so you probably won't wear out a complete set of tires. But this is a "mod" you might think about if you are looking for something to do. If you stay with 18s, just the new wheels with the same tires...........

Agree...the Detroits are really striking looking wheels, but heavy. If someone made a forged wheel that looked like them, I would buy a set - probably 20 lbs. as opposed to 29 for the factory cast ones.

bankerdanny

smrtypants44 said:

Its only because they bought ridiculously overpriced OEM tires (probably since the car is on loan). They could have bought higher rated tires like (prices per tire rack):

Michelin Pilot Super Sport: 190/per
Bridgeston Potenza S04 148/per
Continental DW 133/per

They could have bought 4 new DW's (excluding installation) for less than they paid for two of those oem tires installed

I had 17" Conti DWS's on my MkIV Jetta and really liked them a lot, although that had to do with great winter and summer performance, a much bigger issue in Chicago than SoCal. I will be putting a set on my wife's '09 Vibe GT before Fall.