HID Fan

Hello Everyone,

I'm in the process of buying replacement tires for my vehicle. Due to the fact that I live in the Midwest, I need all season tires. I recently purchased and installed the Bridgestone Potenza RE970AS Pole Position because it was rated high on Tire Rack. I'm not sure that I like these tires very much. Although the handling seems to have improved slightly, I can definitely feel more of the road imperfections. Also there seems to be more rattles inside the car since I put these on. Does anyone have a good experience with another Ultra High Performance All Season Tire? Has anyone had an experience with Continental ExtremeContact DWS or Michelin Pilot Sport A/S Plus or Pirelli PZero Nero All Season? I'm replacing the OE tires that came with car which are the Dunlop SP Sport 5000 M. The tire size is 225/45/ 17. Any opinions would be greatly appreciated.

Kurtz

iTrader: (1)

The DWS is probably the best all season out there right now.

That said, I'd still encourage you to avoid all season tires.

if you live someplace it snows for a porition of the year then run snow tires during that part of the year, and summer tires the rest of it. You'll get significantly better performance, handling, and most importantly shorter braking distances, year round as compared to the compromise tires that are 2nd or 3rd best at anything they do versus dedicated season tires.

laobo979

iTrader: (5)

Im have to disagree with you on that Kurt DSW suck. They bubble up on the side walls very easily. Read some review. Had them on my girl car and at 5k two started to bubble up on the side wall. Tires only lasted 1yrs 1/2 before the inspection station said there no longer good to pass.

Kurtz

iTrader: (1)

Sounds like you got a defective set then.

Read the reviews indeed, they're highly rated.... 8.53 out of 10 on average with nearly 2000 reviews.

http://www.tirerack.com/survey/Surve...%3D245WR7ECDWS

They are easily the highest rated tire in their category with at least 1 million miles of survey data.... (in fact they're #2 among all tires in the category and that's with customer reviews with over 13 million miles of driving... the #1 tire, the RE970AS, only has about 300k miles of surveys)

http://www.tirerack.com/tires/survey...jsp?type=UHPAS

And I personally know an SC300 that's had em on for about 20k miles so far with no issues.

laobo979

iTrader: (5)

Yeah kurt i read the review on tiretrack when i bought them.That why i end up getting it for here car. But to get 1 1/2yr over the stock dunlop that got 45k which had a less tread wear. That just didnt make these tire worth what they said they were. Plus there are more and more of the bubble issues popping up now online. I can only talk from what i see with these.

HID Fan

I also read some of those reviews about the bubbling, that's a reason I initially didn't go with the Continentals, however, some people really like them. Kurtz did you experience any loss in performance when cornering or instability due to the softer side walls?

Kurtz

iTrader: (1)

they're not on my car (as I said, I'd never use any all-season, they'll always perform 2nd or 3rd best compared to snow or summer tires depending on the weather).... but I have driven then SC in question with them a decent bit...and, for all seasons, they seemed quite good and I had no problem with handling. "softer sidewalls" is sometimes a 'feel" complaint rather than an actual performance complaint though... and since it wasn't my car I wasn't exactly autocrossing with it either, just some mildly spirited driving on public roads.

And as I said, they've had no "bubbling" issues... I haven't seen/looked at any reports of that in any detail, but it's possible they're all from one bad batch/shipment, certainly wouldn't be the first time that happened with someones tires... and continental has a pretty decent warranty on the DWS AFAIK.

HID Fan

Thanks guys for posting your experience with these tires. I really appreciate. Does anyone else have an opinion on the matter?

nitrotang

iTrader: (2)

I just got a new set of DWS on mine after riding on BFG's before. The Continental's are noticeably quieter than the BFG's and the stock Potenza's for that matter. Never had experience with Michelin on my IS, but you definitely can't go wrong with Michelin. I think they're probably one of the best tire manufacturers out there.

mrraider

Just got a set of general gmax as03 tires. Highly rated on tirerack, reasonably priced, and they have a mail in rebate going.

I should mention that I don't care about winter and snow traction.

jimtur

iTrader: (1)

I got today my new Hankook V12 on 225-45R17 size, I will lte you know if seem great like other member said!.

kuuqi

Hankook V12's are summer tires so it won't work at all during snow.

With that being said, I switched from the stock Dunlop SP 5000? Whatever it was to Bridgestone RE960AS's (which I believe they now have the RE970AS).

Better ride, stiffer sidewall, better handling, longer lasting (so far). Also I had a bubbling issue with SP 5000's but I haven't had a single problem with the Bridgestones thus far.

Kurtz

iTrader: (1)

Right- that's when you'd want dedicated snow tires.

Thus do you get significantly better performance, handling, and safety 100% of the year, rather than the 2nd or 3rd best (often with 30-40% longer stopping distances) that all-seasons give you 100% of the year.

HID Fan

Thanks to everyone that posted. I appreciate your input. I think I'm going to try the Continentals and see how it goes. Wish me luck.

kwbuggy