First of all sorry guys for starting yet another tyre thread but I did a search and could not find what I wanted to know.

Basically on the way home from a friends last night in my vRS I had to swerve quite sharply to miss some idiot cat that decided to take a walk across the road. Managed to miss the cat but upon swerving heard that classic hissing sound coming from one of the tyres.

Pulled over to find out it was the front drivers side one that had gone and proceeded to spend the next 30 minutes swapping it with the spare. (20 minutes spent trying to get those b***dy black caps off and bending my house key in the process)

Job done, and just as it started to rain, glad I didn’t leave 10 minutes later!

Anyway when i got home i decided to inspect the tyre for damage and found a rip in the sidewall about half way down and about half an inch in length.

Now my first question is would it be possible / worth getting this tyre repaired (bearing in mind that both front tyres have around 3-4mm left on them)

My second question is (and this has just occurred to me) the spare wheel has a brand new tyre on it the same as what I currently have on the fronts (Continental SportContact 2) so i was thinking it might be a good idea to buy the same tyre to replace the punctured one and then get the garage to swap the good tire with the new one off the spare (basically meaning i will have two brand new tires on the front)

I have heard that the continentals are not that good a tire but is it really that good an idea to have two different makes of tire fitted to the front at the same time?

If I was changing them because the tread was running low then i would just get something like f1's fitted but it seems a real shame to waste that brand new tyre on the spare especially as im a bit strapped for cash at the moment!

Anyway sorry for the long thread but any help would be greatly appreciated

Over to you guys

A ripped wall means it's fubar'd mate I'm afraid.

A Conti SC2 would be around £65 from Camskill (+P&P / +fitting). Nankang, Federal or Khumo would be IRO £40 (+P&P / +fitting) each.

I've just fitted 18's to the missuses Octy and the tyres they came with are a very cheap brand, but after a couple of weeks punishing them hard (and I do mean hard) on Cornish backroads I am mightily impressed with them in both wet and dry. They came from Motorsport Wheels but I can't recall the brand. I'll check them when I get in later this morning, but the alloy package with Nankangs would have been £20/wheel more, so a very cheap but good bit of rubber IMHO.

Sorry, but there is no way they will repair a tyre witha damaged sidewall. If if it was possible to repair a 1/2" gash, which I doubt, it's illegal to repair a tyre anywhere but in the centre of the tread.

If the tyrewall ripped and you'rre absolutely, 100% certain, didn't hit anything ie a kerb then I would contact the manufacturer or the place you got them from for a replacement tyre. There is no way that should happen in normal use. And normal use does include sharp maneouvres to avoid things in the road. What brand of tyres are the fronts? I don't suppose you have pictures?

Continental Sport Contact II's are one of the better tyres out there and certainly one of the more expensive. I doubt many tyre places will remove a tyre from a rim and put it on another wheel. Something in the back of my mind says they may not be allowed to do it anymore. It's certainly not good practise. You could almost cerainly bet two new Falkens for the price of a Continental Sport Contact II.

And where were you sitting when you heard this hissing noise?

A Conti SC2 would be around £65 from Camskill (+P&P / +fitting).

I can't find Continental listed on Camskill in a 205/45/16 W 83 but the cheapest I can find them is £83 delivered on Blackcircles.com or £95 fitted on Kwik-fit.

I haven't tried Nankang, but Falken is the budget brand of Sumitomo (Dunlop and Firestone are they high and mid-range brands) and they are pretty decent budget tyres, and they're roughly £55 each fitted.

you could always try ebay new or part worn depending on how tight the pennies are

205/45-16 TOYO T1R 87W XL 2054516 205 45 16 205 45Z16 on eBay, also, Tyres, Car Wheels, Tyres Trims, Cars, Parts Vehicles (end time 28-Jun-09 20:00:00 BST)

For future reference, in the toolkit that sits in the spare wheel well there is a small U shaped plastic clip whose purpose is to assist you getting the plastic caps off effortlessly.

Just had a look at the tyres on the Octy and they are ATR Sport Achilles...

Test reports for all-season tyres Achilles - ATR Sport

Call UK Distributors BBS Alloy Wheels Fox Racing RS OZ Toyo Tyres for their best price and to locate the nearest outlet if interested. After two weeks driving with them on the Octy in both dry and wet, and through some very high speed country lane driving as well as long motorway runs, I much prefer them to the Nankangs I have on my Fabia. Driving home in the wet with those I was scrabbling for traction all over the place, and Nankangs are supposedly well regarded as a cheap tyre.

For future reference, in the toolkit that sits in the spare wheel well there is a small U shaped plastic clip whose purpose is to assist you getting the plastic caps off effortlessly.

In the foreground (sorry about the little pic, all I could Google).

I've got a brand new Cont 2 spare tyre if your interested. Never been used.

Thanks for the advice guys

Yeah I didn't think it would be possible to repair it but I thought I may as well ask.

I definitely didn’t hit a curb or anything else, was in the middle of the white lines after I had swerved. Thought I had picked up a nail or something so was quite shocked when i discovered it was the sidewall that had split!

