How bad are budget tyres?

[Phil-E]

I had Kenda Kaiser tyres on my car when I bought it... rubbish!

 

 

[Ootohere]

I forgot i had used Toledo Blue Snow tyres a few winters back. 

'German Technology',   Under £40 fitted, Much Cheapness 'Budget Snow Tyres' . They do exactly what the are supposed to do, keep the shiny side up.

(Good as a gravel tyre and also gave grip on the 1/4 mile strip.)

[Breezy_Pete]

Have you tried the Yellow Snow?

[Ootohere]

Just as an indicator, p!ss to see what way is down hill in a white out, just as long as there in wind blowing in your direction.

Or use it to make someone elses brew up.

Edited 6 September, 2018 by Offski

[camelspyyder]

On 03/09/2018 at 20:28, labman1001 said:

There are budget tyres then are cheap tyres .... Barum are a good quality budget tyre which I used for years on my old Citroens with no problems at all.. I'm currently running Rovello on the front of my Octavia as the Barums in my size, 225/45/17, have fairly jumped in price to make them more of a midrange tyre price...

 

I bought a C5 with new budget tyres... "Triangle" .. Fitted to the rear and even a mildly damp road surface had the break away on a roundabout and that was from a standing start... Replaced with Barums after a week and no issues at all... I was convinced by a local tyre place a few years back to fit "Westlake" and I didn't get 2 miles up the road before going back and having them pulled off as they where leathal with no grip whatsoever and that was in the dry in the height of summer... 

 

Not to doubt your Westlake story at all (I believe they are rubbish), but brand new tyres don't grip that well until run in. 

 

My neighbour just dropped his Fireblade outside my house at 5 mph, when his brand new rear tyre spun up. Luckily the Audi S5 that's normally parked where he ended up wasn't there at the time.

[Ootohere]

Somepeople might wonder why some tyre fitters / motorsport tyre fitters leave the labels on tyres and send a car out.

 

Maybe it is because the piece of paper & sticky back has more grip than the Green / Unscrubbed new tyres.

[labman1001]

Hi Camelspyyder..... When I say the Westlakes had no grip I seriously mean no grip.... There was no wheel spin taking off, that was fine, but when you go to go around a roundabout and turn the steering wheel left yet the car continues to go straight on that's the lack of grip I mean and no it wasn't an oily or greasy road ..... It was the height of summer on a bone dry road and I'd never experienced in my life other than when I'd once hit a patch of black ice.

[Phil-E]

My winter rubber are "budget" tyres. They are "Kleber" (German for glue) branded but have just scored 4th place in the ADAC winter tyre test 2018 so I'm happy with that.

[Ootohere]

Kleber a company owned by the Michelin Corporation along with BF Goodrich & TIGRA Tyres.

& Riken, Komoran & Uniroyal,  so they have all the bases covered from what might be Premium to Budget.

Edited 26 September, 2018 by Offski

[Babs]

Tigar are just awful tyres!

Edited 27 September, 2018 by Babs

[Guest]

19 hours ago, Babs said:

Tigar are just awful tyres!

Try Laufenn, I believe they are the same as 'last years' Hankooks which are v good - certainly owned by Hankook!

[Ootohere]

Babs,

what cars did you use the Tigar tyres on and which Tigar Tyres.

 

I used them in winter on 200ps + Automatics in Winter were snow and ice can be around for days and weeks. 

I could have used anything else and have done but the TIGAR Tyres did the job and survive potholes rather well.

[Russ77]

In September 2000, I took ownership of a brand new 1.8 Focus Estate, certainly not the quickest car in the World but at the time, only the 2nd car I'd owned and certainly quicker & better better handling than the 1.4 Astra it was replacing.

 

When the OEM tyres needed replacing, I went for literally THE cheapest tyres I could find, I mean they couldn't be that bad could they?  £37 per corner (195/60/15) as opposed to around £50 for well known mid-range tyres?

 

Well in the dry they were great, the car still handled really well, in the wet.... hmmmm, not as good as the tyres they'd replaced but I'll take the hit as they were cheap.  A slightly damp road?  It was like trying to drive on ice, if you accelerated hard you could get wheelspin changing up in the 2nd and 3rd gear (bear in mind this was a 115bhp petrol with very little torque).

 

Add to that after around 11K miles the fronts were worn to the TWI and I also got a nail through one of the rears which was practically on the shoulder.  I replaced all 4 with BF Goodrich tyres at £50 each, the fronts lasted around 20K miles..........  Putting the obvious safety issues aside, which was the cheaper tyre?

