I've had an MOT done last week and was told my offside front tyre needed replacing for £150 to pass the MOT. I told them to replace the tyre but now i've noticed that the tyre they fitted is not the same brand as the other! Should the garage not have put both my rear wheels on the front and front on the rear? I was told it's ilegal to have 2 different brands of tyres on the front due to one having more grip than the other and one has different tread? I was going to bring the car back and ask the garage to fit the front on the rear. What should I do?

As long as the tyres are the same size on any one axle, it's fine. They don't have to be the same brand or the same condition.

Ideally they should put the new tyres on the rear (generally speaking you want your better gripping tyres on the rear, especially on FWD cars) but it's not a requirement, so they haven't done anything wrong by not doing this.

Perhaps not, but I wouldnt be happy at 2 odd tyres.

It's preferable to change tyres in pairs, but I accept this is not always practical. If your other front is under say 3mm then personally I would have this changed to match the new one.

I was told the only thing that matters was the specification being the same. I've got one original rear tyre and one damaged one replaced with a dirt cheap Sunny, and I can't tell the slightest difference! Mind you I don't drive like a rally entrant so I'm nowhere near the limit.

Perhaps not, but I wouldnt be happy at 2 odd tyres.

Neither would I, I'd probably just have a pair done and do the wheel rotation. All I'm saying is that they've not done anything wrong, the OP asked "should they have...." and my answer is "ideally yes but they don't have to". There's no grounds for taking it back IMO as they've done the minimum necessary to deem it worthy of an MOT test pass, it might not live up to an enthusiasts standards but they probably just don't deal with many enthusiasts and don't bother "upselling" as it's a waste of time. At £150 a tyre they probably just assumed you wouldn't want to buy a second one, as that's pretty pricy (again IMO).

Edited 21 December, 201114 yr by gac

I'd not have that on my car and would have carefully specified what I wanted.

Dangerous to have different tyres each side in my personal experience. I binned a rear tyre(India) as it cause a slide in my Mini.Kept the ZX on the other side.

Neither would I, I'd probably just have a pair done and do the wheel rotation. All I'm saying is that they've not done anything wrong, the OP asked "should they have...." and my answer is "ideally yes but they don't have to". There's no grounds for taking it back IMO as they've done the minimum necessary to deem it worthy of an MOT test pass, it might not live up to an enthusiasts standards but they probably just don't deal with many enthusiasts and don't bother "upselling" as it's a waste of time. At £150 a tyre they probably just assumed you wouldn't want to buy a second one, as that's pretty pricy (again IMO).

Pricey? :wonder: That's the cheapest tyre i've ever had on my Vrs! When my other tyre needed replacing the tyre was £200!

What brand did they fit? What brand did they replace?

What size are they? I'm assuming that they're 225/45/17s or 225/40/18s at most. 225/45/17 Toyo T1-Rs are £102 on Blackcircles, and they're rated as one of the best gripping tyres on the road (although short lifespan), Hankook Ventus V12 Evos are £105 which are also rated very highly, unfortunately another tyre I like is the Uniroyal Rainsport 2 which aren't in stock but I would imagine they're around the £105 mark as well when available. All very good tyres, well known brands (not budgets), and around two-thirds of the price you just paid so I would say the garage you went to are pricey, yes...

edit - sorry, the Rainsport 2s are in stock at that price, I just didn't see them. They're £112 a corner, and again, are often rated as one of the best wet weather tyres around. But nearly £40 each cheaper than whatever you've just had on the Octy today.

another edit - some quick Googling suggests that the Mk2 vRS is 225/40/18, so prices are:

Falken FK452 £99, Toyo T1-R £113, Hankook V12 Evo £119, Rainsport 2 £122

So not quite as much of a price difference but still £30 or so unless you go for Falkens which come in at less than £100 and are pretty good midrange tyres...

