Chocolate Fireguard Tyres

[delta925]

The ride is just fine on the 16's. Slightly more at risk of kerb damage but the Bridgestones have a rim protector to help with that. I have to say though that the Bridgestones don't seem to be that great a tyre. I expected them to be better in the snow than Toyo T1-R's (famously crap in snow) but they are just as bad! They're OK in summer, though nowhere near the grip of the Toyos. Lets see how long they last, I'd be expecting 20k+ with this grip level.

Thanks for your comment that the 45 profile 16" wheels / tyres don't make the ride harsh.

Mine are around 18500 miles now and have loads of life left in them. Ive never had front tyres on a FWD car last as long, I reckon easily 25000+ miles in them.

Of course much depends on each persons journey and driving style but with FWD getting 20000 from a set of tyres is good so if these Bridgestone's still have 3.5+ mm depth after 18500 to make it to 25000 with 1.6-2mm depth they are a hard compound.

The various comments that normal tyres of any brand are not good in the snow and about driving styles are reasonable.

However if 'Fab Estates' Fabia on these Bridgestones is far worse than his Zafira on Continental Premium Contact surely the tyres must be contributory.

Depending on the model a Zafira's kerb weight is around 1400kg so it is not that much heavier than around 1200kg for the Skoda if the grip given by the extra weight is considered to outweigh actually moving the extra weight.

[Fab Estate]

Is the Zaferia Petrol, coz I will admit Petrols are far easier in ice then diesels my old fab mk11.4TDi was like glue on ice / snow.... however that said some cars can be a little more unstable in ice then others, Fiat Bravo 1.9 TDi is the worst I have had the mis pleasure to drive in ice / snow lots of slip 'n' slip etc.... but still can be driven in the ice

With respects to diesel vs petrol the answer is in the torque at the wheel... petrols have less therefore easier

regards

Timelord1.9Tdi

No it is a diesel, all my cars have been diesels for over 20 years.

[MZPRX]

With respects to diesel vs petrol the answer is in the torque at the wheel... petrols have less therefore easier

Well, depends on the diesel actually. Your observation is more or less correct for modern small capacity highly boosted diesels . Almost all of them have virtually no torque al low revs and then all that mountain of torque kicks in from 1800 rpm (or so) onwards. So, in order to move on you have to give them quite a bit of juice. The throttle is like on/off switch, you can't control the the torque precisely. It was completely different matter with the naturally aspirated larger capacity diesels in the old days. Most of the old school NA diesels were like fitted with a traction control - the torque was so smooth and linear (although much lower absolute values, but that's not the matter in this case) and I had number of cars with such engines which were pure joy on snow and ice. No petrol engine could come even close to that.

Edited 1 January, 2011 by MZPRX