Which Tyres?

[VectraMan]

But if you are keeping to Highway Code Stopping distances they would all be ok. Its only if you want to cut your own safety distance that you might be in trouble.

Those stopping distances probably go back to the 60s or something ridiculous. Any modern car with decent tyres should beat it by quite a long way. Worse than cheapo tyres are eco-tyres. They've been designed to have less grip, and so to "save money".

[bobspud]

Except you also need to be able to stop if a prat pulls out without looking or dog/cat/tiger/donkey/child walks out in front. In any of those cases, having bought el cheapo Chinese tyres to save a few quid and therefore not being able to stop (albeit not your fault someone else did something stupid) might be painful.

EDIT - BTW not suggesting your Vredesteins were what I'd call "hedgefinders" but the cheapo ones are dangerous. I tested this theory one by buying a car with brand new "Chongdonkey" (can't remember the actual name) tyres on the front. After a couple of months I concluded they were dangerous and got some Michelins fitted.

The reason I started using the Vreds was MB started using them on the S-Class for a while and I stuck them on my R129 SL at the time and liked them. Then used them on a subsequent Audi TT and then my Saab. I would say they are fairly expensive considering they were £180 each for 17/225/45 at the time.

I moved to these as a stop gap and ended up running two sets of them and covering over 50k

N6000 | Ultra High Performance Directional Summer | Nexen Tire

They would be considered Hedge finders in terms of price but more than matched the Vreds for what I do.

[eek]

Bollocks

From Autocar -

The magazine tested wet handling and braking, dry handling and braking and aquaplaning, plus a high-speed test at the Contidrom test centre in Hannover. Senior tester Jamie Corstorphine summed up with: We expected the bargain tyres in this test to fall short of the Continental, but we were not prepared for just how poorly some performed.

The results are shocking. To get the full test results you'll need to buy autocar this month, but the results from the wet braking speak for themselves:

Continental: 31.7 metres
Nankang: 33.8 metres
GT Radial: 35.8 metres
Wanli, Triangle and Linglongs: 40.2 metres

+1 my new car handles like tulip in the wet. It has continentals on the rear but newish acceleras on the front.

They are going early next week and I'm putting on Falken ZE914's as that's what I had on the mini.. Would go continentals on the front but the Falkens are almost a 2 for 1 deal....

The thing is that tyres are expensive risks.... so I'll stick to what worked last time....

[northernladuk]

Except you also need to be able to stop if a prat pulls out without looking or dog/cat/tiger/donkey/child walks out in front. In any of those cases, having bought el cheapo Chinese tyres to save a few quid and therefore not being able to stop (albeit not your fault someone else did something stupid) might be painful.

EDIT - BTW not suggesting your Vredesteins were what I'd call "hedgefinders" but the cheapo ones are dangerous. I tested this theory one by buying a car with brand new "Chongdonkey" (can't remember the actual name) tyres on the front. After a couple of months I concluded they were dangerous and got some Michelins fitted.

To be for most people improving their driving style would be a much better benefit to them than expensive tyres. The advanced courses teach you to be more aware of dangers like this than your standard test. Just learning to look at the driver and not the the car in most instances has saved me a number of accidents, particularly on the motorbike. A seemingly insignificant act but a real life saver.

[Peoplesoft bloke]

To be for most people improving their driving style would be a much better benefit to them than expensive tyres. The advanced courses teach you to be more aware of dangers like this than your standard test. Just learning to look at the driver and not the the car in most instances has saved me a number of accidents, particularly on the motorbike. A seemingly insignificant act but a real life saver.

Totally agree, but-

1)If someone's too cheap to buy decent tyres are they really going to pay for training?
2)You can't predict or anticipate everything - for that eventuality, the better tyres, brakes etc you have, the better likely outcome.
3)If you had the good tyres and good training, it would surely be better than the good driver/crap tyres version?