 

I do laugh when I hear "but I don't drive fast" of "I never go very far" but even at 30mph popping down the shops to get your newspaper, if you need to brake hard & maneuver to avoid something you could be struggling, especially in the wet!

I've used a variety of brands over the years, Avon, Uniroyal, Hankook, Falken etc, all perfectly reasonable tyres costing between £60 - £90 each, wear on my last focus (2.0 TDCi) was my biggest bug bear as I was only getting 11K-12K out of them.

 

I've put Michelin CrossClimate+ on my Octavia, worked out around £90 per corner (I figured I'd paid a lot of money for a nice car so I want it to be as safe as possible) but I think I can say they're the best tyre I've ever driven on (so far).

 

Whilst not massively more expensive than the mid-range tyres, they're still a lot cheaper than some of the more premium options available and they seem to be wearing very well too. 

[Babs]

5 hours ago, john2017 said:

Try Laufenn, I believe they are the same as 'last years' Hankooks which are v good - certainly owned by Hankook!

 

Luckily I've no intention of ever going below a Falken or Khumo!

[Babs]

5 hours ago, Offski said:

Babs,

what cars did you use the Tigar tyres on and which Tigar Tyres.

 

I used them in winter on 200ps + Automatics in Winter were snow and ice can be around for days and weeks. 

I could have used anything else and have done but the TIGAR Tyres did the job and survive potholes rather well.

 

 

 

 

No idea what the tyres were, but it was on a Mk4 Golf. They were worse than the Federals I had on an Audi A4 previously that almost killed me on a dry roundabout.

[Stuart-h]

On ‎03‎/‎09‎/‎2018 at 21:14, Phil-E said:

I had Kenda Kaiser tyres on my car when I bought it... rubbish!

 

 

Had the same fitted on mine when I got it. Had them on a week and soon changed them for a set of Dunlops!

[Ootohere]

 

 

[Babs]

Same tread pattern doesn't mean it's the same carcass, or rubber, though.

[Ootohere]

Indeed,

but then no point condemning tyres or brands if you have no idea which actual tyres were on the car.

 

Sadly the TIGAR i like & have used different versions of before were not available last week so i got AVON's instead.

 

Done 1,000 miles on them in icy non salted roads and roads running like a river and pleased so far.

Budget type prices, and doing as well as ones at 50% more in price if not double that.  Tyres are consumables, but it is nice if the car stays shiny side up.

Edited 8 November, 2018 by Offski

[gregoir]

2 hours ago, Babs said:

Same tread pattern doesn't mean it's the same carcass, or rubber, though.

Exactly.

And how would we know about these so called identical tread alternative tyre brands? We recognise

the genuine tried and tested brands. The others may well be fake knock- offs.

[Ootohere]

^^^ Could be if you buy them that fell off the back of a lorry, ebay etc,

but then that could be the same with Fake / Hooky branded ones, out of dates, seconds etc if you buy tyres that way,.

If people / factories are turning out hooky tyres,.

Edited 8 November, 2018 by Offski

[logiclee]

It's Australian for amusement.

 

But I tend to agree with most of it.

 

 

 

[edbostan]

I have bought budget tyres most of my life and have never caught a cropper and they have worn reasonably well usually. I never drive on the limit and never had a high performance car. Currently i changed Hankook to Hankook on the Roomster. Those are probably the first set of mid-range tyres but only got 24k out of the front set.

Edited 15 November, 2018 by edbostan

[ChoonDoode]

Whilst at 78hp, my old Hyundai i20 wasn't the quickest car, it was still able to provide a smile on occasions.

 

I had Nexen CP461's put on when the time came for new tyres. They were a decent set of tyres, especially in the wet. The only drawback with them was the increased road noise.

 

On an Octavia VRS however, I don't think I'd be so quick to throw on a budget set of tyres. 170 more horsepower and 380 ish more newton meters of torque than the i20, so I'd want to make sure what's in contact with the road is going to keep me safe.

[KeteCantek]

I am fortunate to experience a vision zero event by Continental tyres where we get to drive around in cars shod with different tyres.

 

Summary is, a worn ( 2mm is left) set of premium tyres is worse (slightly in dry and significant in the wet) than a new set of budget tyres. This is mostly down to thread depth. 

 

End of the day, buy good tyres if you can. However, if you can't, then at least be aware of the limitations and adjust driving style to suit especially in inclement weather.