What size are they? I'm assuming that they're 225/45/17s or 225/40/18s at most. 225/45/17 Toyo T1-Rs are £102 on Blackcircles, and they're rated as one of the best gripping tyres on the road (although short lifespan), Hankook Ventus V12 Evos are £105 which are also rated very highly, unfortunately another tyre I like is the Uniroyal Rainsport 2 which aren't in stock but I would imagine they're around the £105 mark as well when available. All very good tyres, well known brands (not budgets), and around two-thirds of the price you just paid so I would say the garage you went to are pricey, yes...

edit - sorry, the Rainsport 2s are in stock at that price, I just didn't see them. They're £112 a corner, and again, are often rated as one of the best wet weather tyres around. But nearly £40 each cheaper than whatever you've just had on the Octy today.

another edit - some quick Googling suggests that the Mk2 vRS is 225/40/18, so prices are:

Falken FK452 £99, Toyo T1-R £113, Hankook V12 Evo £119, Rainsport 2 £122

So not quite as much of a price difference but still £30 or so unless you go for Falkens which come in at less than £100 and are pretty good midrange tyres...

I haven't looked at the brand of tyre but I noticed it was a different tyre when I reversed into my parking space and drove through a puddle. The wet tyre marks on the road gave it away! My tyres are the 225/40/18 I had a Michelin sport3 or something like that fitted a while ago and it was £170 for tyre and £30 fitting it! Some of the prices of these tyres are crazy in my honest opinion. Why do they sell tyres with a speed rating of 150mph? when you're never going to go that speed anyway? Those figures you mentioned above, where do you buy tyres for that price?

What brand did they fit? What brand did they replace?

I'll have a look tomorrow and let you know

Any time a car has gone in for service (main dealers included) If they say I need new tyres, I always get a price first and find out what they are fitting, I'll then check online for a price and ask them to match it -if they can get close then I'll go for it, they will negotiate.

The last time I had 2 tyres done on my Volvo at a Volvo dealership I saved £70 per tyre, for the sake of a bit of haggling.

I have driven many cars with odd tyres on over the years, never been a problem.

The only thing you cannot do is fit crossply and radial ply on the same axle. Since crossply are very rare these days you really dont have a problem.

Why do they sell tyres with a speed rating of 150mph? when you're never going to go that speed anyway? Those figures you mentioned above, where do you buy tyres for that price?

The speed rating (I believe) is not as clear cut as that. The rating of "150mph" is only for something like a 10 minute burst. So if you put it on and did 150mph for several hours then you might still have problems. Equally, if you could get such a thing as a tyre rated for 70mph (UK maximum) and you bought it, it would only be rated at that speed for 10 minutes so your first motorway journey could get a little bit interesting.

The prices in my post above are all from Blackcircles.com, where you order tyres online and they get delivered to your choice from their list of local "fitting partners", and then you just drive in and out on the day you're due. The only downside is it's not instant and you can't just drop in, but you can really save some pennies if you get round to checking your tyres a few days before an MOT rather than being had over a barrel by a garage who's got your car and pretty much won't let it go without you agreeing. You also get more choice as well, I'm going to bet that the tyre you've got fitted for £150 probably isn't comparable to something like the Rainsport that you could have had for ~£120...

Any time a car has gone in for service (main dealers included) If they say I need new tyres, I always get a price first and find out what they are fitting, I'll then check online for a price and ask them to match it -if they can get close then I'll go for it, they will negotiate.

The last time I had 2 tyres done on my Volvo at a Volvo dealership I saved £70 per tyre, for the sake of a bit of haggling.

I had a main dealer service where I was advised the rear tyre was at 3mm and that I should replace it.

The dealer was very keen to charge over a ton for a Dunlop SP1. What he had not done was look in the boot at the brand new, undriven, OEM tyre on an Alloy wheel. :wonder:

I am very careful of "upselling" when dealers "find" stuff.

On the other hand, I once ignored an independent garage who gave me a heads up on my starter motor. Week later it failed and left me at the side of the road.

I once had a car which went for a VW dealer service, and I got a written workshop sheet saying that both my tyres were at 3mm but would be fine for a while. A week to the day later, one of them was so worn that the cords were showing and as soon as I parked up at home, deflated itself. I've tried not to use main dealers since