Replacement tire advice

jcmdie

I need to start looking for new tires for my Ram
1500 4X4. I have read a lot of negative stuff on
Goodyear quality. What gets the most bang for the
buck these days.

markbuck

Last American tire company. You have an American truck, go Goodyear!

I ran the Goodyear GSA's on my old one ton, quite happy with their performance. Will replace my Chevy's tires with the Goodyear GSA's when due.

Had a set of Goodyear Ultra Grip Studded tires on my '99 Ford Escort Rally Car. No quality problems in these either.

rrichf

jcmdie,
I'm sorry that you feel that way about Goodyear. It has been my experience that for my trucks over the last 15 years Goodyear makes the best tires in the world. The Wranglers are typically 15/32 tread depth while most others are only 13/32. Usually takes much less weight to balance a tire and if it doesn't give 75K highway miles of service, something is weird.

BF Goodrich is now owned by Michelin (Since 1986) but I don't know which is made where and by whos quality standards. The Michelin is probably next best and if you can find some of the high pressure Michelin tires you'll get a couple miles per gallon at the expense of ride.

Firestone was acquired by Bridgestone. Personally since the Firestone 721 radial fiasco I won't buy them.

Rich

bookitty

I have experienced good luck with Cooper tires. My wife's forerunner has had Bridgestones and Goodyear. Neither tire provided very good service,
as dry rot was a factor with both. Tread wear was good, but when we switched to Cooper, there seemed to be an increase in tractive effort. In 2WD, the forerunner (no LSD) breaks loose on any occasion where you are not pointed straight away on dry roadway surfaces. Thus far, we are extremely pleased with the Cooper tire, and so is my friend who handles the line (among others). Just my subjective $.02.

Bookitty

jcmdie

Please don't get me wrong. I have Goodyear tires on now and have no problem whatsoever with them. My cocern stems from reading posts about other people's experiences with out of round tires. I have 35,000 miles on now and probably will chgange out around 40,000 as I want new rubber on in the fall.

spike50

Just bought a 2000 Dakota Quad with the Tire / Handling package. That means I have 31x10.5R-15 RT/S Goodyears. In the past, I purchased a new 1973 Volvo that came with Goodyears. They couldn't pass inspection by 20K miles. Went with Michelin XZX and these lasted forever. In 1985, I purchased another new Volvo which came with Dunlops. These were worse. Not only did they wear out quickly, they also hydroplaned at anything above 50 mph. In 1992, I purchased a new Caravan SE, and at less than 35K the tires had to come off. With the Volvo and Caravan, I was buying Generals and these were OK.

Usually my cars last 12 years or 130K miles before the rust finally kills them. I'm also rotating the tires according to conventional wisdom.

Like I said earlier, the truck has the Goodyear RT/S. I'll see how long these last but if I could choose, I'd pick something other than Goodyear. Thinking about Yokahomas for the truck but we'll see.

cdean

Well, we've never had any luck with any Goodyears we ever run in heavy hauling/heavy off roading situations. Tires literally blew out when loaded down for long periods (yes, within load limits). Noticed on every set of Goodyears, they were dry cracking after year and a half, and wearing much faster. Performance never impressed us. depsite my extreme dislike for Goodyears, I do know folks who use on their personal vehicles that liked Goodyears, but they honestly never put their trucks thru the wringers like we did.

Michelins we ran were average. held loads, resisted puncture as expected. Average life, average performance.

Bridgestones gave us best performance. we were going thru about a tire per month per truck with Goodyears, and Bridgestones usually lasted to 40K mile +. Fabulous heavy duty tires, like on the 3500HD GM trucks (19.5"). Have seen those tires go 100K under 14,000lb constant load.

Personal use, I bought the Bridgestone APT from Sears for a good price on my last truck. comparable tread to the Wrangler. Excellent tire, lasted 55K, probably longer (sold the truck). great performance on/off road, rain, snow, slick boat ramps. i was very impressed i got such a great tire for $90.

just bought Firestone Steel Tex 10 ply's for my new one ton. not crazy about most Firestones (treads), but i bought a $140 tire for $95 a piece (slightly used, still had little rubber knobs on 'em). So we shall see how they do. So far, mostly highway, done very well in heavy rain conditions. we shall see.

mgdvhman

everytime you hit re-fresh..it re-posts..

Don't blame a computer for your actions!

LOL

- Tim

spike50

I think that I'm the only one apologizing about multiple-posts. Just reinstalled IE-5 and that has cleared up the problem. In past when I would hit post button only half of the screen would display then there would bits and pieces of machine code displayed all over the place. Real mess, never knew if it posted and there was never any "buttons" to get back to "Placemarks" or to "Logout". I'd hit "Refresh" as you stated and then there might be a blank screen and it stated it was "Done". Only had this problem in Edmunds but no other sites. Really was the computer.

Anyway, it looks like it fixed. I'll be able to keep it down now.

mgdvhman

IE5 here for me....so I use Netscape...

I don't like Bill's Ideas...

- Tim

andy_jordan

Bridgestone or BF Goodrich give the best all round performance. Someone mentioned Cooper earlier on, I believe that they are owned by Goodyear, but I may be wrong. I know a few people who claim that they are good, but I can't say that I have ever used them.

Love Pirelli for performance applications, but I don't even know if they are in the market for truck applications.

All that said, I have Goodyear's on my current truck because that is what was on it and I won't replace until I have to, I just won't be putting Goodyear rubber back on.

spike50

Been on a lot of the tire company sites and there are many "street" truck tires available. The southwestern USA truck (2WD) owners really have a lot of choices. "AT" types seem more limited but most companies have one. And at the other end you have the "extreme conditions" stuff from Mikey Thompson, etc.

Want to try out my "came with the truck" Goodyear RT/S's in the snow before I banish them but like I said earlier, I never had a Goodyear that made it to 30K.

stevek

I had very good luck with the Michelin LTX series tires, good highway tire, works well in the snow and thread life is about 45K+ on a 5400lbs K1500.

jcmdie

The goodyears that I have on now have 35,000 miles and can easily get to 40,000. I tend to lean toward the Michelin 6 ply LTX AT tires. The Goodyears are 4 ply and I believe 1 load rating lower.

superjim2000

Michelins have been great on my truck, granted its a 99 S10 but I've put 15,000 on em and you cant tell them from new, they handle great and I got em from Discount tire so they rotate and balance em every 5K for free. My .02 cents.

meredith

After 30 or more days of inactivity....

this topic is being "frozen." it will be archived or deleted in the next 10 days or so.

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