Recommended tires when replacing original ones?

[LeftieBiker]

In between pricey high end tires and "SUMITOMO" (I hope they are Korean and not Chinese) there is a big realm of good, reasonably priced tires. Actually, the retail (not OEM) version of the Ecopia might be what you want.

 

[sdcoffeeroaster]

The time has come to replace the original 17" Michelin tires on my 2015 Leaf SV. Originals lasted 24k :x. I had the mechanic install a set of SUMITOMO (not sure of model) for a great price. He laughed when I mentioned LRR tires and said he had never heard of such. So I went with the suggested tires and now this week on my normal 17 mile (1 way) trip to work I have noticed my range is left at 74 miles where as the stock tires left me with 84 miles!!! A 10 mile range decrease each way is a significant decrease in range! I am increasing the inflation from 36 psi to 42 psi and see what happens. I still have a narrow window that I can exchange the tires and pay the BIG difference for some other tire (maybe the Continental Pure Contact) but just wondering if anyone has gone down this road.

2/16/17 After inflating to 42 psi I only gained 4 miles on the remaining range once I got to the office. It read 78 miles and 80% of charge!

I just bought my first leaf, a 2013 SL with about 23,500 miles. The tires are only about half worn and I believe the car was really babied for it's 3 year lease. The tire wear, interior scratch free and exterior ding free leads me to believe this car had a caring home. It's old home was Sunnyvale, CA and now it's in San Diego. But I am interested in which 17" tires you bought that negatively affected the mileage. I'm sure around town the 17" tire/wheel combo affects the mileage over the 15" or even the 16". I tried 17" Scion take-offs in an effort to "fix" my Prius ill handling many years ago. It helped but it also dropped the mileage by at least 10%. So which model of Sumitomo did you try. I tried many different ones with the Prius and Michelin tires handled the best but hurt economy by about 5% or so.

 

[andyson]

Have the Michelin Premeir A/S and I'm pretty satisfied with them. Good traction and handling.

 

[RustyShackleford]

Our 2018 Leaf has Michelin Energy Saver A/S. I do not like them. The front have worn out tread at 29K miles (perhaps previous owner didn't rotate properly). Also, I do not like the handling - perhaps this simply isn't as good handling a car (as our Outback) but that's hard to believe considering how much lower it is (although the Subaru has AWD). TireRack recommended the Continental PureContact LS and they certainly seem to compare VERY favourably against the Michelins (on every category including price, very dramatically so on some of them, such as "would you recommend" and "wet performance").

Any opinions here on the Continentals ?

 

[alozzy]

I just bought Nokian Hakkapeliitta R3s, which are by far the best winter tires I have ever owned. They are supposed to be LRRs, but I don't know yet how much they have affected my range.

I do know that when I floor the accelerator in the pouring rain, the R3s are impossible to spin. I had to be super light on the accelerator with the Ecopia Plus tires, as they spin super easy and pretty much suck in the rain for stopping distance (to the point of being dangerous).

In short, I'm very pleased with the R3s and highly recommend them.

 

[GerryAZ]

Our 2018 Leaf has Michelin Energy Saver A/S. I do not like them. The front have worn out tread at 29K miles (perhaps previous owner didn't rotate properly). Also, I do not like the handling - perhaps this simply isn't as good handling a car (as our Outback) but that's hard to believe considering how much lower it is (although the Subaru has AWD). TireRack recommended the Continental PureContact LS and they certainly seem to compare VERY favourably against the Michelins (on every category including price, very dramatically so on some of them, such as "would you recommend" and "wet performance").

Any opinions here on the Continentals ?

I had a set of Continentals on the 2015 a few years ago (all season sport performance, but don't remember the model name). They were far superior to the Michelins in every way (except rolling resistance was much higher). Since both 2015 and 2019 came with Michelin Energy Saver A/S, I have enough experience with them to say they are the worst passenger car radial tires I have owned.