I had a look for the tool to remove the caps but it was no where to be seen, knew the should be one in there because my dad has the same sort of thing for his 307

Wouldn’t have thought there would be a problem swapping them around, what if you wanted the tire removed for a refurb or something and then went somewhere else and had tires fitted to different wheels? At least that’s my reasoning

My next question is then is it really a big deal running the spare wheel for any amount of time? I only ask because I have tickets for alton towers Thursday so if i order tires online i doubt i will be able to get it sorted by then. Doesn’t seem like it should be a problem even though it has MAX 50mph plastered all over it as it as a full size spare. Really doesn’t make sense to me!

TokyoPhill you have a PM

Edited 15 June, 200917 yr by VRS_1989
Spell check!

Just had a look at the tyres on the Octy and they are ATR Sport Achilles...

Hmm, perhaps not the best name in the world, considering...

Just don't drive over any stray arrows

There is no reason why there should be a 50mph sticker on a full-size spare, even if it's on a steel rather than a 5th alloy.

Maybe it's because the tyre is different to the other three on the car, the weight of the wheel is different etc.

I agree though and travelled full speed happily on the spare wheel when I was using it. I was almost tempted to buy 3 other ones and have a steel "winter wheel" set...

By "full size" I meant same size and speed rating on same size and offset rim.

Yep, I know - and agree with you - I was just giving possible explanations - when I said the tyre was different I meant different tread pattern, softness and flexibility etc .

Chris (cjb) asked a similar question ages ago and got the following responses: http://briskoda.net/fabia-i/vrs-spare-tyre-spacesaver/68392/

I think the discussion there about directionality is probably right; I'd go to some lengths to avoid getting a directional for a spare though.

I run my car on what is effectively 4 spares. As I'm a driving instructor, alloys are out of the question. The day I bought the car the vRS alloys came off and went in the cellar, only to be used by me on trackdays, and thus are still in pristine condition. I replaced them with 4x Mk4 Golf 16" steelies which cost me £20 from a scrapper, retaining the same tyre width, profile, size and thus gearing and handling. 10 minutes into the first lesson my actions were fully justified and have been so, several times a day since. The steel spare provided in the vRS boot is the same wheel, but as it has not been type approved for use on that vehicle they cover their legal @$$es with the warning stickers. vRS alloys often come up for sale on here so it's quite easy and cheap to get a proper wheel as a spare, and even a few extra just in case

yeah i`v been using a spare for ages now, damn snow! Also, its fine to swap tyres from one wheel to the other, never had any problems or issues with that

A ripped wall means it's fubar'd mate I'm afraid.

A Conti SC2 would be around £65 from Camskill (+P&P / +fitting). Nankang, Federal or Khumo would be IRO £40 (+P&P / +fitting) each.

I've just fitted 18's to the missuses Octy and the tyres they came with are a very cheap brand, but after a couple of weeks punishing them hard (and I do mean hard) on Cornish backroads I am mightily impressed with them in both wet and dry. They came from Motorsport Wheels but I can't recall the brand. I'll check them when I get in later this morning, but the alloy package with Nankangs would have been £20/wheel more, so a very cheap but good bit of rubber IMHO.

Hello,

Why are you pushing hard on my Cornish back-roads, with your lovely spouse's car, ( should be ashamed) haven't they got any back-roads in Yorkshire. ?? LOL

Ian. 16/06/2009

Hello,

Why are you pushing hard on my Cornish back-roads, with your lovely spouse's car, ( should be ashamed) haven't they got any back-roads in Yorkshire. ?? LOL

Ian. 16/06/2009

We have plenty of loverly back roads in Yorkshire, but I like a change every now and then

I took the 50mph sticker off my spare wheel because you could get stopped for speeding. The wheel is the same as the spare in the octy vrs which runs on 17 inch wheels so when you change a wheel and put an odd size on the car you should stick to 50mph.

I run Toyos on mine which are wearing well and seem to grip well.

Lots of interesting test stuff on tyres here. The problem with people like us subjectively recommending tyres is that we're rubbish at judging what's good, bad etc. Proper tyres tests with measurements etc. tend to make uncomfortable reading.

To save anyone reading - Michelin Premacy HP last longest and save the most diesel, Continental Sport Contact 2 are the best compromise tyres, Kumho:eek: are the quietest and Vredestein are what you want in a monsoon.

Toyo Proxes T1R's braked well in the wet, but were indifferent in the dry, pretty middling for straight and curved aquaplaning, top 3 for wet handling but in the bottom 5 for dry handing. That's the same tyres on the same car measured on a G-meter. So maybe not so good afterall.

Why the shock at Kumho Mr wja? I've always rated Kumho tyres very highly and am very impressed thus far with the Kumho Ecsta KU31s I have on the front of the fabia at the moment, especially in wet weather.

But you're right - we are not very good at judging what's good, especially as most of us have only ever sampled a small selection of tyres.

I thought Eagle F1s were amazing but I have been running Kumho Ecstas recently and I think they're much better mainly due to the slightly stiffer sidewalls (or at least the tyres don't seem to feel to flex as much under hard cornering...)

With contradictory results like those between aquaplaning and wet handling and braking performance, I'm inclined to suggest that there are flaws in the test procedure.

Also, with about 1.5% difference between best and worst dry handling, does that test really matter?